Here are some last minute things you can do to make the holiday run a little more smoothly:
1. Draw some water. Rather than referring to the Water Pouring Ceremony that took place during Temple times, this is about drinking water for the table. Collect drinking water in large covered containers and keep it in the sukkah. If you serve water with ice in a pitcher at the table, you'll only have to bring out the pitcher with ice, and it can be filled outside.
This speeds up the serving time, minimize trips back and forth, and prevent spills. The empty containers should be refilled as they are used during the meal.
This is our water dispenser, that we keep filled with water throughout the holiday week:
2. Draw more water. If many guests are expected for the Yom Tov meals, the traipsing back and forth between Kiddush in the sukkah, washing hands in the house, and HaMotzi back in the sukkah seems interminable. Each trip is a fresh opportunity to track mud and leaves back into the house.
We avoid this by making a washing station outside.
Many years ago, I ...Any small table (or large cardboard boxes weighted with bricks or large vegetable cans) will do.
One plastic gallon-sized pitcher on top of the table fills the washing cup. Under the table (already filled today) we keep many containers of water for refills.
3. Make a door sign. Give guests a written welcome with directions to the sukkah. There is too much going on just before dinner, to monitor the front door.
It's helpful to mark the path to the sukkah well, to avoid losing or frustrating guests.
I made this "Baruchim Habaim" ("Welcome") sign with day-glow paint, which does a passable job of showing up at night. I had hoped it would almost look illuminated with the phosphors in the paint, but that was a pipe dream.
(Don't forget to turn on the outdoor lights to help the guests find their way.)
4. Use trays.
5. Plug in any devices that are needed for Shabbat if you live outside of Israel, where it is a three day holiday this year. Set up the blech, hot water urn, and any other heating device needed for cooking on Shabbat, but not needed for Yom Tov.
6. Use real food for the eruv tavshillin. This is probably obvious to everyone else, but it took us twenty years of marriage to figure this out.
We used to use a piece of matza and a boiled egg. It was only a few years ago that we learned we were obligated to actually eat the eruv tavshillin foods. Since then, when we made eruv tavshillin, we'd pass around the matzah and three-day-old boiled egg, in a scene reminicent of eating the Afikomen at the end of the Passover Seder.
Just this year, when I asked my husband to open the box of matzah, he held up one of the dozen round loaves of challah I had just baked, and asked, "Why don't we just use this?"
It was a "duh" moment, for sure. Why not, indeed?
Shortly thereafter, when I set about to boil the eggs for the "cooked food" needed for the remainder of the eruv tavshillin, I realized that gefilte fish is a cooked food.
Thus we've come full circle. Not only are we setting aside real foods prepared for Shabbat and Yom Tov together, but they're the foods we actually planned to, and want to, eat! What a relevation.
(Stay tuned for the next episode of "The Dense and the Obvious", where we'll watch our heroine discover that if you write menus in pencil, they can be erased...)
7. Let go. I fall short my ambitions every Yom Tov (and every Shabbat, too.) I have banners left undone, blog posts about sukkot art projects I never finished, recipes I meant to prepare, clutter piles unsorted....
Submitting to the reality of time as a finite resource is difficult. Once I do, and admit to myself that certain expectations and flourishes must be discarded, I usually experience a cathartic release of nervous tension.
All those unrealized plans will be a head start for next year. We're not behind schedule; we're a full year ahead, see? That's my story and if we all stick to it together, it might as well be true!
Continuing from the previous post, here are more of our family's favorite sukkah decoration projects:
Eighteen years ago, for our very first sukkah as a couple, I typed in the sukkot torah readings (careful to substitute a letter for G-d's name, just in case they were blown away in a tornado) and printed the text on certificate paper (paper with pre-printed decorative borders.)
These were laminated with self-adhesive laminating sheets. We used to hang them from our sukkah's canvas walls with large stainless steel safety pins. The grommets were a later adaptation.
