debka_notion

I spent most of today's work hours in the GTU library, doing various work and reading for my online classes. It's amazing how different the amount of work feels, when the "class time" gets broken up over the course of the week. It feels a lot steadier, and therefore I can't figure out if I'm spending more or less time on it, over all, than a regular class.

This getting out and sitting in a library thing is really good for me though. I do waste some time/take some breaks, but they're a lot shorter.

TBC

Today has been both very fuzzy and shapeless, and has been the beginning of things taking shape here. I had nothing in particular, besides some school work, scheduled until 2pm today. I'd meant to get out, check out the public library and work there- which didn't happen at all. Perhaps tomorrow. However, at 2, I had a meeting with my mentor at the synagogue internship that I have set up here. So I saw the shul, met the staff, was given a welcome to be in the building whenever was convenient/helpful for me (yay, a place I can do work that is close to home- less initiation energy involved than always needing a half hour walk to wherever I want to work for the day), and we started to think about what I'd be doing, etc. To start with, we're meeting again tomorrow, and then next week I'm shadowing him at a few meetings, and I may get to do some adult ed, some work with the pre-school, and who knows what else. He's a very interesting person, and I think it'll be really interesting and different, learning from him.

In just a little while, I'll have an online class of the "there's actually a set class time" variety, for an hour and a half, while sitting in our guest room. I missed the first class, so this should be a new adventure for me.

After my having been back in the US of A for nearly 6 months, Facebook has Just Today noticed that I'm no longer in Israel (as determined by the shift of the advertisements from Hebrew wedding related ads to English ones.)

Bravo. Look at me clap.

In moving out of my dorm room, H and I packed up and mailed 3 boxes of my things- two to his address, and one, of books, to my parents' address. The former two boxes have arrived, safe and sound. The last box just arrived- totally empty. Or rather- it still contained two of my papers, and had been refilled with crumpled brown paper. I don't know what someone wanted with a couple volumes of poetry, several books pertaining to Jewish education (this year's free Behrman House books, from their annual visit to JTS), last summer's sermon notes, and my class notes and papers from the semester. But they now have them, and I don't.

I am pretty pissed off, since if the books and papers had just fallen out naturally, the box wouldn't be re-stuffed with paper, I presume.

So I've called the post office and filed a complaint/a case. They've promised me a call back within 2 business days. I don't know what that will do, but maybe it'll provide me with some idea of what happened, and whether or not it's safe to mail packages...

This morning, H and I met with a potential DJ. Seems very interested in the job, very enthusiastic, very cheap- we'd have to coach him on what goes on in a traditional Jewish wedding: he's done tons of Christian/American ones, none of the classic Jewish mode. (And I realized, in talking to him, I haven't been to a non-Jewish wedding since I was about 11 or 12- when my youngest uncle got married, and I remember almost none of that.)

We finished off the morning by finishing H's packing to head back to CA.

Then it was off to the train on the early side, since delays were predicted for the subway, once we were in the city. Of course, that meant that the train was perfectly on time, although quite crowded. So we got some lunch at the train station, and picked up a dinner for H at the same time (So very nice, having a kosher restaurant in Grance Central), then headed out to the airport on the early side, so as not to worry about those delays too much. So, once again, everything ran more than smoothly, except that the airtrain wasn't running when we got there. In a way that might have been better for H- a free bus instead of a $5 airtrain ticket... I left him there, and headed to the apartment of cynara_linnaea for dinner in place of our usual Tuesday lunch date (something we did all semester, which I'm going to miss).

Shortly before I was going to head out for the train back to CT, I got a phone call from H, telling me his flight had been cancelled, and did I have a place for him to stay. As it turned out, for once I didn't, but he asked me to stick around NYC until he figured things out, thinking that if he had to be here, maybe I'd come stay with him if possible... We had a series of phone calls, figuring things out, and he'd just about set up a plan, staying with a cousin, or maybe the cousin's girlfriend, it was a little unclear, when in the weirdest move in airplane history- they reinstated his (cancelled) flight. Last he told me, they were now scheduled to leave at 9:15. Having just checked online, the plane actually took off less than an hour ago. What a mess.

So I'm home, and he's on his way home, and my sister, who's been waiting for her car to be repaired, has it back and will be on her way home tomorrow. Normal life of some sort is on its way to resuming- and I miss H. However, we had a lovely and also productive vacation, and tomorrow I'll get my ticket to go out to CA, and that should be in only about 3 weeks. (Ok, 3 weeks to do major wedding planning stuff, and have a vacation, and work on what I'm doing in CA. I can do this.) Next time I'm in the airport, it'll probably be because I'm heading out to be with him. I can do this.

I briefly owned two umbrellas. Now I own one.

