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Over the years I have come to appreciate how Jewish customs give us time to grieve and to heal.  When we lose someone beloved, we are allowed a week away from the world.  We are not made responsible for meals or for everyday chores.  Those who visit us during shiva, the first seven days of mourning, are reminded not to expect us to  be responsive or even sociable – the rabbis advise the community just to sit with those who mourn, not to try and comfort them, but to witness their grief and to honor it.

Only at the end of the week do we make the first tremulous steps back into the world.  A mourner is gently accompanied outside and taken for a short walk around the block.  The mourner, like someone recovering from illness, is weak and needs support.

For thirty days, during shloshim, mourners are allowed time to feel free from social obligations.  Only after a month, should we expect a mourner to be able to attend celebrations and festivals.  And our liturgy offers mourners a prayer to recite each day for a year.  Those who have recited the Mourner’s Kaddish each day know how it can become a meditation on memory, an acknowledgment of loss.  We mark the yahrzeit of our loss, we remember our beloveds at particular liturgical times each year with a yahrzeit service.  We give ourselves time.

Over a decade ago, long before our congregation came into existence, I experienced medical challenges I struggled with mostly on my own.  Of course, Ralf was my support and my strength.  Still, hardly anyone knew what was happening and I still prefer not to speak of that time.  But what happened left me with fears, particularly around surgery.

So even though a thyroidectomy is not major surgery, and even though I am likely not facing anything terribly threatening to my health, I have been unsettled and uneasy.

I realized, though, that I could rely far more on Jewish tradition than I ever imagined possible when there was no congregation nearby.  Now, I am part of a loving community.  I realized that it was all right to ask for help.  I thought about our mourning traditions around shiva and shloshim.  I became aware that these traditions served as a model for those who were facing medical challenges.

I decided that I would take seven days after the surgery to rest and recuperate, and remind myself that I was not obligated to do everyday tasks.  I was going to plan for quiet and rest.

I was further going to listen to my surgeon when he told me that it could take a month for me to feel like myself.  I was going to say (and sing, as soon as I could!) healing prayers.  I would recite Modah Ani, to thank God for the miracle of my body and Elohai Neshama, to express thanks for the gift of my soul.

Why do I write this?

Because I would like to remind us all that Jewish tradition and our liturgy afford us ample opportunity to grieve as long as we feel our grief, to take the time we ourselves decide we need to heal, and to rely on the community to help take care of us.  I write this so that you know that I am grateful for your support, for your good wishes, and for your prayers.

One important Jewish tradition is to have a dedicated group of congregational members at the ready to organize and mobilize support for those of us in need. Heather Chait, as you all know, has just stepped forward to reform our Chicken Soup Committee. Its members might write cards, make calls, and help mobilize us all when our help is needed.  It’s not hard to write a get-well card or make a phone call to check on an elderly congregant or to use internet resources that help the congregation respond with meals or other services if someone is taken seriously ill.  Please join – we can all take a turn!

May we share in taking care of each other.  May we practice lovingkindess and patience.  May we be gentle with ourselves and others.

And may we say, “amen.”

Rabbi Barbara

She took it upon herself some years ago. She would hunt for information after every service, after every festival celebration, after every single congregational event.

Who had prepared and set up rooms? Who had decorated? Who was responsible for oneg? Who had stayed to clean and sort and put things in order before we left?

Then, she would call up each family, each individual. She would thank them personally.

“It’s so important,” she told me. “People need to be thanked. They need to be appreciated.”

Ruth Kingberg, once the head of the oneg committee in her congregation back up north, the matriarch of our congregation, the first up to dance and the first to offer a hug, is our role model. What she does is, in fact, so important.

What keeps folks going who are paid little to nothing for all they do for the congregation? Our appreciation.

What helps anyone feel that what he or she does is worthwhile? Our thanks.

What creates a sacred community, one committed to caring for one another in good times and bad? Mutual respect and support.

When was the last time you thanked someone in the congregation for what he or she did to create the good feeling and the sacred space we enjoy?

Our opportunities are everywhere. Why not express gratitude for a wonderful hagbah, when one of our own holds the Torah aloft with all three columns wide open and clear for us to see? Whoever is doing the heavy lifting that night would probably love to receive our appreciation.

What about thanking the children when they sing for us and help lead our prayers. What about acknowledging the harmonies now enriching our prayer experience?

What about thanking folks for the wonderful food they are bringing, for the physical labor of bringing in and setting up chairs and tables and taking them down long after most of us have left? What about thanking the teachers who sacrifice their month of Sundays (and then some) in education committee meetings, in creating lesson plans, in shopping for the kids? What about expressing our appreciation for those who help us organize opportunities for tikkun olam?

What about simply turning to each other and thanking the person next to you for showing up to make a minyan, for engaging in prayer with us, for asking about our family and work life?

Remember your Books of Life from the High Holy Days?

Here’s a suggestion: Think of people you could thank. Make a list in your book of all those people – all the people who are doing something to help keep Temple Or Olam going. Write an email. Send a card. Remember to pass your thanks along at the next oneg.

Ruth is right: It’s so important.

P.S. And while we are on the subject of thanks: Many thanks to Heather Chait for stepping up to lead our Chicken Soup Committee.  I didn’t expect to be the first recipient of her committee’s care, but I want to take the opportunity to thank her and all those who have been so kindly offering to help take care of us after my surgery next week.  Ralf and I are very grateful!

Dear Temple Or Olam Members,

Before you light the Hanukkiah tonight, please take a moment to grab some paper and a pencil.

Then, light the first candle.

Wait just a little to open the presents. First, take a few moment to engage in knowing, in recognizing, and – most importantly, to rededicating.

Watch the candle burn – it takes just thirty minutes. If children and family are near, sit with one another. The candle will flicker and hold, stretch and go small. The blue at the core gives way to gold. Light, offered through the thin wick, is fragile, tender.

What are your hopes? What are your dreams?  Talk to the children about theirs.

Reflect on the things that matter most to you, the things that remind you who you want to be. Name your needs.  Then, write them down in the form of blessings. “May I be blessed with…” “May I find…” “May I know…”

Collect your blessings and drop them in a bowl. Do this as often as you like – perhaps the first and final nights of Hanukkah. Perhaps every other night. Perhaps each night.

These are your extra Hanukkah gifts to yourselves.

Hanukkah means “rededicate.” It is a time of year to assess, to reflect, to rededicate ourselves to all the wishes made during High Holy Days, to remember that we made such wishes. At Yom Kippur, we asked the Holy One of Blessing to give us the chance to do better this next year, to receive the blessings of wisdom and insight, to be granted opportunities to give and to award ourselves the right to receive.

We dedicated ourselves then to the tasks of becoming better at the job of being human, of growing in our Jewish practice and of building and caring for our Jewish community.

Let us rededicate ourselves to understanding what it is we need, what gifts may be ours to give ourselves. When we grow and learn, when we care for ourselves and others, when we reach out to connect with our community, that is when we ourselves help create the blessings we ask for.

When Hanukkah is over, collect your blessings and glue them into your Books of Life, the ones everyone received at High Holy Days. Look at them, their covers filled with stars and glittery colors. Look at your early notes, at your prayers, at the poetry we read together.

Abracadabra. We create that which we name.

May the Holy One bless all of you this first night of Hanukkah with all that you hope for!

Rabbi Barbara