A Lesson in Anarcha-Feminism at Lush

Today, I said "yes" to three new gigs sort of kind of officially. One is with a Jewish school, one is with a Jewish author, and the other is with a really awesome Jewish project that I will blog more about later. In between all of that "yessing" I was running oodles of errands to fun places like Target and Whole Foods. I also happened to stop by Lush, one of my most favorite stores in the entire world. This isn't only because their products are amazing, but because to be honest, they have the best customer service and employees on the planet. Period. Moisturized hands down.

Oddly enough, while this trip to Lush -- where the amazing Sales Girl talked me into probably way more than I needed -- I had an educational experience. You see, I wear a lot of purple. It happened by chance that my MacBook cover is purple, my cellphone cover is purple, my favorite shoes and sandals are purple, and so on. In fact, I got rid of a purse that was purple because I felt like people thought I was nuts. But today I happened to be wearing a purple tichel from Israel, a shirt with black and purple headphones on it, and my purple sandals.

Oy.

Sales Girl: You like purple?
Me: Oh, geez ... yeah. I do. It's become my favorite color recently.
Sales Girl: It's my favorite color, too!
Me: Oh nice.
Sales Girl: Especially purple and black!
Me: I seem to wear a lot of that.
Sales Girl: You know those are the colors of Anarcha-Feminism, right?
Me: Oh, really.
Sales Girl: Do you know what that is?
Me: Um ... no.

The Sales Girl proceeded to explain the idea behind Anarcha-Feminism, which left me feeling a wee bit weird. Why? Well, the concept of Anarcha-Feminism basically marries anarchy and feminism (and that's sort of a pun, because A-Fs don't really believe in marriage). It differs (according to my Lush gal) in the fact that Feminism demands equality, and A-F calls for a reevaluation of the establishment of patriarchy. Here, how about this:

Anarcha-Feminism views patriarchy as a manifestation of involuntary hierarchy. Anarcha-feminists believe that the struggle against patriarchy is an essential part of class struggle, and the anarchist struggle against the state. In essence, the philosophy sees anarchist struggle as a necessary component of feminist struggle and vice-versa. 

Interesting. And there I was, in my head covering, married, being that stereotype of what A-Fs argue as the stifling of "individual growth." As I looked over the amazing Lush dry shampoos, I explained how covering my hair has affected my hair, and she responded with some ideas. But from the moment she was rubbing Dream Cream all over my hands and explaining Anarcha-Feminism to me, I felt, as I said, weird. I also started to wonder whether lots of people know about A-F and think my purple-black combo means something more than it actually does.

Oddly enough, A-F was really championed by Emma Goldman, an Orthodox-born Jew who helped establish the anarchist movement in North America. When she died in 1940, she was against the war with Hitler, which makes me wonder whether, with as politically active as she was, really knew what was happening. Anarchist or not, I think there comes a point when your values can be challenged by reality. [Read more about Goldman on JWA Online, too!]

Either way, weird or not, learning about Anarcha-Feminism was interesting, despite it being a philosophy I'd never personally consider or take on. 

Have you ever heard of A-F? Would you call yourself a Feminist? Is there a place for Feminism in Orthodox Judaism?

A Historical Minute

The hat tip on this goes to my Uncle David, who sent this to me via email today. It's an interesting look at some important historical moments in Jewish history. Enjoy!

American Minute with Bill Federer
Ferdinand and Isabella sent Columbus on his voyage in 1492 after they liberated Spain from occupying Muslim forces.

Spain's policies then forced Jews to flee, first to Portugal, then to Amsterdam, where some sailed with Dutch merchants to South America.

When Spain attacked there, they fled again and 23 refugees, on the French ship Sainte Catherine, became the first Jews to arrive in New Amsterdam in 1654.

Governor Stuyvesant tried to evict them, not letting them worship outside their homes.

In 1664, New Amsterdam became New York, where the first synagogue was built in 1730.

Jewish population in colonial America grew to 2,000 in 7 synagogues from New York to Savannah.

Beginning in 1830, Ellis Island had 250,000 Jews immigrate from persecution in Bavaria.

Starting in 1881, over 2 million Jews fled Russia's pogroms to America.

By 2006, Jews comprised 2 percent of U.S. population.

President Woodrow Wilson wrote:

"Whereas in countries engaged in war there are 9 million Jews, the majority of whom are destitute of food, shelter, and clothing; driven from their homes without warning ... causing starvation, disease and untold suffering. Whereas the people of the U.S. have learned with sorrow of this terrible plight, I proclaim JANUARY 27, 1916, a day to make contributions for the aid of the stricken Jewish people to the American Red Cross."

A Yiddishe Kupf -- A Jewish Head

In the eternal struggle, at the age of 27, to know who I am, who I was, how I got here, and -- I hope -- where I'm going, I've been digging through an old LiveJournal, old poems, things that smatter my hard drive from years gone by, things I'd probably attempted to forget for one reason or another.

This is something I wrote on April 25, 2006, as part of a final paper for my Jewish-American Fictions course, which was one of my favorite courses of my undergraduate career. It was, also, the last class I attended as an undergraduate student at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. I wanted to create some poetry for the class, even though the course was on fiction, prose, not poetry. I am also trying to track down a sort of heart-wrenching poem I have about the Shoah and being a convert.

So, until then, here you are: A little piece of me, right around the time of my conversion to Judaism under Reform auspices.

Jewish-American fiction puts pen to paper, making an image of who 

we are and where we've been. It's Tova Mirvis making my heart bleed 

at the makings of a family figuring out when everything started changing 

and Jonathan Safran Foer making "small prayers to G-d" out of 

memory and religiosity. Jewish-American fiction places faces and makes 

a mosaic out of the grab bag of the things that mean "Jewish." Turning 

tradition into struggle, love and survival into the trappings of figuring out 

what modernity means to the tradition of remembering. Jewish-American 

fiction is a window to the outside world, as Jews and nonJews, and characters 

kept inside story forms make it possible to peek outside and see what we do to 

be Orthodox, Reform, lapsed, born again, a believer or dreamer, secular, 

sane, insane, in love and out of love, living, dying and surviving. 


But above all else, when we are bound to a book below lamplight,
 

it’s easiest to say that Jewish-American fiction is the definition of humanity.

I ended the paper with the following, If anything, [Bernard] Malamud is using Jews as the example: Humanity at its core is Jewish. It is survival, perseverance and remembering so as not to repeat. By saying “all men are Jews,” Malamud creates a most-powerful metaphor, and an example, for all religions, races and nations. He simply is saying “here is the beginning, here is who you are, don’t forget it."