I attempted to use the other today to shield me from the rain. The wind (strong, admittedly) first flipped it inside out, then I got it righted, then flipped it inside out so strongly that it a. first looked more like a tree than an umbrella, b. eventually folded over itself to look like a flag, and c. tore several of its metal spokes apart from the main stem, and from each other.

It ended its short life in a trash can on Amsterdam Avenue.

Somehow, a couple days ago, I was talking to H about music- it was in the context of something, I don't know what- and I mentioned Rimsky-Korsakov, who was pretty much my favorite composer for a while. So we went to youtube, and I went "oh, yes, I can listen to these things again, they're accessible, even if my CDs are all somewhere in my parents' attic." (They were mostly loaded onto the old computer, but I haven't put energy into how to get all the information off of it and onto this computer, yet/still/whatever, and some things I just didn't have anyways.) So, I've been listening to a few favorites (mostly Rimsky-Korsakov and Holst) that I haven't heard in what seems like ages, in the last few days, while I work. It's been delightful.

I've been thinking, between this and a previous conversation which led to looking at art by Kandinsky (an artist about whom I did a project in elementary school art class) online a few weeks ago, about how much the education I received as a kid really has contributed to who I am, what I know, and my general grounding. The "extra"s have made a difference, in the little ways that add up over time. It's all just a little thing, not life skills, but things that let me think of myself as someone who has a clue about something of culture. It feels rather good, remembering these things, and then realizing that I have a cultural knowledge base- not a huge one, but also not nothing.

It makes me wonder what my religious school students will find, years in the future- will they have that little bit of knowledge about Judaism that will make a difference? I can't really pretend to think that the 10-12 hours of religious education that they get in a year will give them anything more than that. (This is more like what I know of Kandinsky than of music- I spent 3 hours a week, every week during high school in youth orchestra- not to mention school orchestra, jazz band, trombone lessons, and hanging out with far more dedicated student musicians.) But maybe it'll be enough that they don't feel so clueless that they're afraid to step in the door, when they want to.

1. JTS, and especially its prayer environment, is seeming a socially warmer space these days. I remember mechina and year one, especially, feeling like the whole environment was "cold" enough to freeze water, and feeling utterly lost and alone, because besides my "next door neighbor", pretty much no one spoke to me, and I saw all the post-minchah chatting going on all around me. Today, I not only had peers to say hello to, a dean and one of my former teachers said hello. I remember noticing, in year 2, that people tended to be happier and happier in rabbinical school the farther they got in the process (exempting various ending-of-rabbinical-school stresses, I'm talking about general comfort with the space and the people inhabiting it), and I'm definitely feeling some of that shift at this point.

2. I've been noticing for a while this tension in myself, in relation to wedding planning (but also in general, it's just in this wedding related sphere that it's become a bit more noticeable), between wanting attention and wanting to make space for others and Not to be noticed. I'm sure it's a tension that is universal, but for me- it feels very strong, especially because I seem to feel a virtue in avoiding notice, in focusing attention elsewhere than myself, in being the helpful hands "backstage". And yet, when I do that too much, I get unhappy that no-one is noticing me. There have been a few instances already in this planning thing where I've noticed two options, and I have this feeling as if I Should be withdrawing, less noticeable, etc, and realized that if I pushed myself in that direction, I'd regret it later. And so I gave myself a little shift of energy to be a little bolder, and went with the slightly splashier presentation of self, as it were, and honestly- I've been glad. How to balance that with this notion that it's virtuous to not ask for lots of attention? I don't know yet.

This weekend, inside its bookend of long pieces of travel, was truly wonderful. I left JTS just about after my last class on Thursday, and returned this morning. In between, I met a whole bunch of H's family, friends, and the like. That's the general summary for the weekend- not a lot of formal excitement (although I do now have an engagement ring. That probably provokes excitement, even for people other than me), but a lot of very worthwhile time spent.

Thursday evening, my plane got in early (can you imagine?), and I was expecting to be sitting around for a while- but H checked the flight's status online, and was sitting right there waiting for me when I arrived. We were then that stereotypical couple in the airport, bit the big embrace, paying no attention to anyone else. Then we headed to his place, but stopped off at his folks' home to say hi, and for me to briefly meet his dad, and then, across the backyards, to do the same with his grandma, before we had some dinner with his folks, and went off to his place (where I'll be living next semester) for the night.

Friday he had work, and I spent a relaxing morning before hanging out with H's parents in the afternoon, talking, occasionally managing to help with some of the shabbos cooking, and the like. I think I broke up their usual pattern, or something, because a lot of things were happening at once, and a bunch of them almost got forgotten about, and were remembered at the last moment. But it was a pretty comfortable time, although I kept feeling like I was just hanging around, and wasn't familiar enough with the set-up to really be of much help- but that will, I imagine, come in time.