Here is a chain that holds many fusible bead projects of varying vintages, hanging from clear plastic lanyard. 
Have you noticed I like using chain? It is sturdy, relatively inexpensive, and you can get it cut to size at the hardware store.
It's easy to measure by links how far apart the projects should be, and it's very expandable.
Be sure to get coated or stainless steel chain, so it won't rust in the rain.
Projects can be added easily in subsequent years, enhancing how it looks, minimizing space, set-up and take-down time.
It's also nice that all of the children's projects form one display. That way, if someone made
gazillions of items, and someone else made only a few, it's still their project together. I find it remarkable how the children remember which items they made, and seem only to see their own work!
At the top of the picture to the left is a clear piece of packing material. I think it came from a thumb drive. Abigail (who was 8 at the time) strung beads in the Hebrew letters that spell "Sukkot", and we glued them to the clear plastic with a glue gun.
The package conveniently came with holes for hanging on pegs in the store.
Here are a few more banners:
Olive tree banner
Since the metallic paint in the letters reflects light, they sparkle in the lights of the sukkah at night.
, my old favorite, and the one our shul uses) are put away, and our Sukkah is up, I can to share a few easy, inexpensive, fun, and somewhat water- resistant crafts for Sukkah decorating.The challenge is to find Sukkah decorating activities that are cheap, easy, fast, weather-proof, beautiful, appropriate for the holiday, not too messy, and can be accomplished by groups of children with a wide age range.
One strategy that works for our family is to use the summer to make some crafts for the Sukkah. This allows for more involved projects, and for paint to dry. In the summer, the days are long, and there is time to indulge in elaborate multi-step projects.
This isn't always possible or desirable. Often, we need to have Sukkah decorating art projects to make with large groups of children, either to decorate our synagogue's Sukkah, or as a classroom activity.
Sometimes, we just want to have the projects made closer to the holiday to make it relevant for the children.
Sometimes, we need to fill an empty space to replace decorations that were blown away or waterlogged last year.
My favorite projects involve all the children, like this banner made from the kids' hand prints. It was quick and easy to make.
To make it, let each child choose a color of fabric paint. Encourage them to choose dark colors that will show up at a distance.
Work with one child at a time, one hand at a time. Using a paintbrush, cover the child's entire hand with fabric paint. Ask the child to relax his hand, and press down firmly on all the fingers. Draw stems and make a pot. (Pot = trapezoid with long side on top, and a thin rectangle longer than the long side of the trapezoid just above, touching the trapezoid.)
Don't forget to write the date in fabric paint!
Six years ago, I bought this huge container of fusible beads for $11
The beads are tiny colorful plastic tubes that melt when ironed. The system includes a rigid heat-resistant plastic plate with many tiny pegs. The beads are placed on the pegs, touching each other to the desired pattern.
When the pattern is complete, a piece of wax paper is placed on top (gently and carefully) and the beads are fused through the waxed paper with the iron. They melt and fuse together in about a minute of ironing.
I like to flip them over and fuse the back side as well. Don't forget to use the waxed paper in between the beads and the iron, or the iron will be covered in melted plastic, perhaps ruined.
Crafts made with the fusible beads will stand up to many seasons in the Sukkah, exposed to the elements. To make the decorations easier to put up, remove, and store, it helps to invest some time attaching them to something else that hangs.
Try to avoid using bare wire coat hangers, because they rust in the rain.
The stars in the picture to the left were made by different children over different years. At some point, I collected them, inserted a jump ring in the top, and strung them with plastic lanyard.
To keep the stars evenly spaced from year to year), thread the plastic lanyard through a pony bead, then through the jump ring, then back through the pony bead.
Before I had children (back when I had copious spare time on my hands!) I used the same type of Perler fusible beads
this sentence, one letter per square (hanging at the bottom of the picture to the right):
הזורעים בדמעה ברינה יקצורו (He who sows in tears will reap in joy)
For items painted with acrylic paint that you'd like to keep for multiple years, it can be helpful to spray them with fixative when they're dry. This will make rainwater bead up and not penetrate.
with the fusible beads.