In response to my final paper (which is much longer than these two excerpts), my professor gave me one of the greatest compliments I've probably ever received from someone, and this was just as I was converting the first time around! He said, "Jewishness, Jewish culture, is a matter of putting pen to paper – you’ve got that down, too. You have what my mother would have called a Yiddishe kupf – a Jewish head. You see the subtleties, the nuances in things. You see the humor that’s enveloped in tragedy, and the tears hidden inside the laughter." Here's one Jew who knew.

A sampling of some of the amazing things we read that semester, which I definitely need to revisit are:

• "Lady of the Lake" by Bernard Malamud
• Maus I and Maus II by Art Spiegelman
• Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
• Goodbye, Columbus by Philip Roth
• The Outside World by Tova Mirvis
• "Electricity" by ... I can't remember. This bums me out greatly.
• "When You're Excused, You're Excused" by Bruce Jay Friedman
• The Inn at Lake Devine by Elinor Lipman
• The Shawl by Cynthia Ozick

And, if you know what's good for you, you'll purchase Bad Jews and Other Stories by Gerald Shapiro. Would I lead you astray? 

I Wanted to Be a What?

February 17, 2007
Post Title: Biggidy Bam (a meme)

And I quote ...

67. If you could have any job (assuming you have the skills) what would it be? rabbi or judaic studies professor.

WHAT?! Okay, this journey back in time is going to be much more interesting than I anticipated ...

The Way We Were.

A friend posted on a forum some classic photos taken from 1939-1943 in color! Photos in color were rare back then, and these photos are so vivid and gritty ... I really can't put into words the emotions some of them evoke. This one, in particular, really struck me. It looks like it could have been set and taken today.

Women workers employed as wipers in the roundhouse having lunch in their rest room, Chicago and NW Railway Company. Clinton, Iowa. April 1943. Photo by Jack Delano. (Library of Congress)

You think about people looking different in a different era, their faces expressing the time, the place, their life then. I often look at the Jews around me, and -- morbidly -- I attempt to picture them in 1940s garb, what they'd look like in a kitchen in Germany or Austria or France circa 1938, and into the 1940s. Is that weird? Like I said, it's probably morbid. I have such an affinity for the past, my memories of moments thousands of years old vivid (that's another blog post, standing at Sinai, the imagery clear as my childhood in my mind), so these photos really sing to my spirit.

Woman working on a "Vengeance" dive bomber. Tennessee. February 1943. Photo by Alfred T. Palmer.
(Library of Congress)

You can view the rest of these photos by clicking here. Check out No. 30! (Shout out to Lincoln, Nebraska, there!)

Once Upon a Time, I Was Agnostic.

Let's get personal. I don't know that I've blogged about this specifically before, but I figure now's a good of time as any. I was inspired to write it after all the hullabaloo re: an earlier post on a certain rabbi who shall remain nameless.

When I was a kid, I didn't go to church. My parents weren't big believers (so far as I could tell), and we were raised on the Golden Rule (do unto others, etc.) and I got a small Precious Moments bible at one of my early birthdays. The only church I ever went to was with friends. This time of year, I'd be gearing up for Vacation Bible School, full of home-made ice cream and bible tales that I never retained. These characters, these Marks and Pauls and Johns and the Jesus guy ... well, I didn't believe.

I was a child, and I didn't believe. Jesus, to me, was a mythical creature, a fake person, a non-existent fabrication. A man to color in a coloring book. Religion didn't exist for me beyond something to do during the summer, and I never spoke to G-d, I spoke to my dead grandparents who I had never met and the stars in the sky (Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight ...). And then?

When I was about 10 years old, I experienced an incredibly scary crisis of reality: I realized that we die. I realized that at some point, life stops, and what comes after it I didn’t know. For two weeks I was awake every night in my day bed, the light of the moon peeking in my curtains, and I cried. I felt silly in the morning, and I never did tell my parents about it. I didn’t ask them. I felt as though I should know what happens when we die. But all I could picture in my mind was darkness, pitch black nothingness. I would talk to my grandparent’s (my father’s parents who I never knew) in the dark, asking them to ask G-d for a sign of what I needed to know, what death was about. And then, for some reason, I went to bed without tears. I’d realized that death didn’t matter, and what came after it certainly didn’t matter. Our life here – both how we live it and how we choose to live it – were what I realized are most important. Suddenly I understood. (From my conversion essay.)

This was when I started believing. At least, that's when I remember believing. In something bigger than us. There was something, someone, sitting somewhere, guiding our thoughts and our hopes and our deeds, and that was all that made sense. The here and now being so important, someone had to be expecting something of us, right?

I spent the next nearly 10 years floating in and out of Christianity, clubs and getaways in high school geared toward "being saved," and anticipating the "big reveal." I was waiting for the moment when I'd believe all the stuff I was being told, that I had been told for so long. But it never came. In high school, I decided it was all a sham and I couldn't do it anymore. I declared myself an agnostic -- I believed in something, I just didn't know what it was, but I felt it at my core. I couldn't define it, no matter how hard I tried. I was agnostic, I denied praxis entirely, and maintained that there was something, but that was it.

One day, I outlined my principals of belief. One Higher Power (HaShem?), a focus on this life, living for the good, doing good things and not focusing on only doing them for a someday entrance into eternal life, wherever or whatever that was, being more conscious of the world around me, and figuring it out. I was on the search. That thing at my core was yearning, hungry, trying to crawl out of its cocoon, and as I grew, it grew, and in the early years of college, over a conversation with a friend, I discovered what it was; it was Judaism, haShem, the Jewish people.

I was once a non-believer, then I was some kind of believer, I was a Christian faker at one point (and I gave that up pretty quick, believe you me, I felt like I was misleading my friends), I was another kind of believer, and then I found what I was looking for. Will I always be so healthy in my relationship with HaShem? No. No one is. We're all imperfect. If we were perfect living in a perfect world then I'm pretty sure Mashiach would be enjoying this coffee with me right about now. The point is to search and inquire and ask questions in the hopes of developing a more well-rounded and clear answer to all of the BIG QUESTIONS out there, including whether HaShem is, was, will be, and whether Judaism is the right response to an individual's neshama.

I have no direct line to the answers, but this works for me, even as an ever-curious academic analyzing tough and contradictory topics within academia and Judaism. But the inquiring and searching -- Judaism DEMANDS it! I like to think of myself as one in a long line of individuals who have been able to inquire, think, and insist on exploring while also believing, wholeheartedly, in this big, great, amazing thing we call Judaism.

I don't think it's easy for everyone, but I'm proud that I can seek and believe, that I can ask and brim with faithfulness. My academic inquiries, truth be told, have brought me closer to my belief. Maybe I'm an anomaly.

Memories, Nothing but Memories.

