The ten days starting with Rosh Hashanah and ending with Yom Kippur are commonly known as the Days of Awe (Yamim Noraim) or the Days of Repentance. This is a time for serious introspection, a time to consider the sins of the previous year and repent before Yom Kippur. My Grandma Buncher, actually born in America, kept Kosher, and spoke perfect English, always instead that her grandchildren understand the values that the nation of America provide, and respect both our Jewish heritage as well as our American entitlements. My Grandpa Buncher from Ukraine, happened to find himself with a Tailor Shop in a very non-Jewish neighborhood, and reminded his grandchildren to fight for their identities no matter who the bully, and to always believe that God is on your side, with respect to his expectations, but continue to be the Jew you were meant to be. My Grandma Braff was both a stubborn person (she refused her arranged marriage) and a very superstitious Romanian Jew. She was enthralled with the magic of America but packed in her very limited cargo at least two dozen Romanian superstitions, which somehow seemed to grow in size, similar to the Gremlin’s when water had been added to them. For my mother's side of the family, there was always worry, never comfort in not suffering, and when the Days of Awe came about, less gossip and more graciousness. I grew up in a household where too many sides of the story were told, leaving me to invent my own version of the Days of Awe. And in all of that confusion, I became a Jewish Communal Worker devoting myself to uncrazy the craziness o being a Jew trying my hardest to understand my similar position in a world of non-Jews. Along the way, I also discovered that all of the definitions and seemingly black and white world of the 50’s, one in which God played a REAL important role in establishing rules, were more hyperbole, hype, and hope that all of us would remain the same cog in some imaginary wheel. I discovered that something called homosexuality was not a disease, was not a curse and certainly could be as healthy as being Jewish and being an American.
If you have been reticent enough in reading my entire lengthy introduction, thank you; I had to write ALL of that to make the point, that I happen to be a Jewish man who happens to be a homosexual who happens to understand forgiveness, compassion, empathy, sympathy, equality, and acceptance, and no matter the meaning of the Days of Awe as scribed in the Bible…And I find myself in a strange world filled with men and women Jewish and non-Jewish who somehow exist in a dimension so different, than any norm I have to wonder what the fuck God is thinking right now? For all of the LGBTQ Jews, the RepublicanJews, the Jews in the Trump Crime Family or his Jewish Fixers or Donors, have you no idea of the sins and sinister machinations and intentions, of the man you adore? For all of the Republicans and non-Jewish 1% folk who somehow go to church and then pray to your bottom line of wealth with a hardy AMEN, have you no idea of how impotent and unimportant your ideology to God has become.
Supposedly throughout the Days of Awe, the Jewish God, has a book, the Book of Life, the pages open on Rosh Hashanah, and we have 10 days to undo, the most heinous, hideous or just simple sins, so when the when it is time for the Book of Life to be closed On Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, we have another year, to try again. I am not sure, how I, no we as humans have made it through this year…From Flint to Puerto Rico, to good Nazi’s and Black Lives, from lies and money laundering to grant theft of tax dollars, to politicians more concerned about their own needs…this has been a year. I am in awe, but I am not sure for the reasons God has supposedly set aside!
