debka_notion

A List:
-Pre-Purim craft: helped C make crowns for herself and for H. (Later in the day, they made one for me.)
-Purchases: Heating Pad, tampons, tissues. At least one of these was opened and used before we got them home.
-Playground: over an hour, when the child didn't want to go at all, beforehand.
-Baking: a triple recipe of hamentaschen, fit onto 4 cookie sheets, one of which burned.
-Planning/Research: stuffed bread recipes, which I'll probably take under advisement, then do my own thing.
-Dinner: pancakes (we need to grocery shop- between a trip to Toronto and the YCT dinner, the regular shop didn't happen this last Friday or weekend).
-Laundry: 4 loads, washed and hung. Tomorrow- need to fold.
-Dishes

Another List:
Things I/We Need to Accomplish This Week:
-Acquire: bags for Mishloach Manot, groceries,
-Fold Laundry
-Clean!
-Schedule Purim stuff- which Megillah readings, exact (ha, ha, ha) Seudah time, etc.
-Make SHabbos, esp. lunch
-Bake rolls for mishloach manot
-Stuff I'm forgetting

I decided to start keeping a list of kids books that we're really enjoying, so I can remember for future gifting-to-others, not to mention future library trips.

English Books
Dinosaur Kisses, by David Ezra Stein
Quiet Bunny's Many Colors, by Lisa McCue

Hebrew Books
לכי מפה מפלצת ירוקה- Ed Emberly, translated by someone else- probably great in English (or better even? But we found it in Hebrew first, and Hebrew books I can read rather than having to translate as I go are wonderful, although Haggai makes many kids books even better in his Hebrew narration than in their English original- but I may be biased).

I feel awkward resurrecting this journal just to write about a dead man, but since I didn't want to put it on my regular blog, and it is, indeed, quite personal, here it is, in case anyone reads it.

My grandmother's husband died yesterday afternoon. He'd had heart surgery last week, and first he was doing well, and they extubated him and he was awake for a little while. Then he got an infection and he wasn't breathing well on his own, and they re-intubated him (with all the concomitant sedation) and they had to put him on dialysis, and then suddenly he was brain-dead. When my father emailed me yesterday morning, they said he was dying, and would probably die within a few days. I emailed my boss about needing some time off at some point next week to go to the funeral (it'll be in his old shul in CT, where he's a past president, and where he and my grandmother were married last year, the same place that took me in so generously and warmly when I was on breaks from college). He was dead around the same time that I finished CPE for the day.

So the funeral is going to be on Sunday. It's going to be a really weird Purim. Not that Purim is one of my favorite holidays, not that I tend to feel so comfortable with your standard Purim party. We were just going to do things fairly low-key already. But going from whatever Megillah reading on to a funeral and all that goes along with it is going to be, well, one of those really sharp turn-arounds. This is (among five or fifty other reasons) why I didn't want to be a pulpit rabbi. But in your own life, you don't get to choose- things just happen. And I'll manage, and it'll be another note in our Purim associations from now on. And that'll be ok, that'll be the way it is.

But I wanted to say something about Eli, and about who he was in my life, because for all that we were never very close, he was a part of my life for longer than my grandfather was. Pop Mel died when I was 9, and he's still somehow a foundational part of my picture of who my family is. Eli was with my grandmother for something like 15 years, and married to her for the last year and a bit of that, and when I was younger and they were more frequently local, I saw him fairly often. But I don't have a lot of specific memories of him. There's the fact that every time Amie Roz sent us a card, he sent one too- separately, in a different envelope, with a separate check enclosed, because he wanted to be a part of my life too. I have a couple of books that he gave me, when he was cleaning out his library- his Encyclopedia of Jewish Concepts is on our shelves now, although I must admit that I haven't opened it in years. And years ago, when I visited them in Florida for a weekend and wanted to go to shul, he took me to morning minyan on Friday (I remember all the guys having shnaps and herring on a Friday morning at about 9am afterward), and then drove alongside me as I walked to shul on Shabbos, because he was worried. At the time, it annoyed me, because it felt so over-protective (and I was worried about his driving- he was diabetic, and his fingers were mostly numb by that point, already). But I have this image of him in my head now, pulled up on a patch of grass between the sidewalk and the road, waiting for me to catch up and pass him, and then he'd drive another couple of blocks and wait for me again. And then he sat with me at a shul that was nearly High Holidays sort of full, with a truly dull hazzan, and then we did the whole thing in reverse, going home. To quote yet another of my sci-fi favorites, "let that memory lighten grief".