On the way down to Jersey yesterday night, I perused my computer's old files of poetry and photos of family and my early years in college at the Daily Nebraskan (forever my happiest memory). I'm amazed at the content of some of the files, not all of them poems, but late-night rants of me talking about religion in 2003 (noting, by the way, that I was looking into Judaism) or dreaming the ideal vision of Christmas morning that same year (happiness, a tree, family, snow). I have pictures of long-since-dead relatives, decked out in Victorian gowns, and yet another, still, of the grandmother I never knew playing around, wearing the army-issue hat of the grandfather I never knew. (I wish I knew where the photo was taken, what landmark sits in the background, or what exactly they were doing out on what appears to be a cool day.)

My computer, it seems, has become a hotbed of history and memory, and sometimes it's just hard to swallow. Some of it, however, makes me wonder why I got so old, so young. My poetry precedes me, in all things. I'm not sure why I stopped writing, but it happened when I moved to Connecticut. I have breakthrough spurts of emotion and lines, but they're fleeting. That poetry used to be my therapy, especially when I slammed, standing in front of a crowd made silent by rhymes of death, the Holocaust, and being Jewish, and hollering, hooting, over lines about my figure and the words "you could be the first fat miss America."

Here's something old, something from September 9, 2001. It's weird, because, well, two days later it happened. I'd never connected it before, actually, but sometimes, I see these things coming.


Apocolyptic Atmosphere

Someday
the stars
will fall from the sky
and land on your head
and the
moon will fall into your hands
and melt before your eyes
with star dust crawling across your skin
and fireflies and dragonflies will buzz beneath ur chin
all before the world comes crashing in.

Should Jews Thank the Church?

As I finish up Paula Fredricksen's "Augustine and the Jews," there is a question that lingers in my mind. Perhaps those of you with strong opinions one way or another about Christianity and/or the church can weigh in here. I'm talking about Augustine's "witness doctrine," derived from Psalm 59 that says, "Slay them not, lest my people forget." I know this was big doings for the church in the medieval period, but I don't know how much it played into other strands of Christianity throughout time and through the present.

Augustine's philosophy, although really, incredibly backhanded, was that Jews survive and should survive throughout all time until the End of Days in order that they serve as evidence to Christianity's truth. By Jewish survival, Jewish books survive, and, according to Augustine, it is Jews and their books that provide a walking, talking, breathing witness to the truth of Christianity -- that the church fathers didn't just "make it up." Jews and Judaism were not a challenge to Christianity, insisted Augustine, but a witness to it!

So my question is this: Does the world's Jewish community underestimate the power of this doctrine's importance throughout the past 1600+ years? Is it Augustine's (REALLY BACKHANDED) doctrine that has allowed the world to not completely destroy Jews and Judaism? Hitler wasn't too interested in church philosophy, and I honestly don't know his thoughts on Augustine or the "slay them not" doctrine. Anyone know?

Either way, I'm intrigued. We joke so often about how every great nation, political entity, or world power that has tried to destroy us has failed and disappeared into time. But is this G-d, or is it the church?

Talk amongst ya'selves.

The End of Days & Big Differences

This is where it begins, that flurry of blog posts inspired by blurbs in books stacked high on my "to read" list for class. There's no such thing as "pleasure" reading during the semester, not exactly. "Pleasure" reading would be defined as books I chose to read, books that I picked off the bookshelf myself with delight. Don't get me wrong, all of the books I read during the semester are in my area of interest, and they all are (usually) fascinating. It's just a different kind of reading. There's no fiction, only books that are nonfiction in so much as they resemble fact, although my professor likes to say that "history is not facts." At any rate, I offer some thoughts on something I'm reading: "Augustine and the Jews" by Paula Fredriksen.

I hadn't thought of it before, but in the apocalyptic literature of Judaism, the texts usually say that in the end of days, the nations (ha'goyim), referring to gentiles and whomever else, will turn to the one G-d. Nowhere, I repeat NOWHERE, does it suggest that the nations will convert to Judaism. In the Christian literature, on the other hand, there is a strong principle of understanding that in the end of days those non-Christians (specifically Jews) will turn -- as in convert -- to Christianity. For Judaism, in the end of days Jews will be Jews and the nations, the Gentiles, will revere and exist before the One G-d of Israel, but they need not convert to worship the Israelite G-d. That, folks, is a big, stark difference in the theology of each. I'd never thought about this difference in relation to the apocalyptic literature, but wow. Fascinating to consider, yes?

Back to reading ...

Things You Might Not Know About Me! Part I

I don't know what spawned this, but I'm trying to catalog things about myself that people might not know about me. I like to maintain a human atmosphere here so you all know that I'm a real person living a normal life. I like to douse my tomatoes in salt, eat cold apple crisp, organize my clothes in my closet by color, and I prefer black pens over any other color (except red when I'm editing). So here are some other, perhaps more deeply meaningful, things you might not know about me. 

That's me, yes. On the right. With my Momma Brady haircut, circa my senior year of highschool 2001-2002. On the left is one of my oldest friends, Christina, and the guy in the middle? I forgot his name. He went to Norris High School, which is there in the background, and actually was mostly destroyed during Tornadoes in 2007. We're all supporting LNE quiz bowl team shirts, since we were at a quiz bowl tournament! I was a geek. I still am. I was the "random knowledge" guru. 

In high school, I gave one of three graduation speeches while standing before my class of 525 students in Lincoln, Nebraska. My school was gigantic, but luckily only 20 some students tried out for the graduation speech spots. If I remember correctly, the dual validictorians got speeches, and the other went to a lucky winner. I tried my temporary speech out in a classroom one day after school and was lucky enough to get chosen. I wish I could remember where my speech is, as I know it's on a computer somewhere in the Edwards family home. It might also be in one of my high school boxes with all the random homework and papers I'd kept. I should find it. It was written in poem form and touched on everyone in the class, from jocks to choir nerds to academic decathalon nerds to the drama geeks. Why? Because during high school I was privileged to run in all of those crowds. You see, I played volleyball my freshman year and was the team manager my sophomore year. I was in choir every year of high school, and I managed the Math Club as secretary for two or three years. I served on Academic Decathalon and Quiz Bowl for three years, and I also found my way into the Model UN and about a half-dozen other clubs. Contrary to a lot of people, I loved high school. So standing up, before all of my friends and people I'd never even seen in school before, I told about my experiences. As a surprise ending, I closed with something my father always says to me -- and he had no idea it was in the speech, which left him speechless. The quote: "Life is not a problem to solve, but a reality to experience."

Also, during that same graduation, I had the leading off solo for Concert Choir. We were singing R. Kelly's "The World's Greatest," and after years of just singing in the choir, I finally stood out senior year with my belting voice. You see, I can't sing good quietly, but if you give me enough room and volume, and I could rock your world. I guess I just have that kind of a voice -- sing loud, sing proud. So I landed the opening verses: "I am a mountain, I am a tall tree, ohhhh, I am a swift wind, sweepin' the country." Now, that's just a few small verses, but the soul I got to punch into them empowered me. I guess, if anything, R. Kelly's craziness aside, those verses sort of expressed who I wanted to be and who I saw myself as. But singing those words, jamming with friends, and having people -- years later remind me of that solo -- makes me feel good.