On the outside of our Sukkah we have a very large banner made from a tablecloth. It is 5' wide by 12' long. I call it the "Simcha Banner".
This was made by masking the width of both borders with pieces of paper all around, and placing large cut out letters in the middle. They spell out "zman simchateinu, mikrei kodesh , zecher l'tziyat mitzrayim" (Time of our rejoicing, sanctified, a remembrance of leaving Egypt.)
The banner then was spray-painted blue over the message.
When it was dry, newspapers were placed over the middle part, and the border was spray painted beige.
After the beige border dried, the inside half was covered with paper, and the outer border was spray painted purple. Then all the papers were removed, including the letters in the middle message.
The letters were filled in with bronze paint, and a bunch of biblical sentences about simcha were written in blue on the beige border. It's very hard to see, but the purple outside border was stamped all over with one of Shulamit Ron's stamps that says "moadim l'simcha". 
Sentences around the border of the Simcha Banner include:
I put grommets all around, and voila!
In this picture you might be able to see the stumps of the tree branches that had to be removed last year. From this angle, it looks like a normal tree, but from
the side it looks like half a tree! (In order for the Sukkah to be kosher, it can't be in the shade of a tree.)
Every year, we try to make a few new permanent crafts for the Sukkah. However, the bulk of crafts made each year are not so long-lasting.
Something I've found very helpful over the years is chain, the length of the Sukkah, fitted with clothespins every third link.
I attach it securely along the railing. A standard 8.5"x11" paper, held in landscape format, can be held with three clothespins. If held in portrait format, it takes 2 clothespins.
This chain can hold all of the last minute paper decorations that the kids make. Since it is about 3 feet high, and since clothespins don't require adults or knots, the children can hang their own work. This helps a lot.
Above the chain you can see the beaded chains. These were made by the children from pony beads (very inexpensive, waterproof, and easily for small children to manipulate, due to their large holes) strung on plastic lanyard.
To make it long enough to drape, plan for the finished beaded length to be about 150% of the length it will reach.
The banner that says "Ufros Aleinu Sukkat shlomechah" (Spread over us Your Sukkah/shelter of peace.) was made by a group of the children.
We put paper-cut-out letters on the banner.
Then they cut leaf shapes from kitchen sponges and sponge-painted over the paper letters in Autumn colors.
When the paint dried, the paper letters were removed and the shapes that remained were outlined in fabric paint.
Of course, the ultimate in one season use Sukkah decorations is the ubiquitous paper chain.
Every year, when I pack up the decorations after Sukkot, I prepare a bunch of 1.5" strips of construction paper, stick them in a bag, and place them on top of the decorations box.
This way, the children will have at least one craft's materials prepared and ready to go as soon as we open the box next year.
Believe me, if you do this, you will thank yourself next year.
I hope to post a detailed tutorial for these recycled craft mobiles soon.
The stars are shapes cut from the tops of plastic produce containers (such as blueberries, grape tomatoes, etc.)
These clear plastic shapes are then soaked in soapy water to decorate the Sukkah: remove the product label and a hole is punched on top.
The horizontal bar is made from a Popsicle stick. Drill tiny holes in the Popsicle stick with an electric drill for the ribbons to thread through, and it will hold up to the wind nicely.
The painted shapes are attached to the Popsicle stick with curling ribbon.
The big gold banner in this picture has a picture of a lulav and etrog, and "Hodu L'Hashem Ki Tov, Ki l'olam chasdo."
This is what we say when we shake the lulav during the Hallel prayer (hymns of praise) during the holiday.
The smaller "banners" below, along the railing, were made from dinner napkins.
(For Jonathan's bar mitzvah a few years ago, it turned out to be cheaper, easier, and less frustrating to buy tablecloths and cloth napkins in bulk, than to rent them from a linen service.