So we tried to book Greyhound tickets last week, for a short trip we're taking on Thursday, to go to Baltimore, to a wedding (a family friend of H's family). Everything was set- and then their website was messed up and wouldn't register my credit card. So we waited, wrote to customer service, and got a useless answer. I would have called, but it was going to be a 30+ minute wait to talk to someone, and I just didn't have the time...

Sunday, I looked at the different bus options, found that Bolt bus was now cheaper than Greyhound (as we could no longer get the advance sale price), and went with that. More expensive than we would have managed before, but still cheaper than the now-available Greyhound prices, and leaving at a good time for us.

Today, I got an email from Bolt Bus saying that there was some trouble, and they had rescheduled us- sorry for the inconvenience. Sadly, they rescheduled us to arrive 15 minutes before the wedding starts- if nothing goes wrong, no traffic, no road work, nothing at all. And then there's a cab ride to get to where the wedding is, and we'll need to change- and this just isn't going to work at all.

So I wrote them, asking for an earlier, rather than a later bus. But if they push us too far earlier, we'll have to miss the whole day of yeshiva, rather than just the afternoon- and that's not good for H, who's getting a stipend for doing this. But I really Don't want to have to pay even more.

1. This is a gratitude- our new building is really a delight in its management. We were having an issue with our shower drain, and today Haggai called the super. He told H that had to get the key from the landlord, who wasn't in today, and so was going to come tomorrow to do it. However, we got home, and the drain had been replaced. After the absurdity of our old apartment, this is a beautiful change.

2. We finally got around to getting our ketubah framed. The framer put in a different, nicer mat with it than we'd picked, because it went better- and didn't charge us for the snazzier mat. Also, it looks beautiful. We're looking forward to hanging it.

3. I'm having a chance to learn some really interesting material with some really skilled chevrutas, this summer.

4. We've been able to host two different friends for a night or two each in the last week- it's been fun to see them, to have people test out our guest bed/futon, and really "warm up" our new apartment.

5. We're off to a weekend of family, friends and a wedding in Boston, starting tomorrow afternoon. Should be a nice time.

I'd left a comment on a blog that I've been reading, a while ago. It turns out- as I found out on shabbos- that the author is in fact someone I go to shul with. That was pretty cool, but it gets better. She was really grateful for the comment I left- it was something really useful for her. Pretty nifty.

Also- there's a woman in this summer program that we're doing who'd been at another such program with me 4 or 5 summers ago. We remembered each other, and not only that, she'd been inspired by my headband/scarf practice at the time to do the same. It made me pretty excited.

We're at my folks' house, about to go pick up a UHaul and drive back to NYC with assorted furniture (table, chairs, dresser, a bookcase, and assorted odds and ends). The move is progressing, although there is still a significant quantity of assorted Stuff at the old apartment- it's hitting that "well, we've done the bulk, but there's so much random junk to move still- it's overwhelming" stage of the move. I think once we have this furniture in, and the new place starts to take shape, it'll start feeling better.

Still- bonuses of coming out here, in terms of stuff (on top of the bonuses of seeing my parents, and having a lovely break-fast of hot-and-cold salad and stuffed grape leaves with them)- 1. a small sewing machine, which previously belonged to my aunt's mother (now I just need to learn how to use it!), 2. a decorative item that my parents had on their walls for years, that is quite attractive, and some very nice curtain rods. 3. a mirror I'd forgotten that I owned, and 4. a standing clothes hanger/rod of the right height for shirts, etc. This should allow us to fit more long things in the closets, without pushing all of H's shirts and jackets to the far side of the apartment.

Item MIA: a pair of curtains my folks got me for my JTS dorm room, which I'd been hoping to hang in our living room. We'll see if/when they turn up. Either they'll turn up here, or it will turn out that they're somewhere in our current apartment, I imagine- but we'll see... They may not turn up until too late.

1. Hooping is starting to pay off- we were doing crunches and such, last night, and I could do far more than I used to be able to, and then I did a plank for a minute, and probably could have gone a bit longer- last summer, I was topping out between 45 seconds and a minute, and I was in worse shape for a good chunk of this last year. So even if there's been less weight-loss than I was hoping for, at least I have a sense that I'm actually gaining in fitness.
2. I found my kippah-pattern book at my folks' house, when we were there at the beginning of the week.
3. Decent weather
4. the way putting on my tallis and tefillin (often) makes davening easier to do
and last but far from least:
5. We have a new apartment for next year- we signed the lease yesterday.