I've started about seven different versions of a book on my life. They're all really cheesy and ridiculous. I watch friend-bloggers nab book deals about their life, about their conversion stories, and I feel like my story is just lame. I feel like it's weak. I didn't grow up in an abusive household, I'm not a minority, I'm not the product of some kind of oppressive family that forced Christianity or Islam or something else down my throat. Then again, I also had no inspiration from people or experiences to choose Judaism. Someday I'll write my story. Someday. I just want to inspire others.

I love to drink pickle juice. Yes, you heard me right. My mom used to pack me a Tupperware with pickles for lunch when I was a kid and she'd always pour in a bunch of extra juice and I'd drink it while making my tiny classmates gag. We're talking first grade here, folks. I still do this, however. I think I make Tuvia gag!

Journeying to Judaism: A Square Peg

When I was a kid, my parents urged me to live by the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” They bought me a Precious Moments bible at a young age; after all, we lived just minutes from the Precious Moments Chapel in Southern Missouri and spent many holidays visiting the grounds to see the work of the artist known for cute figurines and graphics in childrens’ bibles. I even attended a wedding there once. Even now, looking back, the artwork and the artist’s inspiration are beautiful, even if his book isn’t my book.

I don’t remember a single time that my parents attended church with me, unless it was a wedding of course. My childhood experiences in church were had with friends, actually. I went to vacation bible school during the summer with my friend Annie, and I remember one summer where the theme was something about Cowboys and the Wild West. I remember wearing a cowboy hat (that I had for many years after that, until I was in high school I believe), and helping make fresh ice cream in some wooden barrel, intermixed with coloring pictures of Jesus in cowboy gear. I don’t remember the message, I just remember that the ice cream was really good and the church was massive. This was in Southern Missouri, right there in the bible belt where the evangelical agenda swirls about as fierce as the tornados in Tornado Alley. Annie was incredibly religious, and everything her family did I remember was intermixed with a religious theme. She was one of my best friends, too. One of the six that I was attached to for the first 12.5 years of my life. One of my other friends, Kendall, was a Jehovah’s witness and despite their beliefs about holidays (there are none), her parents still showered her with gifts when the rest of us were getting them – all because she was a “good girl.” She left school during every celebration, too. I was always bummed that she missed out on the Valentine’s Day box contest. I won one year for “The Love Boat.” It was a classic three-tier box with a hatch that opened for cards to be undelicately shoved inside. Oy, that was a proud moment. But I digress! They say there is a friend turnover every seven years, and when I turned 14, I stopped talking to most of my Missouri friends. I hope they all are finding what they’re looking for.

When I was 13, we moved to Nebraska, and I also happened to fall into a religious group of friends. In Middle School I ran around with a crowd that belonged to a large church downtown that frequently had lock-ins and activities for the younger kids. One fall I managed to stay up 72 hours straight: one day was a dance, the next a lock-in, the next a sleepover. Those were the days. But I don’t remember doing anything religiously motivated at that lock-in. I just remember a friend chugging a bottle of Mountain Dew and subsequently hurling all over the rec room. In high school, my group of friends came from a variety of backgrounds: Protestant, Lutheran, Catholic. I learned early that a friend’s parents weren’t really accepted by the Catholic Church for one reason or another. I spent holiday services at different churches, and at one point I remember taking communion because everyone else was and I still don’t even know what it was that I did, but I remember knowing that it was wrong. One Ash Wednesday I went with friends and got ashes placed on my forehead and I remember thinking how weird and uncomfortable I felt. But it was pervasive around me – everyone was Christian, everyone was religious. Everyone with ashen marks upon their foreheads. It was how I rolled. I was the secretary of Fellowship of Christian Athletes and went on several “Weekend of Champions” adventures in Nebraska, including a trip in which I was “saved.” I was in Campus Life, where Jesus was presented through large assemblies on Club Day and it was more about having fun than getting or experiencing Christianity. I wanted so badly to fit in and feel the way my friends felt. That unbending faith that you didn’t have to worry about a thing because Jesus died for you. It was easy peasy. Just believe, and you’re saved. That’s all it took. And even that time, when I was saved, it was a lie. I didn’t believe it. I wanted to believe it. My entire life I’d wanted to believe it. But I couldn’t.

The last straw of my social Christianity, my trying to fit into the mold that was pervasive around me, was in college. I attended services with my friends, and I really liked them. The singing was powerful and intense, and the pastor was so hip and friendly. I remember during emotional services he’d call students down to pray at the front of the shul, if they were suffering. I stood there, wanting to go down, wanting to try, that one last time, to make it work. But I didn’t. And then the pastor confronted me at a dinner and handed me a copy of a book that is known for turning people toward Jesus. I put that book on my bookshelf and never looked back.

I’d spent my entire life attempting to fit into the mold around me because my friends were all devoutly religious individuals comfortable in their Christian skin. Whenever I’d bring up a controversial topic, wanting to discuss what scripture says about modern topics that need practical applications, I was shunned, given a bible verse, and sent on my way. It had never sat right with me, and my questions always were left unanswered. Christianity, in my experience, had become an easy out that I just couldn’t grasp. It would have been so easy to just believe, to put all my faith in a single idea, and let the rest of my life waft by. But that wasn’t my mold. So much of my unhappiness throughout high school and into college was supported by my never-ending attempts to make it work, to fit in, to force myself into the Christian club. There are so many experiences I could write about in my efforts to fit my soul into Christianity. Retreats, discussions, arguments, fights, lost friends …

These, my biggest problems in high school resulted in a deep depression. I tried hard to fit, but I didn’t. Anywhere. I was the Christian Girl in Academic Decathalon and Quizbowl, Math Club, but also Choir and sometimes Volleyball, Model UN, honors society. I went a variety of avenues. I attempted to perfect who I was. But it always came back to the search. The Big Search. I was helpless, hopeless, lost. I kept pushing the square peg in the round hole. I’d done it my entire life. It hadn’t worked, but it was an effort. It was something.

And then? Judaism. Out of the blue, the word was whispered to me in a conversation about beliefs and religion my freshman year. My knowledge of Judaism was the Holocaust, a topic covered by my 8th grade teacher Mr. Smith. I met a Holocaust survivor, I watched the movies, we talked about the catastrophe. But the Jews were a distant people and I didn’t know a single one. Eighth grade came and went and the Jews were never affiliated with anything more than the Holocaust. In high school, my junior year, we did Fiddler on the Roof – never a more distant musical topic for a group of Midwestern Christian kids. But we didn’t talk about Judaism, or why we were singing certain songs, or why the chuppah was important or why Shabbos was so special. I played Mottel’s mother, and that was that. He was 6-foot something and I was 5-foot something. It was implausible, and the musical was more about getting a chance to step out in my musical prowess than about the characters, the history, the story, of the Jews.

