Friday, December 21, 2012

School Closings Due to Mayan Apocalypse Rumors? Seriously?

This is shameful and inane hysteria gone wild. Adults need to lead, not follow. Referring to the administrators who made this decision as "leaders" is oxymoronic. How about deciding to suspend the regular curricular priorities and empowering teachers and students to spend time discussing both the tragedy in CT last Friday and the rumors? Materials for talking with kids about violence are readily available. So are materials about how gossip and sensationalism can be dangerous if not kept in thoughtful perspective. If there is such a level of excitement about all this, the students obviously need to talk about it and process their feelings and thoughts with guidance. Giving them days off from school is just abdicating responsibility for educating them for life.  This is a classic "teachable moment!"  What a waste!

Friday, November 30, 2012

I Blinked

I blinked. 
That's how it happened. 
Tonight, as I blessed my son before blessing the wine and challah at our Shabbat table, we were both standing up. I noticed that I was looking up at his beautiful face. It took him until the last sentence of the blessing to figure out why I looked so puzzled and surprised. He is suddenly taller than I am. Only a few short weeks ago, we had checked and I still had about a half-inch on him. Now, if my hand felt correctly when we stood back-to-back in our stocking feet, he has an inch on me. So we said Shehecheyanu together (the Hebrew blessing for arriving at an auspicious moment). I remain in shock. Quite pleased with himself, "You're next!" he tosses at his Mama with a gleeful grin. We sit down to bless G-d for the meal and enjoy it.

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Unreasonableness Rewarded

Awake at this hour, beyond reason, I am rewarded with the sound of an Eastern screech owl on a warm October night.

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Obstruction Equals Thievery

"Barack Obama began his Presidency devoted to the idea of post-partisanship. His rhetoric, starting with his “Red State, Blue State” Convention speech, in 2004, and his 2006 book, “The Audacity of Hope,” was imbued with that idea. Just as in his memoir, “Dreams from My Father,” he had tried to reconcile the disparate pasts of his parents, Obama was determined to bring together warring tribes in Washington and beyond. He extended his hand to everyone from the increasingly radical leadership of the congressional Republicans to the ruling mullahs of the Iranian theocracy. The Republicans, however, showed no greater interest in working with Obama than did the ayatollahs. The Iranian regime went on enriching uranium and crushing its opposition, and the Republicans, led by Dickensian scolds, including the Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell, committed themselves to a single goal: to engineer the President’s political destruction by defeating his major initiatives. Obama, for his part, did not always prove particularly adept at, or engaged by, the arts of retail persuasion, and his dream of bipartisanship collided with the reality of obstructionism."

This quote comes from a "New Yorker Magazine" article. To me, it is one of the most important pieces of the picture and one that has not been voiced often or loudly enough. The obstructionists in congress referred to by "the editors" not only slowed Obama's progress and damaged his ability to achieve anything close to what he had hoped (while providing fodder for Romney to complain about Obama not keeping promises), they neglected to do their jobs: representing and advocating for the citizens who elected them. Instead, they attempted to usurp our  jobs--to vote for or against a candidate for office, to use our voices to show approval or disapproval. They preempted the citizens of the United States, trying to steal the decision from us. It was the first of many methods the GOP is using to manipulate our right to vote for those who lead and serve our country in public office.

Now, let's just think logically for a moment. Do you think that if they had a viable, fair, and valuable alternative to Obama they would have to go to such lengths to swindle the American people? I don't. If you are undecided, please consider giving Barack Obama four more years to accomplish OUR goals. Romney will take us back, not forward, and he said last night at Lynn University that his plans would need eight to ten years to see results.

I am not willing to wait that long. Are you?

Friday, October 05, 2012

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Helpless Hopeful

I think of you
I miss you
I ache on your behalf
Lacking actions or words that can heal you
I am at a loss
Far away with helpless, taskless hands waving uselessly in the air at the end of shrugging shoulders
Wishing we could sing or dance or walk together to take your mind
Away from the pain
Away from the past
Toward the the new chapter in your life
Where I, too, need a new place
Or maybe an old one
Where I need to find my way
My role
In a landscape of your creation
Your control
Your choices
   and mine.

Monday, April 23, 2012

Hawks in Spring!

Red-tailed hawk eggs are hatching in Ithaca, NY, at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. You can watch!

Cornell Hawk-Cam watching Big Red & Ezra nesting.