1. A lovely, rather impromptu visit with my parents
2. being finally cool enough at night, even cool enough to cuddle
3. finding my kippah-pattern book, after much searching
4. our first wedding anniversary, last week
5. sharing books I've enjoyed with H

1. I have a job offer for a part-time, paid CPE internship. It isn't enough hours to be a "real" residency, but it's something serious, and will get me my 3 more units of CPE that I need (or well, that I need at a minimum) to get a real chaplaincy job. At worst, I'll need another unit, done separately... I still haven't heard from the one other place, so it seems likely that I'll be taking this, and then adding another part-time job to it, but still, the idea that there's a real, live offer makes me awfully happy. This one probably deserves its own entry, really. But instead, I'll add on the following.

2. My parents are coming to spend shabbos/the weekend with us this week (and some of our favorite local people are coming for lunch with them).
3. My babysitting charge has been relatively well behaved of late, which I'm particularly grateful for, as I've been with him far more than my usual number of hours this week.
4. Dictionaries- and the sheer variety of them that we own
5. We now how a free used air conditioner, courtesy of H's cousin, who no longer needed it, and H, who went out to Brooklyn to pick it up, and brought it back via subway. Our only costs were subway fare and a little bit for a cab from the subway to our place, as it was raining (and the thing is pretty heavy). I'm not someone who feels a huge need for air conditioning, but for the worst of the heat, it should be a nice respite.

I've also started a blog, about (just guess) head-covering, from a variety of perspectives.
Here's the link:
http://www.howtocover.blogspot.com

I'm hoping some of you might find it interesting.

1. When my crochet work is admired (H saw a recent kippah that I made, and asked if he could have it. So when you see a grown man with a kippah with green elephants... In any case, the elephants were fun, and if he's wearing one, I can do another for the stash.)
2. Friends who share work-out hobbies (A friend and I had a 1.5 hour hula hoop and chat yesterday afternoon- lots of fun, I worked up a sweat, and I'm not even quite sore.)
3. H has today off from school, so we can cook and prepare for yontif together
4. I've made it on to a second set of interviews for a CPE residency (one that I interviewed for in February- go know).
5. Finally getting back to learning with H at "kollel", after a few weeks off for graduation/ordination related activities. (That said, it looks like I'll be skipping another one in a couple of weeks, in order to host a sheva brachot meal. But still... Learning together is really good, and even better when I'm not exhausted.)

1. Amazing visits and love from my family for ordination.
2. My bar mitzvah student (finally) starting to get a grasp on the trope I've taught him so far
3. Invitations for several shavuos meals
4. The elderly lady who used to sit down my row, and hasn't been there for months, was in shul this week. (I'd been worried about her. It turns out that she had knee surgery.)
5. Projects

Yesterday was one of those days- just packed from beginning to end.

I started the day by heading out early to lead P'sukei D'Zimra at school. I'm not usually much for the JTS minyan, but this was actually a very special and lovely part of the day. I actually had a really good, spiritual experience while leading davening, which is not hugely usual for me. And then I felt involved and comfortable during Shacharit, even during the singing- unusual for me on a weekday. The leyning was sort of amusing: three different people leyned, the first two cantorial students, the last, a rabbinical student- and sadly, the first two sounded like folks with fairly little experience leyning, while the last was fluid and comfortable (although there were a couple of errors)... I had breakfast in the cafeteria with some classmates (who I usually would have been too intimidated to ask to join, but by some grace, I just did it, basically, and it was fine).

Robing was another humorous social experience, including a group decision against wearing the graduation caps, although we'd been encouraged to do so (although in the past, rabbinical students never have)... A classmate gave me a lovely card along with photos of me that she'd taken over the past 6 years. It was pretty amazing to see the differences, and the similarities.

Graduation itself was, well, a graduation, but there were some high points- walking in to the ceremony through a double-line of professors clapping was actually a pretty inspiring moment. Kind of breath-taking, actually. Also, it started nearly on time and ended a few minutes early, which shocked and impressed me.

After graduation, H, his dad (who came in for the event, and this weekend), and I hit a grocery store, and went and had a picnic lunch in Riverside Park. It was just the right break between two events with lots and lots of people for me. We bought way too much food, of course, but it was a very nice lunch, for all that I didn't end up eating very much- too excited.