How funny to think that me, the little girl who delighted in ice cream at VBS in Joplin, Missouri, and the Precious Moments Chapel’s Christian Bible depictions, who tried her entire life to be a devout and serious Christian, would be at the doorsteps of Orthodoxy, stepping over a threshold of thousands of years of memory and tradition. Even in the six years that I have pursued Judaism, I still vividly remember all of my experiences living the way I thought I was meant to live. I remember taking my little brother and older brother to a Christmas service at my friend’s church – urging my parents to come with, but them denying attendance. I felt so proud then, bringing my little brother to something he’d never known about or understood (he didn’t grow up with the pressures that my brother and I did with friends and school).

But here I am. Still giggling about Jesus in cowboy boots, wondering if I grew up with Jews and just didn’t know it. Smiling, knowing that my children will be brought up with not only the golden rule, but a tradition deeply embedded in my soul. My children will have the right and will be encouraged to embrace what is truly true for them as my parents allowed for me. But at the same time, I hope that I can raise my children in a way that they will respect, connect, and cherish who they are as Jews, carrying on a tradition that their mother’s neshama traveled so long and so hard to give them.

P.S.A.

In case you didn't get a chance to read up on Kristallnacht, of which this year marks the 70th anniversary, I found the Yad Vashem site to have some pretty compelling and fascinating reads.

On November 9, 1938, the Nazis unleashed a series of riots against the Jews in Germany and Austria. In the space of a few hours, thousands of synagogues and Jewish businesses and homes were damaged or destroyed. For the first time, tens of thousands of Jews were sent to concentration camps simply because they were Jewish. This event came to be called Kristallnacht ("Night of the Broken Glass") for the shattered store windowpanes that carpeted German streets.

If anything, I am reminded of how we are not all that far away from the events of the Shoah. It is as if it were yesterday. Once it hits 100 years, 150 years, I have to wonder whether it will feel so distant or still close. The world isn't so young when we think about these things. It allows us to remember that we're not so far away from the chaos as we thought.

A Bit of the Old, A Bit of the New!

During lunch yesterday I was graced by the presence of the New York Times at my table, so I picked it up and browsed (something I haven't done since I worked at a newspaper), and was lucky enough to happen upon a pretty exciting and possibly groundbreakingly awesome news story: "Find of Ancient City Could Alter Notions of Biblical David." The find?

"Overlooking the verdant Valley of Elah, where the Bible says David toppled Goliath, archeologists are unearthing a 3,000-year-old fortified city ..."

The site is five acres, and only a tiny portion of the area has been unearthed, meaning that there's still boatloads of research and digging to do. So far, there are some olive pits that have been found that have been carbon dated to between 1050 and 970 BCE -- a very controversial period in history during the supposed reign of David. Likewise, the writing on pottery appears in "so-called proto-Canaanite script and appears to be a letter or document in Hebrew." But we can't get too excited, I suppose. There's still a lot of the area that needs to be uncovered, and I'm tempted to book a ticket to go hop on that dig. The fascinating things about these digs is that they're used to sort of "validate" the "historical" evidence that we see in the Hebrew Bible. Can you imagine the potential for history-making finds in this dig?

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On a completely and entirely unrelated note, I just wanted to mention that my favorite new artist -- Shoshannah Brombacher -- has a show opening at The Tea Lounge of her work, and it will run through the month of November. Her work has appeared on A Simple Jew 's blog, Chabad.org, and so many other places on the web. She has a flavor of Chagall, with a very ethereal, dreamy quality to her paintings ranging from music to the great Chassidic masters to modern Jewish celebrations. Can you guess what this painting is alluding to? I'll give you a hint: It's a classic parable involving Hillel and Shammai!

It is with that that I wish all a Shabbat Shalom -- may you have rest, peace, and good times with Torah, friends, family and G-d!

Revisiting Shabbatai Zvi, the False Messiah.

Oy it's been a busy couple of days. Word got out that I really wasn't doing much at work, so my administrator decided to throw a whole bunch of work at me, just to make sure my last week really reminds me of what I'm leaving. At any rate, I haven't had much time at work to respond to comments or to work on any blogging. So here I am, sacrificing dinner to hang out at this lovely coffee shop in my neighborhood for some liquid dinner so I can respond to some emails and perhaps elaborate on comments I made about Shabbatai Zvi and the Baal Shem Tov and the book Constantine’s Sword in this post. In that post, I mentioned a note I had made while reading the text some months ago about the author's mention of these two men so close together implied "falseness." Let's discuss.

(As background on the author: James Carroll, is a former priest and former Catholic chaplain, who left the cloth to become a writer. He is active in the Jewish-Christian-Muslim debate circle and has written extensively on Catholicism. This book, in particular is a confessional of sorts, about his coming to terms with the church's role in Jewish history.)

I've transcribed the text from the scanned copy of the page (389) I have, and I realized that the rest of the section, which is important, is on a page that I didn't scan (and 390 isn't part of the Google Book Preview!). Thus, this is what I have:

... other manifestations of Jewish vitality showed themselves. Messianic figures appeared, like David Reubeni and Solomon Molcho in Portugal, and conversos and unconverted Jews alike took heart from their bold rejection of the idea that Jews were fated to be oppressed. In the next century a Kabbalist from the Turkish city of Izmir emerged as the leader of one of the most potent religious-political movements in Jewish history. He was Shabbatai Zvi, a self-declared Messiah who found enthusiastic followers in Jewish communities around the Mediterranean, and in Europe as well, especially Poland. The political hopes that many had for Shabbatai came to nothing when, imprisoned by the Turks in 1666 -- the combination of sixes in that year had made it portentous -- he chose to convert to Islam rather than risk martyrdom. But his heroic movement had by then spawned numerous centers of enthusiastic Judaism, including one that would quicken in Poland and Ukraine in the eighteenth century. Spreading throughout eastern Europe, this movement was led by Israel ben Eliezer, the beloved Baal Shem Tov.  ...

I know that it is the author's intention to discuss the prevailing movements during this period in relation to Kabbalah, and I know that a simple reading of this section alone would leave an average reader with the sense that Shabbatai Zvi did a good thing for the community, as his "heroic movement ... spawned numerous centers of enthusiastic Judaism." Follow this with the Baal Shem Tov, and the reader is just aglow with the glory of these two men and their contributions to Judaism and the Jewish community. But for those who know about Shabbetai Zvi and how he truly effected the Jewish community, this is a mess of irritating text.