After the bar mitzvah, I washed them, and have used them for multiple other events since then. I hope to use them for the girls' bat mitzahs, too.
Whenever the white dinner napkins get stained, we use them for crafts like this.)
These 20" square napkins are the perfect size for children to decorate with fabric paints, tie dye, etc. I set grommets in the top corners to make them easier to hang. Every year, we add to the inventory of these smaller banners.
Materials used:
Instructions for making a table:
The three bricks in the container make it sturdy. The bricks on top of the plywood are not shown in the photo above, but should always be in place when these tables are used. Otherwise, the top will likely flip over when the children put pressure on it.
WITH THE BRICKS, we have used these "tables" for many birthday parties and as "kids tables" in our sukkah.
We keep three or four of these "tables" in our basement. They store very compactly, as the storage containers stack, and the bricks and plywood fit inside.
The last time I made them, was about four years ago. It cost under $20 to make 3 tables like these. Using the little plastic yard chairs (usually go on clearance at the end of the season for $3 each) we can seat 8 children at each table.
The nicest part is that the storage containers can be re-purposed if you decide you don't need them for use as tables.
When we sin against another person, we have to ask forgiveness directly of him. We are not allowed to ask G-d for grace or mercy until we have made attempts to receive forgiveness from the person we have wronged.
This is something we're supposed to be doing year-round. Consider the ideal a "just-in-time-inventory" of apologies, where the supply repentance keeps up with the quantity of transgressions, without back orders. Unfortunately, none of us realizes this ideal.
Before Yom Kippur can function as a day of atonement, we must make things right between one another.
That's the rationale of the "asseret ymei teshuva", the period of the Jewish calendar between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. This time is set aside to take stock, ask and grant forgiveness from one another, and resolve conflicts.
It's a quiet and serious time, a time for healing relationships. It's a time for introspection and for reaching out. In contrast to secular new year's custom, we celebrate the Jewish New Year by making amends, rather than resolutions.
Four months ago, when I started this blog, I would have thought it silly - perhaps inappropriate - to include "virtual" relationships in this interpersonal reckoning. Since then, however, I have discovered how interconnected and personal bloggers' interactions can become.
In this short tenure, I have come to feel close to a large number of people I've never met.
We follow the details of each other's lives with the concern of dear friends. We carry on extended relaxed sometimes life-changing conversations and unlimited passionate debates. We anticipate the publication of their next post like children waiting for treats.
We agonize, cheer, and kvell as families full of children grow and mature, yet we only know them by their nicknames. Their idiosyncrasies, habits and talents are know to us only through the details revealed by and limited to the perception and understanding expressed by their parents.
Despite differences that would otherwise separate us, we listen and we react. We learn from people who we never expected to know. They provide us access and insight to worlds and worldviews of which we otherwise would have been unaware. We change each other's minds.
Another strange subset includes bloggers whose articles I read regularly, but react only in my own head. For whatever reason, I've lurked. I have never commented, or sent an e-mail to these authors. Yet I think a lot about what they have to say.
There are the blog-less commenters whose profile links lead nowhere, and the commenters who we feel we know well, but only from what they've said on another writer's blog. They don't know that they effect us, that they are characters in our story, too.
There are the readers who are family or friends from our"real" life community who we know are out there, some of whom share their thoughts in comments, some privately, and some not at all.
And then there are the anonymous lurking readers, who intrigue and motivate without saying a word. When they eventually reveal themselves, they bestow a precious gift.
As a result of blogging, I care deeply about a bunch of people I don't ever expect to know.
It's natural to feel a connection with an author or someone with whom one corresponds. However, the bond between bloggers feels qualitatively different from the relationship between reader and author in more conventional venues.
All human relationships involve the risk of discord and the potential for growth. The nature of the Internet multiplies both the reach and the risks inherent in communication. We often forget that there are people behind the text.
