debka_notion (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
debka_notion) wrote2007-09-09 09:30 pm
debka_notion) wrote2007-09-09 09:30 pm
In Which I Go Places, Buy Books, and The Like
Life has actually be been and not so easily described at times, lately. Not bad, just not fitting into proper-for-LJ sorts of descriptions well. The new school year is busy, still a bit tense especially since I haven't had all my classes yet and one of them, the one I'm most nervous about, is one of the two I have not yet had, and it will be only once a week, from 3:40 until 7:50pm on Mondays. (We will get a dinner break at least, I think- I certainly hope. Otherwise I may well go mad.)
In any case, I had a lovely and rather unusual Shabbat. I had dinner with two friends who don't actually know each other particularly well which made for mildly awkward conversation, but it was still pleasant, low-key, and let me get to bed at a reasonable hour. In the morning I went to a shul I don't go to terribly often but which was pleasant and also fairly low key, and then left a touch early (just after the Musaf kedushah) to meet the woman with whom I was walking to Shabbat lunch. We hadn't met before (the host of said lunch is a mutual friend- she's someone he dated a few times, he and I are old friends from dancing), but we found each other quite easily, and had a very nice walk (mostly through Central Park) to our host's apartment. It took less time than we thought (only an hour, although admittedly we started a half-hour walk from my place), so we actually got there early. The other guests were significantly late (well, the other two who did show up- one never did), so the three of us had a nice hang out before lunch. Both that and lunch were made slightly more interesting by the fact that the host and I have been friends for years, and rather close friends at that, and he'd known the other guests for rather less time and rather more casually. The other point of interest for me was that for the first time, I was dramatically more Jewishly educated than anyone else in the room. I mean, Steve has some reasonable background, but it is still fairly basic, and the other guests were both BTs and fairly new to things. So I found that I was needing to slow down and enunciate in order to help people get through reading the Hebrew during Birkat HaMazon and zemirot. The usual crowd with whom I have Shabbos meals lean towards those folks educated in Jewish schools and such, so this was new and different for me.
After lunch, everyone else headed home, but since I had the farthest shlep, I took Steve up on his offer to hang out until after Shabbos- so we talked, went to shul for the Talmud class (more of a lecture model, but quite interesting and well done), mincha, seudah shlishit (where there was a significant lack of clarity about whether or not seating was segregated by gender or not, and general confusion, and where it became clear that women at shul at that time were a bit of an anomaly: there were 4 or 5 women there and 25-30 men, and this was apparently more women than usual- it was a hard shul to figure out), ma'ariv and havdalah of the sort that you don't notice until they're partway through. It was a situation where I was glad that Steve's custom is to do havdalah at home as well. Afterwards we hung out a bit, and then I headed back to JTS and was home briefly before heading out for Slichot.
I attended slichot at the local egal independant minyan, which was very nice and pretty effective for the most part, except when they picked some tunes that were a bit too cheerful for the texts- the tendency to use any catchy tune that the words fit to without concern for the way the tune does or doesn't match the meaning is one of their weak points though, so I was sort of expecting that that might happen. I walked partway back with a friend, and then decided that at that hour it was wiser to take the subway than walk alone, since my friend lived closer to services than I did, and then luckily my timing was perfect- I was only waiting a minute or so before the train came. Some other folks were walking back to my building, but they seemed involved in their own conversation so I decided not to push in with them, especially after slichot, and not being in the mood for that sort of thing.
Today was another busy day: I went to the celebration for![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
hatam_soferet's completion of her first torah which was really, really lovely. There were several well meaning and reasonably interesting speakers, and then she herself spoke very well and honestly about the whole process. Watching her with the torah itself was pretty beautiful- she kept patting it affectionately: it was very sweet- it's beautiful to see someone that fond of their work and that proud of their finished product. I can imagine that to finish something that huge and then to send it away must be difficult. Afterwards, I had a series of interesting conversations, then went off to buy books I need for class and/or the holidays. As a result, I got back with just enough time to tell the man who runs the Sunday night session that no, I couldn't set up for him, and go off to a barbecue run by one of the local minyanim I'm sometimes sort of involved in, and to have a lovely phone conversation on the way there (and sitting just outside the event for a good while once I was there) with pallasrosalind, with whom I hadn't spoken in far too long. Said barbecue was fun, and I now have one meal actually set for the Rosh Hashannah/Shabbat combination coming up. I have a feeling that a bunch of the other meals will be set, it's just figuring out who is making what meal and such things.
THen I got to come back and write about a mentor/teacher/rabbi who influenced my life (I hate such essays- I thought I was done with them, but I guess not).