Shabbatai Zvi declared himself the Messiah. The Baal Shem Tov never did such a thing (some of his followers see him as coming from the Davidic line and thus is a part of the Messianic story, though). From a very basic perspective, this puts the two men very, very far apart. SZ was viewed later as a loony, sort of a joke and an unfortunate person in the history of Jewish thought, whereas the BST is revered as a great sage and a great founder of a mighty powerful spiritual movement. Simply saying that SZ helped create this lively, enthusiastic Judaism is ignorant, because as Torah Jew pointed out in the comments on my previous post, he did a lot to destroy much of Judaism. The short-term effects might have been useful, but the long-term effects were tragic. I can't even fathom why the author would call SZ's efforts a "heroic movement." I just can't bring myself to think that there IS NOT some type of subtext here.

Am I crazy? I am an analyst of text; it's what I do. And to me, obviously when I read this it set off some red flags, and it continues to grate my cheese.

There are some interesting comments about what it was that Shabbatai Zvi was doing juxtaposed with what the Baal Shem Tov was doing. These comments are from The Rebbe, but more can be found at that link:

As for comparing the movement of Shabbatai Zvi to the Hassidic movement—every movement that is started by someone of the Jewish people has some common point because it was started by a Jew. Shabbatai Zvi also was a scholar not only in Kabbalah but in halacha, but after a few years he deviated from the right derech (path). It became something that not was only deviant just the opposite of Judaism. ...
Shabbatai Zvi negated halacha. In the time of Shabbatai Zvi there was a group of Catholic priests that translated Kabbalistic manuscripts and studied Kabbalah. But this is not considered Jewish Kabbalah, as the Catholics did not put on tefillin. It is just like someone in Sorbonne, Brooklyn College, or some other university who can learn Kabbalah without putting on tefillin. For true Kabbalah cannot be separated from halacha.

I feel awkward posting this for some reason. I'm not a Hasid, nor am I Orthodox (yet!), but I think examining the two routes are significant. At any rate, this point of view makes sense to me, and it's also why I roll my eyes at Madonna and A-Rod.

Anyhow, if it is most necessary I'll pick the book back up and find out what's on that next page to satisfy the readers of the blog. I'm not sure if I'm getting my point across, but I hope that I am. Let me know what you think, and please let me know if you think I'm reading way too much into the author's intent. 

NOTE: Computer battery is dying, so I might add more to this post in the AM. Stay tuned, please!

Coffee with Your Torah?

While scanning pages I'd noted while attempting (and failing) to read Constatine's Sword: The Church and the Jews: A History, I came across an interesting passage that I just felt like sharing because it makes me smile. For those of you unaware, I started reading this book many moons ago and have renewed it repeatedly. The 175 pages remaining never got read, and I essentially threw up my hands in protest at the behemoth size of the text and its almost unreadability because of the way the book is -- the entire book (text, notes, index, etc.) is nearly 800 pages, all in one big hardcover binding. It's just inconceivable to read unless you're planning on sitting down at a table consistently becuase it's such a clunker. At any rate, enough kvetching. Essentially I had dozens of pages noted with various comments, and wanted to keep those in case I pick it up again, hence the scanning.

In a chapter (37) on the religious response of Jews to the implementation of the Roman ghetto, the author, James Carroll, speaks about the lively religious community within the ghetto walls. Carroll says, "If the Christian world had cut them off, the Jews would turn their separation into a religious value" (387). The passage goes on to talk about what Jews did in order to sort of religiously rebel against the forces keeping them down, and it is the following that gives me a grin:

If Jews were forbidden to leave the ghetto at night, then night would become not only the time for study and prayer, but an image of G-d's own darkness. (Jews in the ghetto, in the seventeenth century, drank newly imported coffee as a way of staying awake.). 

The item in parens is footnoted to a text by Kenneth R. Stow, "Sanctity and the Construction of Space: The Roman Ghetto as Sacred Space," in which, in reference to coffee, he says, "First, one stimulated his body with this miraculous new beverage, and then he stimulated his soul by ritual devotion."

Isn't that outstanding? Maybe I'm easily amused, or maybe I'm just an academic, but it's morsels like this that fascinate me.

(Of course, it's completely unrelated, but two pages later the author mentions Shabbetai Zvi and the Baal Shem Tov essentially in the same breath, which is valid discussion for an entirely different blog post. Needless to say, I had a written note with this aformentioned paragraph that read: "places Shabbetai Zvi in same breath as Baal Shem Tov -- implying falseness??")

Self-reflection, in the key of the little brother.

I lit the Shabbos candles tonight and watched the wax melt down the candles, angled slightly, dripping wax on the cloth covering the top shelf of the bookcase. I couldn't get them to sit upright, and after many attemps, I gave up, anticipating a mess to clean up after they finished burning. They seem to have burned much quicker than usual tonight, in a rush, like the flame had someplace to be -- someplace important. Sunrise, sunset.

I'm talking to my little brother on MSN messenger. I can't remember the last time I logged into it before last night. Something sparked me to install Pidgin (a multi-platform IM system), which logged me into my old MSN and AIM accounts. I haven't been consistently on either of them in more than a year, MSN for several years. I think we grow out of things, and I think I've mostly grown out of instant messaging (and on to fun things like Twitter and GChat, I guess).

So here I am, chatting with him about his 16-year-old love life. And trying to figure out who his love interest is, I pop over to his MySpace page (the kids are big on the MySpace, not so much with Facebook), and here I am, now, listening to his cheesy punk pop love ballads in his music player. It started with a song by Blink 182 -- "I Miss You."

Man, does that song take me back.

He's telling me about this girl and how it's "complicated" and I'm relaying to him how I have a couple of my own "complicated" situations right now. I'm telling him about when I was in high school the boy I wanted, but the other boy who chased after me, and I finally gave up on the boy I wanted for the boy who chased after me and had a really amazing two-year relationship. About how there's an old flame visiting soon and how there's that other special someone who has me, but doesn't necessarily need me. I know he doesn't care, but listening to this cheesy music and listening to him relay these things, I feel like I'm 16 again.

It makes me wish I could be there for him, even if he didn't need me. I've missed him growing up. I mean, I helped raise him through elementary school, but then I was off to college and he was left to do it all on his own, and he's doing okay. But I feel his distance now more than ever. And then I'm telling him about how I talked with our older brother (one year my senior, 10 years the little brother's senior) and how I think I upset him with my suggestions about how to get his life back on track. And the little brother says,

yah, you're good at that. and alienating yourself from the family in general.

I quickly jumped to my defense -- to defend my life's decisions and aims, but he knows. He's always understood, for some reason. He knows that I don't want to end up obsessed with money, depressed and working in retail with the world's biggest chip on my shoulder. And when I converted to Judaism he thought it was neat, he understood why I was doing it. He's always thought it was cool that I've lived in so many places, traveled to so many more. I know he looks up to me, at least, that's the way he's always treated me. His respect and love is more important than anything in the world to me. If there's one person always worth fighting for, it's my little brother. Joe joe. Bubba. Josephina (he hates that last one).