I'm sad to report that there are no eggs in the Cooper's hawk nest around the block, where we've watched a pair of hawks raise broods for three or four years in a row. The hawks have not returned this year. Perhaps they are using a nest somewhere nearby. Or perhaps something happened to one or both of them. All I know is that I have missed seeing them adding sticks to the nest in preparation for eggs and chicks.

Later this spring, I will miss the mother's imperious look from forty feet up in a tree as I shift my position on the sidewalk below to gain a better view of her face or her tail, or, even later in the season, the heads of her curious young poking up over the edge of the nest. I will miss hearing the male and female call to each other to signal a changing of the guard or the delivery of fresh food. I'll even miss the splatter painting on the street below the nest as it grows with the chicks, who learn (or instinctively know) to lift their hindquarters over the rim before releasing waste so as to keep their lofty home clean.

In mid-summer, I will miss the excitement of young hawks leaving the nest for the first time--tentatively trying their wings as they hop along a branch, then from branch to branch, and eventually figure out how to actually fly. I have watched this process for many hours over the last several summers. It never grows old, though my feet and legs get tired and my neck gets stiff. Getting to watch my very own live episode of Wild Kingdom is worth the discomfort.

Friday, March 30, 2012

Thursday, March 29, 2012

Our Son's Smile

My son has the most beautiful smile.  I know.  Every mother says that about her child.  And we all should.  The problem is, I used to be able to capture that smile in photographs.  Then, my son's school hired a new school photographer.  You know, the person who comes once a year to take school photographs.  This guy stole my son's smile.  Or drove it away.  One way or another, my son could no longer smile naturally for a photograph.  He complained bitterly about the photographer.  "He makes us pose in unnatural poses."  "He wants me to show my teeth and I don't feel comfortable smiling with my teeth."

It's true.  I taught at my son's school and I witnessed this guy, firsthand, with the children in my class.  One little boy with the most angelic smile came outside for his turn on a lovely October day to be photographed for a school portrait.  He sat down where he'd seen the previous victim get up at the end of her turn.  I wondered what Josh was thinking of, because his smile looked so loving and natural.  I thought, "Wow!  He must be thinking of his mom looking at this picture.  She is going to just melt when she see's this face."  Then Mr. Photographer wiped it out with one sentence:  "Okay, show me some teeth!"  Instantly, Josh pulled his lips back in the most mechanical way to "smile" for the camera.  I cringed.  The shutter snapped.  Picture ruined.

So it must have gone with my son in his sessions with this man.  And for years now, we haven't ordered school portraits.  They just don't look like our child.  He doesn't like them and neither do we.  You can imagine how concerned I was about his bar mitzvah* photos.  Candid shots often came out looking great.  Posed shots did not.  Ever.  It was really hard to get my son to smile naturally if he knew a photo was being taken.

Because the use of cameras is not permitted in our congregation on the Sabbath, we arranged with our photographer to take pictures in the sanctuary the Sunday morning before my son's big day.  Marla Michele Must of Enchanted Photography (southeastern Michigan) agreed to meet us at Congregation Beth Ahm at 11:00 that Sunday morning.  When we arrived, she was already there, reveling in the beauty of our sanctuary, snapping pictures, and smiling broadly.  Her son, a school friend of our son's, was there, too.

We began our photo shoot.  And something happened.  Our son's smile came back.  I don't know for certain what combination of factors caused him to be able to relax and be himself in front of the camera.  Was it Marla's excitement?  Was it ours?  His?  Was it the presence of a friend watching and interacting with him from the side?   I won't ever know.  All I do know is that it felt magical that morning—really spiritual and joyful.  It felt to me like Marla was the key, the linchpin, that brought a sense of true celebration to all the moments she captured on "film."  Thank you, Marla, for helping us recover our son's smile.






*Bar/bat mitzvah--Jewish rite of passage at which a child becomes, for ritual/liturgical purposes, a fully responsible adult in the community.

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Friday, March 16, 2012

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Catalyst

I am amazed at how one event, one moment in time with a unique confluence of factors, can catalyze positive energy that results in a cascade of life changes.  Here's what I'm talking about.