While it is impossible to ask for mechila (forgiveness) to an anonymous multitude, in "virtual" life, just like in "real" life, you do what you can. Thus, it makes sense that many Jewish bloggers have included apologies and requests for forgiveness from their readers during this season. Some of these were delivered pro forma, some anguished, some meticulously delineated.
One of my favorites is lighthearted yet heartfelt, and very clever, by Mother in Israel. It is formatted like the vidduy, the formal confession of the Jewish liturgy. Here's another great one in a similar format at Stepping off the Spaceship, also inspired by Mother in Israel.
Continuing in Mother in Israel's style, I'd like to adopt all of hers and add follow suit.
Dear Readers, please forgive me for any transgressions I've committed against you, including but not limited to:
For all these mentioned here, and those mentioned there, for those I don't know about, for those that I don't realize bother you, and for those that I forgot to mention, Dear Reader, I ask your forgiveness.
For the first seven years of our marriage, we spent Rosh Hashanah with my husband's Uncle David and Tante Ursula. It was one of the highlights of our year.
Then we moved home to Massachusetts. While our hearts filled with joy to be near our parents, we always feel a bittersweet lack on Rosh Hashanah away from Uncle David and Tante Ursula.
Whatever we manage to provide for our guests at our own Rosh Hashanah table, our best results are but an ambitious imitation of theirs. Whatever we happen to get right is due to witnessing the sparkling and passionate conversations, learned and inspiring divrei Torah, spontaneous and harmonious singing, delicious and elegantly presented meals, the atmosphere of generosity and appreciation, and the overall kedushah (sanctity) of their home.
As a young bride I found Tante Ursula's kitchen inspiring. I still do. It was spotless and efficient, yet open and warm. It was overflowing with both love and every tool necessary, yet it was without clutter or waste. It was a serious workplace adorned with fresh flowers and posters from the family's many travels. Visitors felt as comfortable relaxing over tea on the sofa, as stirring the soup while the pomegranates were being peeled.
The kitchen table held a freshly starched tablecloth in a bright, colorful floral pattern that was both elegant and uncontrived. It was perfectly ironed - without a wrinkle - yet not the least bit stiff. Her kitchen table was a place to linger for a chat after breakfast, to work a crossword, to polish silver, or to play a very unorthodox game of Scrabble.
On my first visit we had been married exactly one month. After dinner the first night of that first Rosh Hashanah, as Tante Ursula and I were putting the stock pots away, she paused and looked meaningfully at me. She said that when she was first married, her aunt told her, "One should always clean the bottom of one's pots just as carefully and as well as the inside."
Since we all hail from solid yekkish stock, earnest housecleaning advice certainly could be taken at face value. And Tante Ursula isn't prone to religious sermonizing. Her insights are more likely to be revealed via reflection on her irreverent quips or ironic turns of phrase. She keeps her soap-boxes neatly stacked in her closet.
Likely due to the Rosh Hashanah mood, or perhaps from the intensity of its delivery, or maybe because my eagerness to collect whatever wisdom from them I could absorb, I knew immediately that this advice could only be about everything but the pots.
The first part was easy. The outside of the pot is what's visible in public. If this is messy, others will make assumptions about its contents and about the cook. Yet nobody knows what's really goes on inside someone else's pot.
Clearly, the inside of the pot is our private behavior, either at home with family, or in solitude. The cleanliness of the inside of the pot is vital to the integrity of the meal. If you don't clean the inside of the pot, even the most savory roast will be spoiled. Washing the outside at the expense of cleaning the inside is an indication of misplaced priorities.
But the bottom of the pot? What difference could it possibly make if there is a stain that nobody sees, that never touches the food? Who has time to scour the bottom of their pots?
I have to admit, my first internal reaction to Tante Ursula's advice as we said goodnight, and I retired to the guest room, was dismissive. Whatever she was trying to tell me about homemaking, philosophy, or morality seemed like an exercise in over-achievement, a recipe for nurturing obsessive compulsive disorder. Even for a newlywed yekke with little responsibility and a very small apartment.
