introspective

It is a time of year for me to become even more introspective. It is a time of year when I wonder with more energy about the course of the world, and my piece of it. It is the time of year when I realize the many miracles that have actually happened in my life and try to explain how miraculous they were or how unknowing I was in making magic happen for myself. It is a time of year when I miss my Mom and Dad even more than usual. It is a time of year when I, out of know where, remember my kids first attempts at doing anything they had ever done for the first time. It is the time of year when I know how lonely my life would have been had I never grown up with my sisters. It is a time of year when I know the special relationship that is created when you find a total stranger and call him/her a friend. And most recently it is a time of year when I find it hard to imagine never having called Joe my partner.

Growing up Yom Kippur always had some kind of mysterious aura about it. My family was never very religious and most of what I knew about Yom Kippur came from the Romanian side of my family with my Grandma Braff, her sisters, reciting their version of Jewish law as it was practiced in her village of Baylia. I learned about Yom Kippur from the special recipes and food my mother cooked or baked. She would take out the group of recipes in a certain colored note card and those items would turn our house into a bakery, a restaurant the sweetest smelling, mouth watering place in the entire neighborhood. And we would place large bottles of Maneshevitz Concord grape wine on the tables being told by Grandma Braff this IS the only wine God approves of for Jews to drink.

I remember later on in my life when I felt it necessary and comforting to go to Temple, how the Rabbi's would discuss the importance of this day. How it could mean the closing of the book of life, the ability to reflect, the opportunity to recall and remedy the wrong. How this day was set aside so we could feel the frailties of being human and the power of choice as humans. How this day was set aside because so many other days we rushed around, we scavenged, we searched we slid by. And how this one day we could with our will and strength contemplate and atone.

This Yom Kippur has found me in flux and seeking yet newer horizons. It has also found me questioning choices in my life, and trying to understand both the truths and consequences of arriving here now in my almost 62 year. It has also found me in the past year becoming more involved with the politics of this nation, the philosophies of the politicians and the seeking of common sense looking for right over wrong. It has found me questioning and trying hard to comprehend why hate, fear and loathing are always the answer for why.

Why are we told unemployed people are holding back the economy? Why are baby boomers who have paid their Federal Taxes since they were teen agers considered selfish? Why is wanting health care considered Un Godly? Why is equality considered evil? Why is college education for all called socialism? Why is asking all of us to pay an equal and fair share in taxes demonized and called Class Warfare? Why can't those who love one another marry while those who pretend to love one another can divorce and marry again? Why is it that women who want control of their own bodies chastised and called whores? Why do we need enemies to make ourselves seem stronger?

Tomorrow night I will recall and remember Yom Kippur' from years past. I will cry, sight, laugh, grow melancholy, reminisce, wonder and wish. I will speak to God and ponder and push for answers. And as I am doing that I will also consider the world in which I live, the country in which I live, the place I call home. And I will try to understand what seems simple to me, what seems correct, what seems so right is so difficult to achieve.

It is Erev Yom Kippur, the night before the day of Atonement, and as my Mother and Grandmother did so many years before, I will ready my home, my mind, and my soul and become introspective looking for all kinds of questions and seeking all kind of answers.