Friday night, we went to shul (serious low marks for the set-up in the library, where they have Friday night davening. The women's section was poorly set up, and felt seriously marginalized. It turns out that the men hate the set-up too, as I discovered upon mentioning it to H and his dad. We're contemplating writing a letter about it. Dinner was pleasant but a little overwhelming- about 10 people, all told, including us, H's parents and grandma, an aunt and uncle, a couple from shul (whom I'd met and liked when they were visiting their son in Israel, so that was actually a pair of familiar faces in the mix), and a cousin. But I did enjoy listening to them all, even if I didn't quite get myself really integrated.

Saturday was easier- shul was in the main sanctuary, which has a much better lay-out, and I didn't get funny looks for being at an Orthodox shul in a tallit (as H kept reassuring me- it's Berkeley). And then there was the whole business of announcing our engagement there, and co-sponsoring kiddush. That was rather overwhelming at first, but I warmed up into it, especially when H started helping by pointing out interesting items for conversation when various people came over to meet me. Really, we ended up standing in sort of a far corner of the area where they were having kiddush (outside), and people basically just kept coming to us. I'm trying to remember names- we'll see how much success I have. There were an awful lot of people being very excited to meet me. It was flattering, and rather embarrassing, all at once. The better part was seeing how much they all love H.

Then we returned home for lunch, which involved a few fewer people, and somehow it was an easier crowd to get comfortable in. It also included meeting H's best friend from his college-era (and being very relieved that I enjoyed his company), and a remarkable amount of fish (sushi, and then, in various cooked forms: salmon, trout and tuna). (They knew I preferred milchigs, and so that's what they made- they were incredibly welcoming.) Afterwards, H and I went over to his grandma's, and looked at the two family engagement rings in his grandma's keeping, and picked on. It fits too, so- now I have a ring. Wow. It seems to make more of a difference than I thought that it would.

Sunday, we had lunch and hang-out time with H's two particular friends from Iaido (his martial art), including time, in the rain, at what would have been an even more exciting street fair in the sunshine. And then dinner with his family, and back to the airport. H was incredibly sweet, and stood outside the ropes, waiting with me as much as he could, the whole time I was in line for the security screenings. (At the end of which, I got selected for a full pat-down. I don't know why.) Then travel, and home- and this entry is longer than long enough already, so for now, I stop here.

Just another day- although it involved my first day teaching my NYC class of kids- 5 and 6 year olds. They're adorable and Very 5, and once I readjust to the notion that in this location, lots of the parents stay in the room during class, I'll get a little more fluid and less awkward. Also, my co-teacher here is new, and I think new to co-teaching, as well as being new to teaching littler kids, and I think that things will get even better as she warms up and we build a stronger teaching partnership. She's a lovely person, from what I can see- and I got her interested in the Interseminary Dialogue, which is a plus, too... (She goes to the seminary across the street...)

Otherwise classes were good. My Talmud teacher's approach to the texts that we're studying is very different (very rooted in how to use these texts in life, and how to use them in encountering people with other perspectives or whom we want to persuade) from anything I've encountered in a teacher before. It's really interesting, if sometimes a bit strong for my tastes. But I'm really glad to be encountering it- even if I don't know precisely what to do with it yet.

Yiddish class was quite good too. We're now reading a series of poets with an approach to poetry that I sometimes really like, and sometimes don't- but I'm finding that, as often happens, they speak to me more strongly out loud (I know, poetry is supposed to be read aloud- but I'm only so good at it, you know? Not good enough to feel like it's worth doing when I'm aloud, or like it gets me that much, when I'm the one reading it.) But there's one that I really liked- I'm thinking that it's worth sharing here. I found it a little over the top on my own, but in class, it was just really lovely. So here it goes: (Poem by Zishe Landau, translation by Irving Feldman)

This Evening
Evening in the house
where you sit and look out
the window,
and in her chair your wife is knitting
or maybe sewing.
You around- and she is sitting there
doing nothing.
the needle, scissors, cloth
are lying idle in her hands,
and she is lost in thought over the days and days
that creep by in worries.
here, say, everything is always missing
and the daily grind is inescapable.
And every day that's gone gone for good.
it won't come back again.
And just as this one has, the next too will pass,
and what was hoped for, waited for,
will also have gone past.

These are the things she is thinking,
when she looks up hopefully at you-
who have just now turned from the window
to look at her.
Everything suddenly is clear.
You get up
and go over to your wife, your faithful wife,
and touch her shoulder lightly
and stroke her hair,
and want to say so many sweet things to her,
and say not a single word.
You go back to your chair
and look out the window.
The night is deep, the stars are big,
and quietly your heart opens.