Worlds Away

I'm sitting on the balcony of my room at a very nice hotel/resort/spa that my company has seen fit to locate me in while I await an important meeting. Granted I'm not too keen on traveling this late in the summer. I should be at home working on the house and getting ready for the onslaught of fall holidays.

Reflecting on this past summer is a bit tough. I can't help but feel that I have let things slip a little too much on the Jewish front. I live in the constant fear that I'm not doing enough to ensure our kids get the Jewish education that they need in order to survive in this goyeshe world. What kind of example do we set when we are too tired from work to go to minyan. It's not that tough and for the most part it's only thirty or forty minutes out of the day.

Lots happened this summer. In May we bought a house. It's not a new house, but it's new to us. Everyone finally has a room and things are starting to settle down as we all look around and realize we are home. I keep waiting for that feeling to come to fruition. I come home, but it's not "home" yet. We still have to build memories and traditions at this new house. Almost immediately after closing on the house I was off on travel for the day job and spent most of the summer working away from home. And now as High Holy Days approach I am once again on travel. I'm really growing tired of the travel, but the money I get from doing this jobs is what's making it possible to buy the house that we all love.

As a family we spent exactly zero time at shul from the time we moved until now. It got so bad that the Rabbi actually sent me an e-mail last week to make sure that we were okay and planning to come back. I'm sure things will improve once the school year starts and we get back into the routine of Wednesday Hebrew School, Saturday Junior Congregations and Sunday Religious School. I remember some years that I would feel more at home in my shul than at home. We have close friends at shul but now after taking about three months off and being vacant I wonder how much of a friend they think we are.

My daily observance has waned more than I would like it to be. It seems almost strange to get back into my routine now that I've taken so much time off. And again I wonder what kind of example I'm setting for the kids. Are they thinking, "Being Jewish is cool, as long as it doesn't interfere with whatever else I want to do."? Because that seems to be what's going on now. I have to learn to make a stand in my house. I have to be Gandalf and say "This far and no further! You SHALL NOT PASS!"

As a bright spot this will be the first year that we build a sukkah in the backyard as this is the first year we've ever had a yard. I've been researching sukkah designs and think I've come up with a very workable plan using galvanized brackets from Home Depot, about 20 2x4s and a lot of tree cuttings. It should work out and if it does I'll post pictures.

Another routine I need to reestablish is using my blog. It seems I get fired up about something, post it, and then disappear for a year or so. Maybe I should use Rosh Hashana and rededicate myself to being more active in my shul, blogging regularly and growing as a person. Nah, that sounds a lot like work, and right now I have all the work I can stand.

Smoking, it can kill 'ya!

Yes, I confess, I am a smoker. I wish I weren’t. I've tried to quit, and will try again, but for now I am a smoker. I try to be polite about my smoking. I don't smoke near anyone (except other smokers), I never smoke where children can see me, and I always feel guilty when I smoke. Plus I don't smoke on Shabbat or Yom Tov. Granted sometimes I'm making a break for the smokes as soon as I can after Havdalah some nights, but for the most part I can make it a day with no problem.

Today, as I casually glanced at my calendar to make sure all preparations had been made for the High Holy Days, it finally hit me; Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. When we start Rosh HaShanah on Wednesday night I won't be able to smoke again until Saturday night (approximately 7:30-7:45pm) and Sunday is the Fast of Gedalia from Sunrise to Sunset so no smoking then. And then I start thinking about how stupid it is to go the Ten Days of Repentance asking HaShem to seal my name in the Book of Life while I'm smoking a cigarette, so I could, theoretically go from the evening of September 12 until the evening of September 22, smoke free (and somewhat more guilt free than usual), at which point I may as well quit entirely.

Then again Sukkot will be just around the corner and smoking near a Sukkah can be a very dangerous prospect, so there could be eight more days...

Maybe I should check on the patch and see how that works.

Any way in case anyone is actually reading my blog nowadays, L'shana Tova everyone! May this be a sweet new year for us all!

Careful Which Meetings You Attend

My family have been members of our Temple for almost seven years now and in all of this time I have never joined any of the clubs or committees. The kids' mother has been a member of the Sisterhood since just about day one, but due to work commitments and exhaustion I just never participated in anything other than the regular religious services.

This year I decided to make a change. This would be the year that I finally joined the Men’s Club and started building my own social network at the shul instead of depending upon my daughter’s circles of friends. So I took the Daughter to Sunday Religious School and attended the morning minyan as I do each week and met up with the Men’s Club President afterwards. I told him about being a member of the shul for several years, etc. etc. and by the end of the meeting I had not only joined the Men’s Club, but I was also appointed Secretary of the Men's Club and invited to make inputs on the Sukkah project and join in on the sandbox project.

After the meeting I came to realize that the wives and mothers are the real political power at our shul. None of our projects interfere with theirs, none of our fund raisers can interfere with theirs, and we tend to move heavy things for them. Okay, fine by me. So nothing has really changed but now I get to pay membership dues.