Overnight, however, the idea stewed and simmered (sorry, couldn't resist!) In shul, as I listened to the shofar blowing on that first day of the first Rosh Hashanah of my married life, I was preoccupied with Tante Ursula's pots.
The shofar, the trumpet-like instrument made from a ram's horn, is the main symbol of Rosh Hashanah. In fact, when the holiday is mentioned in the Torah, its name is "the time of the shofar blowing", not "Rosh Hashanah".
On Rosh Hashanah, we read the part of the Torah that describes Abraham's binding of his son, Yitzchak, to be sacrificed at G-d's command. First, G-d calls to Abraham. Abraham responds, "Hinneni" ("Here I am") , the rest of the events of the Akieda proceed. Eventually the ram stuck by his horns in the thicket is discovered, and everyone (except the ram) lives either happily thereafter or not, depending on whose interpretation you prefer.
Similarly, the sound of the shofar heralded the events at Mount Sinai. Just before the Torah was revealed to us, as one nation, we said a plural parallel to "hinneni", "Naaseh v'Nishma", ("We will do and we will hear/understand.")
This phrase, "Naaseh v'Nishma" represents Judaism's focus on the value of behavior before belief. Belief, understanding, and faith are experienced as a result of action. Performing a good deed with imperfect motives is preferable to refraining from acting, waiting until the motives are pure. Ultimately, over time and through repetition, proper motives will come to accompany proper behavior.
What a relief that ones merits can accrue directly from actions, which are concrete and observable! How liberating to be free of the need to produce faith on demand, or to expect it of others. We, the nation of Israel, struggle with G-d. We are not judged by the current status of the struggle, but by our willingness to engage in it, and by our behaviour.
I have always taken refuge and found comfort in this approach, because the "naaseh" part is in my hands. I control how I behave. That second part, the "nishma" - the belief, the understanding, the faith - often eludes me. When asked about personal issues of faith, I'd respond, "I'm working on 'naaseh' for now."
And that's why Tante Ursula's pots rattled me.
Does it matter if there is a mismatch between the spiritual level of one's thoughts if one behaves well both in public and in private? Is it enough to concentrate energy on the outside and inside of the pots, neglecting the bottom? Can't the bottom of the pot wait until later? How urgent is the status of the bottom of the pot?
A person could go a lifetime, never giving much thought to the condition of her pot bottoms. The kitchen would likely function well enough, wouldn't it?
However, it is difficult to imagine someone who takes care to clean the bottoms of the pots, not having spotless pots overall. This is analogous to one whose spirituality doesn't translate into good behavior. Such misguided values result in a meal we would not be eager to share.
Judaism's behaviorist philosophy leads me to imagine that even someone who never intended to take care of the cooking parts of her pots, would experience an improvement in this area. Scouring the bottom of a pot makes it impossible to ignore the parts that touch food.
The private, ineffable, "non-functional" aspects of one's spiritual life, like the bottoms of the soup pot, deserve the same diligent scrutiny and thoughtful attention as the outside. Tante Ursula's subtle lesson struck me then, and has stayed with me since.
It is of the most religiously motivating ideas I've experienced.
While distance prevents us from spending Rosh Hashanah with them, we think of them often during the holidays (and throughout the year). And for me, particularly when faced with a sink full of Yom tov dishes to wash.
I wish Uncle David, Tante Ursula, their children and grandchildren, the readers of this blog, and all of Israel a chatima tova. May a year of health, happiness, prosperity and peace be sealed for all of us.
May we all have the time, energy, and inclination to clean even the bottoms of our pots.
UPDATE (September 24, 2007): This article was also published at BeyondBT. Additional discussion may be found in the comments on that page.)
Readers, commenters, visitors, friends, family, and those I frequently read:
(No, I'm not telling you which is which. I love you all the same. Now go clean your room.)
