Okay gang. I'm back.

I'm back blogging. I'm back from Israel. I'm back.

Check out my piece, connected to this week's parashat Shemot (the beginning of Exodus) at the JRF web site. I connect, "There arose a Pharoah who knew not Joseph" with feelings I had while in Israel about the changes in the kibbutz movement.

I've been workig feverishly on the JRF's web site, which is my job there along with running the publishing operations.

We are trying to take an institutional web site and give it the dynamism of a blog while providing all the information that we did on the old site. It's been a lot of fun and many, many hours.

JRF's web site

Glad to be back.

Tonight begins the 49th Day of the Omer (May 31 - June 1, 2006), which is seven complete weeks of the omer. May that part of me that is broken in Malkhut in Malkhut be healed on this day.

 

Shai, Michel & Kahlua Im Chalav
Ben Gurion Airport, Israel by Katherine Lavine, June 1978
 

The funny thing about being so close (to Sinai, to God, to a friend, to a dog) is that the feeling of closeness is often connected to some kind of leaving. We often don't even know how close we are until we have to leave.

 

"Lekh lekha m'artzekha - Go to yourself out of your land." (Gen. 12:1)

The Sefat Emet (19th century hasidic commentator) wrote in response to God's call to Abraham, "The human being is called a walker, always having to go from one rung to another." You have to leave your own "land" to get to your own self.

But what about the pain of leaving? Remember it, photograph it, cry about it.

Know too that the closeness, and your memory of it, will forever contribute to your ability to feel God's presence.

This completes the counting of the omer. Hadran Alakh Sefirat Ha'Omer. Oh, omer counting, may I come back to you again next year!

Happy Shavuot!

Tonight begins the 48th Day of the Omer (May 30-31, 2006), which is six weeks and six days of the omer. May that part of me that is broken in Yesod in Malkhut be healed on this day.

 

Speaking Sweet Nothings to Boaz, May, 2006

I Love Boaz, May, 2006
 

Our family of four humans has had Boaz the cute cocker among us since Passover '05. He was three when we got him.

Our daughter had been pitching for a dog for years. She's incredibly responsible. She proved her reliability with pets having taken meticulous care of two different rats, including the administration of antibiotics twice a day for the last three months of the life of Motty, her second rat.

A year after Motty's death, we couldn't put it off any longer. Both kids were committed to walking and feeding duty.

During the first two months of our life with Boaz my wife and I had more doggy parenting-strategy fights than all the kid parenting fights we had had in eleven years of raising two children. The details are not relevant here. In short, we solved the problems.

We are four complicated, ambitious, smart as well as playful, fun, loving, etc. people. Boaz' presence, however, precipitates the pure love in all of us. He's not complicated. He loves (expressed in oh so many ways), he walks, he plays, he smells, he eats, he takes care of his business. Uncomplicated does not mean, "without quirks." But in seeing his quirks we think of our own and even more love flows.

This uncomplicated love helps all of us to keep things in perspective. It helps us breathe deeper. In a house with kids moving towards their pre-teens, it can be a safer form of love for us to share our common adoration of Boaz than for us to express love directly to one another.

It's so easy to get overwhelmed. There is so much to do and the day is short. The care and love of this dog has helped us all to be more resilient and love each other more deeply.

Tonight begins the 47th Day of the Omer (May 29-30, 2006), which is six weeks and five days of the omer. May that part of me that is broken in Hod in Malkhut be healed on this day.

 

Shai at Israel Independence Day Rally
Sproul Plaza, UC Berkeley, CA, May, 1981
 

Being a leftist and a Zionist on campus was a little unusual. There were about ten of us. Representing the "Socialist Zionist Alliance" I got my three minutes under the sun to speak at the Israel Independence Day rally.

Just before my turn to speak I went over to the "Liberate El Salvador" table and picked up a Salvadorian flag. I got up there waving Israeli and El Salvadorian flags and attempted to equate the two struggles.

Sometimes the imaginative echoing of Hod finds a voice in this world (Malkhut) to speak of connections and possibilities that break convention, thereby bringing us closer to wholeness.

Most people probably thought I was psychotic. I felt very good.

Tonight begins the 46th Day of the Omer (May 28-29, 2006), which is six weeks and four days of the omer. May that part of me that is broken in Netzach in Malkhut be healed on this day.

 

Shai Gluskin by West Lake, Hangzhou, China
February, 1984 Photograph by Suzanne Pemberton

A midrash says Moses spent 40 years in Egypt, then 40 years as a shepherd, and finally 40 years as the leader of the Jewish people. Netzach in Malchut correlates to the 40 years he was a shepherd. It was a period of deep learning, of inner work, and of not knowing what his ultimate life work would be.

The photograph shows a clear path bounded by the misty lake and trees. I am between the mist and the path. Though the path provides direction and clarity, the mist is also helpful. For the feet following the path are not the feet of a leader. The leader in me is still forming, and the mist is critical in helping my message to be birthed.

Patience.

Tonight begins the 45th Day of the Omer (May 27-28, 2006), which is six weeks and three days of the omer. May that part of me that is broken in Tiferet in Malkhut be healed on this day.

 

Wedding
 

Sometimes it just all comes together.

The angst, the limitation, the sadness, the loss, all retreat as compassion flows.

May the memory of these moments give us the joy and fortitude to bring that sense of union into part of each day.

Tonight begins the 44th Day of the Omer (May 26-27, 2006), which is six weeks and two days of the omer. May that part of me that is broken in Gevurah in Malkhut be healed on this day.

Baby at Two Minutes Old

While doctors are less enthusiastic these days about whacking newborns, crying is still considered good news. It conveys the baby's vigor and contributes toward clearing the lungs of any remaining mucous.

Meanwhile, the baby, after nine-months of perfect temperature, constant food supply, and a lot of cooing and petting, has just been put through the trauma of squeezing through a very narrow passage only to face a world of stark light and cold.

But also outside the Garden of Eden is knowing. Knowing in all its forms: the knowledge of the world and the difference between good and evil; knowing difference and the beauty and complexity it adds to the world; knowing people and the comfort, joy, and fun that friends and family bring; knowing another intimately and the closeness and passion it arouses.

Soon this baby will warm up, and the new touch of her parents will soothe her. Eden wasn't nearly as good as this.

Tonight begins the 42nd Day of the Omer (May 24-25, 2006), which is six complete weeks of the omer. May that part of me that is broken in Malkhut in Yesod be healed on this day.

 

Shai in Ten Lakes Region, Yosemite National Park.
October, 1989
 

 

Oh, how great are your works, Adonai! (Psalm 93)

Yesod stands in the middle line of the sefirot above malkhut which is at the bottom:

 

Malkhut is also called shekhina (the one who resides), a name/aspect of God which is closest to the human experience and human understanding. When we look up at the mountain, at God's great works, what do we think of ourselves? How small we are? Our job, with the help of malkhut and yesod, is to see ourselves connected to everything bigger than ourselves.

Once we can feel that connection, then everything "small" becomes filled with dignity and grandeur; the changing of a diaper, sharing a story, an encounter with a cashier. Remembering the image of the mountain helps us transform what might have been mundane and infuses it with life.