(I'm listening to some Frank Ticheli while writing this, and in the midst of a piece called Angels in the Architecture, it just broke out into Heveinu Shalom Aleichem breifly- rather startling, that. It has now returned to sort of classic Ticheli stuff.)

Ordination was a strange combination of overwhelming, powerful and dull, as I suppose any ritual repeated 32 times (or 2 variants, repeated 5 and 27 times, respectively, more accurately) will be. I spent some of the duller moments looking out from the stage to watch my family, which I could do fairly easily. There was a little too much Debby Friedman for my taste (but then, more than a Very little of such will be more than my taste, anyways), but overall, I thought that they/we put together a very well-crafted ritual. The dancing afterward was lovely, and didn't go on too long- although we left quite early in order to get to the restaurant in time for our reservation (as ordination ran half an hour over the time it was supposed to end- that's a point against its well-crafted-ness.)

Dinner went pretty well. We had a little run-around when we discovered that I'd managed to get the wrong cross-street for the restaurant, and so we had to take the grandmothers for a short (few block) walk in NYC, which made me tense. But everyone got there without getting too uncomfortable. And then, since I'd picked out a very small restaurant (vegetarian, too- it was lovely), the hearing-impaired among us (a large proportion) had a better chance than usual at hearing. However, there were still some moments of hilarity (for me, at least) prompted by mis-hearings. And it was very special to spend some time with my grandmothers. I didn't get a ton of time with my dad, but we're planning on having a weekend together that's more time together and less Events, soon... One of H's cousins and his girlfriend joined us for dinner as well, and another will be joining us for shabbos lunch, since he couldn't make it.

While there were a variety of unexpected graduation gifts, the most unexpected, and very special to me, surprise was a gorgeous necklace from my paternal grandmother. The special thing is that it belonged to her mother, my great-grandmother. (Whose pin I had already chosen to wear- although I'm sure that she never wore it on her head, as I did.)

Altogether, it was a really lovely, powerful day. And now I'm a rabbi- no more putting it off, when people ask. This is going to be an interesting transition...

Graduation/Ordination is tomorrow. Until now, it hasn't felt real, at all. Now, suddenly, I'm nervous. Wish me luck!

1. Having some free time
2. lj user="kmelion">, who has inspired me to pick up my hula hoop again, after a bit of a "break"
3. sleep
4. doilies
5. the telephone

1. surprises of positive natures
2. crochet projects (especially ones that are happily received by one's spouse)
3. evidence of learning on the part of one's students
4. friendly people
5. seeing people be more thoughtful on my behalf than I expected

1. getting things pretty much done
2. H's willingness to proof-read for me
3. talking to family
4. hearing the love behind uncomfortable conversation (my grandfather, who has decided, again, not to come to ordination- but was very sweet about it)
5. washing a pan together with H- so much fun (quite the opposite of the usual sort of pan-scrubbing)

1. a really good, encouraging final swing dance lesson of the semester, last Wednesday
2. H, with whom I actually practice said dancing and can work on remembering and incorporating the things we learn, rather than them effectively going in one ear and out the other, since I haven't been able to go social dancing (the time has always been a conflict of one sort or another for me).
3. starting a new tutoring job (a bar mitzvah student), and the chance to start to get to know a new-to-me kid, and practice certain of my teaching skills
4. lj user="wildblueyonder2">, who was thoughtful about having not seen us in ages, and both invited us for brunch and was then willing to come join us instead, so that I could have time to do some work on my finals and make sure I was at said tutoring job on time.
5. my sister, who can't make it to my ordination (which was, at first, rather hurtful, but hearing her acknowledge that it was an important thing made a different to me today, when we talked), but was willing to entertain the idea of coming just for the graduation, if it meant enough to me.

1. Accomplishing things, and the feeling once I've done so
2. dairy products
3. prior knowledge
4. positiveness
5. photo albums

Accomplishments, Pre-Purim

Keeping A List

My Grandmother's Husband: Some Sort of Eulogy

Kvetch

Gratitude and Unrelated Comments

Pretty Cool

Moving Notes

Gratitude 31

Gratitude 31

Gratitude 30

Life Has Been Crazy, But...

Gratitude 29

Gratitude 28

Graduation/Ordination

Well Then

Gratitude 27

Gratitude 27

Gratitude 26

Gratitude 25

Gratitude 24

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