שנה טובה ומתוקה שנשמע רק בשורות טובות לכל עם ישראל
Life.
September 11, 2001 was the 10th birthday of my friend's daughter, Dahlia. This was her reaction.
Life is our honor, our privilege, our gift, our victory.
Gretta is named after my beloved Grandma Belle, who died before I had children.
Here is a picture of Gretta, visiting Grandma Belle's grave yesterday. She is putting rocks on the gravestone, which is the Jewish custom for showing respect/attendance at a graveside.
May you be written in the book of LIFE for the coming year.
Remember the turkey chicks? They've grown a lot over the Summer and have become a marauding horde, terrorizing the neighborhood's tidy lawns and flower gardens.
They're almost as tall as Emily now. The smallest is taller than Gretta.
The local residents are much less amused with them than they were in May.
On a related note, Mother in Israel says "teenagers are a tikkun". As I have a teen, a tween, and three 'in the wings', (my apologies - couldn't resist the ornithological pun) I find this attitude very helpful. "Tikkun" is a much better -more accurate and more positive - word than "nissayon" (test/trial) which I had been using.
A trial is an opportunity to fail, to be found lacking, to be found guilty. (Okay, it's also an opportunity to succeed, to be found competent, to be found not guilty, too. But show me a parent in the trenches of adolescence who sees it that way, and I'll show you someone whose confidence gives me an involuntary shudder of superstition. Sometimes, bliss is ignorant.)
Instead of thinking of this time as a trial, I'm going to try to think of it as an opportunity to repair. Instead of thinking of it as the bill coming due for how much trouble I caused my parents, I'll (attempt to) see it as an opportunity to 'pay down the balance' that I owe them.
Which brings me to my revision of the "Parent's Curse". The Parent's Curse is when parents see their child misbehaving, and say, "May you have kids just like you."
This always bothered me, not only because of the incredibly distasteful idea of cursing your own kids, but also because of the astounding short-sightedness of wishing for ill-behaved grandchildren.
Instead, when I to catch them doing something extraordinary, I offer them my Parent's Blessing: "May you have kids just like you." (G-d forbid they have kids just like me! If they do, I'm not babysitting.)
(Please give me 10 points for having the restraint and good taste to refrain from referring to "leaving the nest" or calling grandchildren "a feather in my cap". See the Savage Chickens: The Optimist Cartoon and Savage Chickens: Therapy Hut Cartoon for more foul advice.)
Nefesh b'Nefesh turns 5 years old.
(Disclosure: Naftali (hy"d) was my husband's cousin.)
Please note: this blog is not updated on Friday nights or Saturdays. Comments made during this time will be put in a queue, to be moderated after Shabbat.
Per request, here are my meal planners for your (free) downloading pleasure:
Just before putting on her play sunglasses, Gretta said, "Look out, Mommy! You're gonna be all pink!"
Would that perspective were as easy to manage and share as a pair of sunglasses.
A friend called to vent this morning, about an interaction with a mutual friend that kept her up all night, agitating about her responses and replies. I know and care about both parties involved.
Both women are caring, loving, sensitive people. Both mean well. They are friends, and only want the best for one another.
The problem is they both know what's best for the other person. They just disagree about what that is. As a result, each feels the other disapproves of her life choices. And they're both right about that.
Yet the criticism they each sense comes from love and friendship.
It's as though one is wearing green sunglasses and the other blue. They're both looking at the same garden, yet can't understand why the other person continues to insist on describing the flowers by the wrong color.
If only they could switch glasses for just a moment, they'd understand.
Are you familiar with the Sesame Street song, "Monster in the Mirror" sung by the Grover (the hapless blue monster who speaks without contractions)?
In the real lyrics by Norman Stiles, Grover sings, "Wubba wubba wubba, wubba wubba wooo".
Here is a link to a video of Grover the Monster performing it.
