I don’t know if I filled my creative coffers this week. By my spiritual and social ones are brimming over. And that will have to do this week for Artist Date 38.
Rosh Hashanah – the Jewish New Year. 5774. I’m at Dawes Park in Evanston for the ritual of tashlich – where we empty bread from our pockets into a body of moving water. Some think of it as casting away one’s sins. I prefer a gentler interpretation. That I am simply cleaning out the residue of the last year. Whatever is stale. Has been sitting around in the corners of my consciousness slowly growing a somewhat furry mold.
I’ve stuffed a package of naan bread in my bag. It’s been in my freezer since November. A friend brought it to a party I had, to go with the curried lentil soup I was making. I’m not much of a bread eater, so I tucked it away for just such an occasion.
Another woman has matzo. I could have brought that two. I buy too much every year.
It is my third High Holiday season with the Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation, so I know where we meet. But this year is different. I not only know the place, but I know many of the people here too.
My friend Phil is here with his family. He introduced me to this congregation – specifically the Rabbi — a number of years ago, when I was feeling particularly wayward and spiritually lost.
Since that time I have developed a close relationship with Rabbi Brant and Cantor Howard. They are tuning up for this short, mostly musical, service that precedes the tossing of the bread. Jeff is tuning up as well. We met a couple of years ago at a Shabbat morning service I attended just once.
He seemed to sense I was new and somewhat hesitant, and warmly welcomed me in. I have had several encounters with him since them. Perhaps my favorite being when he sidled up to me during last year’s High Holiday services.
He said he read my blog postings from Rwanda and that he liked my writing. I thanked him and told him I used to write professionally. “It shows,” he said. And was gone.
Moments before I had silently cried out to G-d, asking what the plan is, what it is I was meant to do. I recall looking up toward the heavens, smiling and saying, “got it.”
Mary Jo is here. Brant introduced us several years ago when I completed my conversion to Judaism. She joined him and Howard as my witnesses, and was there in that same role when I received my get, my Jewish divorce.
I am now on her permanent invite list for Passover, and the breaking of the fast on Yom Kippur.
I feel a tap on my shoulder. It is Rachel. She is a Weight Watchers member I know.
Monica is here with her family. We met at Shabbat services at the lakefront a couple of years ago. Michael is here too. He blows the shofar every year at High Holiday services. He introduces me to his daughters who are following in the family tradition.
I see Hannah. She used to wear her head shaved like mine but now she has a mass of ringlets. She tells me that she’s bought a condo and that she broke up with her boyfriend. She introduces me to her friend Kelly and we agree we must get together.
A woman I have never met before approaches me. Her name is Sheila. She likes my shoes and takes a photograph of them.
Yes, they are “the shoes.” The shoes that have seemingly come to identify me. My orange Fly London peep-toe wedges.
The first summer I owned them, people literally chased me down Michigan Avenue to find out what they were and where I got them. It was fun, talking with all sorts of people I wouldn’t otherwise meet. And today is no exception.
Walking to the water, a tall woman with a mess of dark curls puts her foot next to mine. “Nice shoes,” she says. She is wearing the same ones in pewter.
She tells me she is tossing out the year of rehabbing her broken wrist. It is healed. I do not tell her what I am tossing. Instead, I tell her I like our shoes so much that I have two pairs. That the second I bought before my divorce was final, when my then-husband kindly said, “Do what you need to before we separate our monies.”
I bought a new lightweight massage table, a Torah commentary, and the peep-toe wedges in mustard. We laugh at my choices.
I wish her a sweet New Year and peel off to throw my bread, my karmic residue. There are so many things I could get rid of. The litany that I repeat every year – self-doubt, unkindness, judgment of myself and others. I recall that last year I tossed away my identity as a wife.
It was a Monday. I knew divorce papers were signed on Mondays in the county where we filed. I had a sinking feeling at that moment that I was officially divorced. A call to my mediator later in the day confirmed it.
Today I am casting away what my friend Lisa likes to call “an old idea.” I am embarrassed to admit that I have continued to hold on to it. Actually, I’m not sure I was consciously aware that I had it, but a series of recent events has cast a glaring light upon it and I can no longer turn away.
I point myself east, tear off a piece of naan and whisper to myself, “I let go of the idea that I am only desirable for sex.”
It is windy and the naan flies back at me. I turn west off of the dock where the waters are still. I repeat the words.
I’ve got a lot of naan so I say it a couple of more times, ripping and tossing. Ripping and tossing.
When I am done, I am approached by a woman. She asks me about the shoes. She is radiant and I tell her so. She tells me about her job search. Her cancer.
I suddenly remember that people used to tell me things about themselves all of the time. Friends and family, and random, almost strangers too. Cab drivers especially. I realize people are talking to me in this way again.
It’s not the shoes. Because I wore the same ones last year…I am different. My heart has healed just enough to let some of my light shine out. I am open and there is room for others. They sense it and come in.
A Wandering Jewess 