In other silly trivia about my life, I've been listening to the Incredible String Band pretty constantly lately. It's very calming, somehow, and with the beginning of school and the upcoming holidays, not only am I a little tense but the entire atmosphere around here is tense and crazy. So- calm, unrelated music is a very nice thing.
In any case, I had a lovely and rather unusual Shabbat. I had dinner with two friends who don't actually know each other particularly well which made for mildly awkward conversation, but it was still pleasant, low-key, and let me get to bed at a reasonable hour. In the morning I went to a shul I don't go to terribly often but which was pleasant and also fairly low key, and then left a touch early (just after the Musaf kedushah) to meet the woman with whom I was walking to Shabbat lunch. We hadn't met before (the host of said lunch is a mutual friend- she's someone he dated a few times, he and I are old friends from dancing), but we found each other quite easily, and had a very nice walk (mostly through Central Park) to our host's apartment. It took less time than we thought (only an hour, although admittedly we started a half-hour walk from my place), so we actually got there early. The other guests were significantly late (well, the other two who did show up- one never did), so the three of us had a nice hang out before lunch. Both that and lunch were made slightly more interesting by the fact that the host and I have been friends for years, and rather close friends at that, and he'd known the other guests for rather less time and rather more casually. The other point of interest for me was that for the first time, I was dramatically more Jewishly educated than anyone else in the room. I mean, Steve has some reasonable background, but it is still fairly basic, and the other guests were both BTs and fairly new to things. So I found that I was needing to slow down and enunciate in order to help people get through reading the Hebrew during Birkat HaMazon and zemirot. The usual crowd with whom I have Shabbos meals lean towards those folks educated in Jewish schools and such, so this was new and different for me.
After lunch, everyone else headed home, but since I had the farthest shlep, I took Steve up on his offer to hang out until after Shabbos- so we talked, went to shul for the Talmud class (more of a lecture model, but quite interesting and well done), mincha, seudah shlishit (where there was a significant lack of clarity about whether or not seating was segregated by gender or not, and general confusion, and where it became clear that women at shul at that time were a bit of an anomaly: there were 4 or 5 women there and 25-30 men, and this was apparently more women than usual- it was a hard shul to figure out), ma'ariv and havdalah of the sort that you don't notice until they're partway through. It was a situation where I was glad that Steve's custom is to do havdalah at home as well. Afterwards we hung out a bit, and then I headed back to JTS and was home briefly before heading out for Slichot.
I attended slichot at the local egal independant minyan, which was very nice and pretty effective for the most part, except when they picked some tunes that were a bit too cheerful for the texts- the tendency to use any catchy tune that the words fit to without concern for the way the tune does or doesn't match the meaning is one of their weak points though, so I was sort of expecting that that might happen. I walked partway back with a friend, and then decided that at that hour it was wiser to take the subway than walk alone, since my friend lived closer to services than I did, and then luckily my timing was perfect- I was only waiting a minute or so before the train came. Some other folks were walking back to my building, but they seemed involved in their own conversation so I decided not to push in with them, especially after slichot, and not being in the mood for that sort of thing.
Today was another busy day: I went to the celebration for
hatam_soferet's completion of her first torah which was really, really lovely. There were several well meaning and reasonably interesting speakers, and then she herself spoke very well and honestly about the whole process. Watching her with the torah itself was pretty beautiful- she kept patting it affectionately: it was very sweet- it's beautiful to see someone that fond of their work and that proud of their finished product. I can imagine that to finish something that huge and then to send it away must be difficult. Afterwards, I had a series of interesting conversations, then went off to buy books I need for class and/or the holidays. As a result, I got back with just enough time to tell the man who runs the Sunday night session that no, I couldn't set up for him, and go off to a barbecue run by one of the local minyanim I'm sometimes sort of involved in, and to have a lovely phone conversation on the way there (and sitting just outside the event for a good while once I was there) with pallasrosalind, with whom I hadn't spoken in far too long. Said barbecue was fun, and I now have one meal actually set for the Rosh Hashannah/Shabbat combination coming up. I have a feeling that a bunch of the other meals will be set, it's just figuring out who is making what meal and such things. THen I got to come back and write about a mentor/teacher/rabbi who influenced my life (I hate such essays- I thought I was done with them, but I guess not).
In other silly trivia about my life, I've been listening to the Incredible String Band pretty constantly lately. It's very calming, somehow, and with the beginning of school and the upcoming holidays, not only am I a little tense but the entire atmosphere around here is tense and crazy. So- calm, unrelated music is a very nice thing.