It's a very cute song as written, but during the Jewish New Year season I always think of it with the following slightly modified lyrics: (Note: "mochel" is the Hebrew word for "forgive". We formally ask each other for forgiveness around this time of year.)Grover: Saw a monster in my mirror when I woke today. A monster in my mirror, but I did not run away.I had to face my fear and look inside my head. Though the monster looked at me and this is what he said:
"Mochel, mochel, mochel", you can join in too. Please will you mochel me? And know I mochel you."
Chorus: He asked, "Won't you, mochel, mochel, mochel, mochel me?
Mochel, mochel, mochel, won't you mochel me please?"
He asked, "Mochel, mochel, mochel" so I asked him too: "Will you mochel me, and I will mochel you."
Monsters: Will you mochel me? Please know I mochel you.
Grover: Told the monster in the mirror, "I am kind of scared." Nervously smiled at him because he saw my soul was bared. Well, the monster wondered what to do, he smiled right back and then... The monster in the mirror sang this song again:
Chorus: He went "Won't you, mochel, mochel" and I sang along, cause "Mochel, mochel, mochel" is a proper song.
Monsters: "Mochel, mochel, mochel" is a proper song.
Grover and monsters: Chorus (a capella/voices only)
Grover: He went, "Won't you, mochel, mochel" and I sang along, (instrumental music returns) 'Cause "Mochel, mochel, mochel" is a Tishrei song.
Monsters: "Mochel, mochel, mochel" is a Tishrei song.
Grover: Every mirror has a monster in it, do not doubt. This kind of situation does not call for freaking out. And do nothing that you would not like to see him do...'Cause that monster in the mirror, he just might be you!
Chorus:
Monsters: Will you mochel me and I will mochel you?
Grover: In Tishrei, "Will you mochel me?" is the thing to do.
Grover and monsters: Yes, please mochel us. We mochel you.
Unidentified monster: (spoken) We mochel you.
That's T for the Hebrew month of Tishrei. And 10, as in 10 days.
Rosh Hashanah starts on the first day of Tishrei. This year (2007, or 5768, depending on which calendar you're using) it begins on Wednesday evening, September 12. Counting TODAY, there are 10 days left until Rosh Hashanah.
What follows is my own non-exhaustive, imperfectly-edited collection of lists of things to freak out about consider before the Jewish ("high") holidays. I'm sharing them because it can be helpful to read such a list (not to adopt it completely, but rather) as a trigger to remember things that might otherwise fall through the cracks.
The list items are in no particular order.
If you don't find this type of exercise helpful, please move along. This is a ridiculously long post.
Spiritual preparation is not in the scope of this message. The purpose of these lists is to focus on the physical stuff to clear our heads for the Big Stuff to come.
I guess you could call this an exercise in Getting Jewish Things Done (jGTD? gJtd?)
(Disclaimers: Since this is my list, it is geared to our Ashkenazi, non-chassidic, yekkish (German-Jewish), orthodox family living outside-of-Israel (in the U.S.) Everyone's list will vary with their circumstances and customs.
We're hosts, not guests. If you're traveling, there will be scads of other stuff to do, such as acquiring hostess gifts, packing, etc. Personally, I'd rather cook for a month than pack for a week.
Please consult your local halachic authority about anything that differs from what you normally do. I'm not any sort of halachic authority. I don't even play one on t.v.
I'm not trying to tell anyone (other than my recalcitrant self) what to do. My goal is to help those who want to do these things remember that the time to do them is nigh.
Non-Jews are hereby invited to skip this post. Or you can stay and just smile and nod sympathetically like we do in December. Really, though, I can't imagine it holds any interest to those who aren't in this particular foxhole. Due to time constraints, I'm not going to translate the Jewish and Hebrew terms much. The OU.org website is a fount of legitimate and useful information, such as their Jewish Holiday Calendar overview.
I'm sure I've forgotten at least something vital. Please don't immerse this list in water or hold it while running with scissors. I'm cold, go put on a sweater... )
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