So we're talking, and I'm feeling old. He says I'm "cool old ... you're like..mom old..minus the disgusting parts" and that has me laughing. I get what he means, and I appreciate it. But none the less, I know I can't continue to listen to Blink 182 and relive the glory days where boys would spend months trying to pin me down. Where I was the one in control.

I used to be so difficult. And now? I feel sort of translucent. I wear my heart on my sleeve; I'm not nearly as strong as I used to be. But I guess that's what happens when you get old, eh?

I guess I should peel the wax off the bookcase now, since it's hardened as the night has gone on. Sunrise, sunset, don't you think?

Rashi's Daughters, revisted.

Okay, okay. Let me explain myself.

In this post, I issued my irritation at the perpetuation of Rashi's daughters as a true, factual set of events in history, whereas in truth it is merely a legend developed with no factual documentation beyond it's first appearance in the 18th century. However, I never said that there are no factual instances of women donning tefillin or studying Talmud or being learned in the ways of halakah or Judaism.

There are many instances of this, including that Michal, daughter of King Saul, donning tefillin. In Eruvin in the Talmud there is also notation that "Michal daughter of Kushi wore tefillin and the sages did not protest." Likewise, the wife of Chaim ibn Attar and the Maiden of Ludmir (19th century) also were known to have practiced this mitzvah.

To be sure, tefillin is not prohibited for women. You see, it's a time-bound mitzvah to which women are not held. However, this does not necessarily mean it is prohibited. Some sages, including Rashi and the Rambam said that it was completely acceptable, but that women were not to say the b'racha (blessing), because the "who has commanded us" would not apply. Specifically, the Rambam says, "Women, slaves, and minors are exempt from tzitzit from the Torah ... women and slaves who want to wrap themselves in tzitzit may do so without a berakha. And so too with other such mitzvot from which women are exempt: if they want to perform them without a berakha, one does not protest" (Hilkhot Tsitsit 3:9).

My point in all of this is that there is a difference between historical documentation of women -- plain or semi-important or even great women -- donning tefillin or writing responsa or studying Talmud and Rashi's daughters doing these things. Why is this? Well, Rashi is perhaps one of the greatest Jewish thinkers of all time, and I don't think anyone would disagree with me there. There is much more weight, as such, put into the stories of his daughters being this great liberating, free thinking women of the 11th century than of perhaps any other women of the 11th century doing these things. It's about influence, reputation.

In all things we seek out the best, most reliable source of information if we are preparing to do something. It is why there is a ladder, so to speak, in just about every aspect of life. We seek out the most reliable mechanic on how to fix our cars, we go to the best doctors we can find to seek the best treatment for our ailments, we take our ques from those with the best reputation and we rely on them to not lead us astray.

Hopefully this makes sense. I am not rallying for or against women donning tefillin, really. It isn't for me, but I appreciate that it is completely permissible for women to do so. I just think that when the debates arise about women studying Talmud or doing nontraditional (for women) mitzvot, it shouldn't always come back to "Well, Rashi's daughters did it!" because we know that this has no factual history to it before the 18th century -- hundreds of years after the fact.

I do agree, though, with those supporters of the Rashi's daughters legend, that Rashi's daughters are important and significant in the history of Jewish women, it gives us inspiration and hope, but I just want it to be clear in the same vein, that this is a legend and like all great legends, there is room for error.

As David Mikkelson, who runs snopes.com, once said, "...our willingness to accept legends depends far more upon their expression of concepts we want to believe than upon their plausibility."

On this Day: June 4

I like doing "on this date in history" posts, simply because there's a void of information -- historic information -- thanks to the constant, ever-growing flow of data and useless information we get from television and the internet. So I present to you, some interesting things of note.

+ On this date in 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt refused to allow the passengers of the SS St. Louis -- more than 900 Jewish refugees from Europe -- to enter the United States.

+ In 781 B.C.E, the first historic solar eclipse is recorded in China.

+ It was in 1971 that the patent for the ATM was handed out to three individuals.

+ Massachusetts becomes the first U.S. state to set a minimum wage -- in 1912!

+ In 1917, the first Pulitzer prizes are handed out.

+ Finally, today is sort of an unofficial memorial day for the incidents at Tiananmen Square in 1989. In fact, the government keeps a tight watch on the square on this day to make sure nothing goes down. The incident is known in China colloquially as "Six-Four," and supposedly, there are more than 100 people still imprisoned from the incident, and there's even an article about civil rights activists urging China to release the prisoners. I mean, come on ... it's 19 years later.

My Trip Timeline, with pictures behind the links!

An Abe Lincoln Look-A-Like Enjoys the Celtic Festival

So here's the timeline of my trip south, the videos will come later, so this is just a teaser. There are photos behind some of the links, so be sure to click. I'll be putting up all my photos at some point, but there's a LOT of them.

Friday, May 16, 2008
> Leave work and head to the airport to pick up my rental car. It took me 2 hours to get there, and I drove away with a 2008 Vibe, headed home, grabbed my bags, and headed out of town.
> Arrived in Springfield, Illinois, around 10:30 p.m. and promptly went to bed.

Saturday, May 17, 2008
> Got up at 8 a.m., headed off to Godfrey, Illinois, and happened to get lost on the way. I ended up in po-dunk Illinois where I pulled into a gas station. After getting the attendant's life story (something about rent and her landlord and the electric bill), I asked how to get where I was going. Everyone in the gas station promptly came over and offered their tips and advice. Eventually, a nice fellow in a Silver Chrysler offered to drive me the whole way there. So we hopped in our respective cars and I followed him for about a half-hour through the beautiful country and pure Americana into Godfrey where we stopped at a fruit stand and he sent me on my way. (Note: before the gas station incident, I drove through a small town where I stopped and purchased a fake poppy from a few Veterans selling them for $1 on the side of the road; the old men reminded me of my grandfather -- they, too, were WWII veterans; it made me sad.)

> Found my way (after a quick nosh) to my great-grandfather's old house, behind a restaurant as my mom and aunt had said. I took some photos, and moved on.