Almost two years ago, I was laid off from a job I once loved, but which hadn't been enjoyable for a long time.  The environment I was working in was painfully full of fear, conflict, hypocrisy, and disappointment.  It left me spent, deeply discouraged, just surviving through the aftermath: two years of self-doubt, self-loathing, fighting for my dignity as I applied for one job after another and rarely heard anything.  Suffice it to say that, although I had turned around some aspects of my life on my own, to do so took a tremendous expense of energy, which often flagged.  The resulting state of mind  did not qualify me as a healthy, never mind happy, person.  I was depressed.  Deeply so at times.

In January, unexpectedly, when I certainly didn't feel ready for it, something changed.  I attended the bar mitzvah--the ritual of Jewish adulthood--of a camp friend of my son's.  My family and I spent the entire weekend with people who seemed to exude love, warmth, and celebration of life--this boy's family.  By the end of the weekend, though I didn't know it yet, the self-protective, insulating walls I had built up over years of being knocked down time after time by life's events seemed to crumble.  I was vulnerable again.  I was feeling my powerful feelings--of all kinds--without cushion or anything to numb me.  It was exhilarating and scary.  It was exciting and wonderful to feel anything again and, at the moments that what I felt was related to fear or pain, I grieved profoundly.  The highs and lows shook me.

It so happened that as soon as we came home from that bar mitzvah, I had to kick myself into high gear for my own son's bar mitzvah, just six weeks away.  Anyone who has ever planned a major life event to which many people are invited, and involving multiple gatherings for different sub-groups of invitees, numerous service providers, and complex recordkeeping--this one is coming to this event but not this event, and so on, not to mention last-minute changes--knows that I had my work cut out for me.  Add to that the fact that I was my son's coach for all the service skills he had to master for his ceremony, and you've got a recipe for major stress.

Riding on the energy I felt from that weekend in January, I somehow managed not only to get everything I needed into place (with substantial help from my spouse), I seemed to be attracting more positive energy.  I still had moments of depression.  Self-doubt didn't leave me altogether.  Yet, positive energy drove me forward, in large part manifested in the form of service providers who, one after another, reached beyond my high expectations, and made me feel as if we were their only client--or their favorite one--waiving charges, being flexible about numbers and deadlines, and helping with things that were not normally within the definition of their jobs.

All the events of the weekend seemed perfused with light.  Even when things went wrong they went right.  I felt buoyed by love.

Since then, the trend has continued.  Postponing focus on my new business for "after the bar mitzvah is over," I have found a network of new entrepreneurial women who are supporting each other through the learning curves and growing pains of starting a new business in a tough economy.  I have found a life coach, inspirational speakers and teachers, old and new friends to talk to, and new clients for my business.  Each day, something happens that seems to point in the same direction, with the same message.  "The past is over.  You are able and worthy.  Go forward with confidence.  You are not alone; you will be supported."

Timing is everything.  In the darkest time of the year, this process began.  How fitting.  And how fitting that the deluge last night, with an impressive heavenly light and sound display, gave way today to plentiful warmth and sun.  I pray that the process continues.  You can be sure I'll be doing everything I can to make it do so.

Monday, March 12, 2012

Sunday, February 26, 2012

Janice Alone

You are far away from me.
I see you rarely.
The times in between are half-life to me.


Why should it be?
I have a full life.
Yet you magnify everything.


When you are far it all seems small and gray.
When you are far everything seems enveloped in shadow.
When you are far I crave your arms like a ship seeking a harbor.


When you are near I feel alive.
When you are near I bask in your glow.
When you are near I glow.


Why must you go?






Thursday, February 16, 2012

Insight

Perhaps one of the reasons the Talmud considers each individual to be an entire universe is because each of us is a universe of experiences, abilities, tastes, talents, emotions, and myriad other qualities.  Discovering a new person can be like exploring a universe, an adventure as exhilarating and invigorating as any.

This morning I was texting back and forth with a new friend.  This insight struck because I said (typed) something tongue-in-cheek that anyone who has known me for a long time would have recognized as such.  She took me quite seriously.  I explained where my comment had come from and she got it.  As we ended our chat, I smiled to think that we are on the brink of discovery.  We get each other in general.  We each know we've found a kindred spirit.  And yet we still have much to share of ourselves, much to explain, much to explore.  My new friendship and the promise it holds truly delight me.  I've been smiling a lot.

Monday, January 16, 2012

Six Word Story 2

Love burgeons. Brews. Confessed, everything changes.

Sunday, January 01, 2012

Six Word Story 1

Unemployed sixteen months. Contemplating what's next.