> After a brief bit of being lost (again), made my way to the Valhalla Memorial Park cemetery in Godfrey, where after picking up the directions/obit the office lady left me (she's on vacation now), I ended up in the vicinity of the plot. Since they're all flat, it took me about 10 minutes of walking around to locate the grave of my great-grandfather and his last wife, Edna (not my blood relative). It was a simple headstone. I sat down on the grass in the warm sunlight and talked a bit to the great-grandpa I'd never known. I analyzed his neighbors, placed my stones, took some photos, and left.
> From here I headed into Alton, where I was hoping to go to the cemetery some great-great-great something or other relatives are buried. The cemetery has no records of them, but some useful sources said they *are* buried there. I arrived at the cemetery in beautiful Alton, which is really hilly and from which, perched upon the brick-red cobblestone streets, you can see the river. But it would have taken days wandering around to find their stones, so I took some photos of the vast, historic cemetery and went on my way.
> I drove over to the tallest-man statue, which was pretty snazzy. I took some photos, read the information, and departed.
> From here I left Alton and headed over to the World's Largest Ketchup Bottle, which was actually pretty anti-climactic, but I took a photo and called my mom to gloat where I was. I sent a copy of a picture to a friend, as, well, it might have not been that exciting, but it was amusing.
> Headed off to a mall outside of St. Louis on the Illinois side where I partook in some delicious Chick-Fil-A -- the delicacy of my youth -- and sent some friends a note gloating about my meal, since, well, in Chicago we have no Chick-Fil-As. I bought a couple necklaces (including a hamsa one, which I'd been searching for) and then took off for the cemetery in St. Louis.
> My aunt's instructions were perfect to find the plot of the Weilbachers in the New (formerly Old) St. Marcus cemetery. There were more graves in the plot than I expected, including some people I'd never heard of. I called mom and she told me about her "aunt" Alma, though she can't be mom's Aunt. She must be a great-Aunt, or something. I took some photos, meandered around and checked out some of the graves (saw a Hitler one, actually), then took off.

Note: Having been done with my tasks a lot quicker than expected, I toiled with what to do with myself. So I left the area and headed back to Springfield, where I was staying, in hopes of finding something fun to do for the evening.

> On the way back to Springfield, I saw a sign off the road for a Mother Jones memorial, so I took off the highway into this small, small Union town and went to the Mother Jones memorial in this tiny little cemetery full of union workers out in the middle of nowhere.
> Back in Springfield, I drove around for a while, analyzing the map, and spotted a Drive-In movie theater, which absolutely thrilled me. I called mom to look up the theater and tell me the hours and everything. I decided that I would head back in the evening for the 9 p.m. showing of Iron Man; not because I wanted to see Iron Man, but because I wanted to BE in the drive-in since it was such a part of my childhood. To buy time, I went back into downtown in hopes of spotting some historic stuff.
> Unfortunately, everything was closed at 5 p.m., so I wandered over to where a Celtic festival was taking place. They usually have games and a fest, but the games were canceled because of some problems at the fairgrounds. Thus, I drank beer, watched live performances, and took lots and lots of photos and video. Around 7:45, I took off back to the drive-in to guarantee my place.
> At the Drive-In, I bought nachos and a large soda. I tuned my radio to the right station, and sat, excitedly, while the lot filled up and the sun set. The movie started, and it was probably the happiest day of my life. The Drive-In is a lost and taken-for-granted art.
> I went back to the hotel, watched some SNL, and crashed.

Sunday, May 18, 2008
> I got up at 8:45, knowing that nothing really opened until 10. I took my time, got some breakfast, and headed out.
> I arrived at the Lincoln Depot super early, right as the park's officer was getting there. It was about 9:30 and it opened at 10, but he let me in early (thanks!). I took some pictures, then headed over to the Old Capitol Art Fair, which started up at 10 a.m.















> I spent nearly 2 hours at the art fair, looking around, taking photos, noshing and watching a live band perform. I didn't want to leave, because I was so at peace, but I knew I needed to hit a few more spots before heading back to Chicago.
> I took off for the Lincoln Tomb at a local cemetery -- the second most visited in the U.S. after Arlington National. Unfortunately there was construction, so I couldn't rub the lucky nose, but I did get to see the new, old, and holding tombs for Lincoln and his kin.
> I wanted to hit the Museum of Funeral Customs, but it didn't open until 1, so I took off toward Shea's Gas Station museum, but it wasn't open either ... so I headed toward the 55 and north toward home.

Note: It took me about 2.5 hours to get home, but then I hit Chicago and there was traffic. I then went out to the mall off Touhy to pick up some tickets, but showed up 10 minutes late for Ticketmaster, and then hit more traffic on the highway out to O'Hare to return the car and arrived there with 10 minutes to spare. It then took me 2 hours to get home (whoo hoo Blue Line construction), at which time I discovered my apartment had no hot water (and none this morning either).

I just want to say that I'd kill to be back in Springfield right now. Things in the city are so complicated, so delayed, so irritating. The city reminded me a lot of Lincoln (where I spent my teen years and went to college), but I'll go into that with my reflective post, mmk?

Memories.

This morning on my way to work I popped in the iPod and hit play. I'd forgotten that the last music I was listening to yesterday was Incubus, while at the gym. I find Incubus to be the perfect "amped up" music for getting down and dirty on the treadmill, and while it isn't exactly my cup of tea for the morning commute, it fit today. About three songs and four El stops in, the song "I Miss You" came on. Now, I don't know how many of you out there are Incubus fans (listen, I have and have always and will always have a crush on Gavin Rossdale), but in case you have never heard the song, I'm posting a YouTube video from a live concert in 2001 of the song. The song doesn't really start until about two minutes in, though.

See, I'm a sap. This song was first brought to my attention by my high school boyfriend, the first love of my life, Kevin. It was summertime and he was heading off on a dig with his father in what I remember was Utah (his dad was a geologist), and he was going to be gone for several weeks with no contact. I, being a sappy high school, was devastated and incredibly upset. So the morning he was leaving, he got up and sent me an e-mail in the wee hours with the song "I Miss You" as an attachment. When I checked my mail that day, I cried. I played the song probably 5 million times on repeat, thinking of Kevin and crying. It was really pretty pathetic, but I mean, I was really, really in love with him. We dated for about two years, and he was the sweetest, smartest, most awesome high school boyfriend a girl could have asked for.

So I'm listening to this song on the train and just smiling, hugely. It brought back this rush of memories of he and I standing on the balcony of the student union my junior year (his sophomore year) looking at all of his (and my) sophomore friends outside the union, waving at us (see, it was only a junior-senior prom, so his friends couldn't go, but he could). It reminds me of that special moment when I felt like a princess. In truth, I'd die if I lost any of the memories I have of that part of my life. Kevin meant the world to me, and I was fully integrated into his life and the life of his friends and family. I remember the split and how hard it was for me, especially when he started dating a close friend shortly thereafter (let it be known, that close friend is someone I haven't spoken to since high school and now she's married, though not to Kevin).

I love how music has this affect on us. A simple set of memories, brought rushing back by one, cheesy song. It's so magical, and it really helped me get started on a positive note this morning.

I still talk to Kevin every now and again. I have frequent dreams involving him, which then usually results in me sending him an e-mail making sure everything is fine and dandy. I think he's off in Costa Rica or something right now. It's so strange, though. He was this 6-foot-something redhead -- completely outside the realm of anyone else I've ever dated. His height was one of my favorite things. He's also the person who tipped me off to Weezer and the Pixies and all those other good bands I still listen to. So here's to Kevin, and my memories of us, and that one summer that he made me feel so lucky, so special.