Luggage

The eight poems posted under this post were written while I waited for the bus last Wednesday. I also wrote this one about courage. I was thinking, in part, about The Book of Qualities. I was channeling the energy/frustration of the long bus wait. In retrospect it was a pretty productive hour. I wrote this one - about a holy friend - during that time.

Here's one right out of the oven:

All that I see goes

In the bags under my eyes

They are for storage

Humor

Your sense of humor
Will drop by and save your life
If you let her in

Self Reliance

On self reliance
You can surely/always count
If you can own it

Sad Pity

Self pity remains
the saddest of all the pities
standing so alone

Impatience

Extreme impatience
Loves to drive you to your grave
Going way too fast

Pity

Pity; enemy

Though he poses as a friend

The friend is kindness

Whom pity pushes aside

So you stay just where you are

Insecurity

Insecurity
Promts us to show what we know
When it's not our turn
When someone else has the stage
And it makes us look foolish

Tiredness and Anger

Tiredness, like her
Cousin Anger
can be your friend
if you will just listen
to what she is
saying

Hunger and Boredom

Hunger
and her brother
Boredom
come by
to point out
holes in our insides.

One Of The Stars

Mazal Tov! Yesterday a dear friend, whom I've mentioned here several times, got married. There's a picture of him here. He is a chavruta/true friend. How it great it was to spend time with him that eternal summer. "Someone once told me that Yerushalayim is called 'Ir shechubrah lah yachdav' because you tend to meet so many people that you know there." That's what Jon said to at the Kotel one day, from behind me, catching me off guard. He was quoting an idea I once told him, as we met - by surprise - in Yerushalayim. (I originally heard the idea from my friend Rabbi Avraham Newman).

I also mention Jon here, citing Torah that he told me. One of the people he quoted was his mesader kidushin and MC yesterday, Rabbi Dan Friedman. He called me up (to my surprise) to read the tana'im, and when I finally made it through the crowd Rabbi Friedman commented, "Jon tells me you're funny, so I expect you to be funny now" (or something to that effect. I chose to play it straight. As I stepped down from reading the tana'im, Rabbi Jonathan Rosenblatt asked me, "What, no jokes?" Sometimes I think this Funniest Rabbi title is more trouble than it's worth (and, pretty obviously from the name of my blog and more, there are other times when I don't think that).

Jon once asked me about the poem called Tourists by Amichai and I re-posted it in his honor. (I'm still shook up by a recent presentation I heard from a well known speaker/scholar. He cited this Amichai poem and mocked it in terms of form as not being a poem, and misrepresented it in terms of content as proposing that the past of Jerusalem does not matter at all.)

Three years ago, standing at the Kotel I gave Jon a copy of Aaron Bulman (Z"L)'s book and inscribed it with these words:

Dear Jon,

p

I spread his books

around my worlds

as a non believer

would spread his ashes

o

These books are pieces

of Aaron and thus pieces of me,

friends of distinction

like you

b

Perhaps one day there will be

a physical book of my poems

In my mind it is written

with you one of the stars

n

We were blessed this summer

in the city that unites souls

to talk Torah in our way

Torah that restores spirit:

u

Holiness of friends

like the Western Wall itself
hovers and protects

On the Amtrak train to the Baltimore wedding I wrote this:

h

I think of the leaves

on this beautiful flower

also beautiful

l

During chazarat hashatz of Minchah this came to me:

g

G-d is present tense

Building Jerusalem and

Returning to Zion

i

The Chupah was outside and it was drizzling. Remarkably (though no-one mentioned it), the rain came to a halt as the Chupah started.

l

The rain trickles down

A guy I married says hi

Soon, soon - the Chupah

l

During the meal I caught up briefly with a woman who used to live in my neighborhood. She asked if I still write haiku. I don't remember why she knows that I do. I told her that I'd just written one (the one about waiting for the Chupah to start) and shared it. She didn't seem crazy about it.

l

A short while later I bumped into someone who graduated about ten years ago from the high school I teach in. She's involved in a poetry organization that is interested in creating a poetry league for yeshiva high schools. I think they envision it as a poetry slam kind of thing and they want it to be edgy, just as they wish to be. And they want to oversee it themselves.

h

It was so great to see my friend, to see him getting married, to see him filled with light.

h

He wrote a poem

to read in the yichud room

showed it just to me

l

The mesader kiddushin cited a vort from Toldot Yaakov Yoseif : Why do we say Mah Tovu in Shul, as it refers to the home? That blessing depicts positively Jewish ohalot and mishkenot. Toldot Yaakov Yoseif suggests what is straightforward, but not usually broken down and focused upon. An ohel is a home, a mishkan is a sanctuary, and the two have a symbiotic relationship. (That's my take, actually, that each one feeds into the holiness of the other. His take was specifically that the public temples are only as holy as the private homes.)

h

The fellow sitting next to me at the Chupah told me a nice thought. Here's my riff on what he heard on Shabbos at a Shul his acapella group performed at. He said that jealousy is a normal human emotion. The extreme contrast between Korach and Moshe was the degree to which they tamed or were overtaken by their emotions. Korach was probably not the only Jew at that time to be jealous of Moshe, but boy did he let it get the better of him. And Moshe was not the only human at the time to have have potential for greatness, but boy did he ever achieve greatness. May we each be so blessed.

Don't Allow The Lucid Moment To Dissolve

A friend just lent me Sarah's Key. I searched for reviews and a positive one came up on the blog sheistoofondofbooks.com. I looked around on the blog and found a nice post about how this blogger wishes to broaden her reading habits and so she attended a poetry reading of a recommended poet. She posted this poem of his (like all his work, translated from Polish), which I in turn pass on to you:

Try to Praise the Mutilated World

By Adam Zagajewski

k

Try to praise the mutilated world.

Remember June’s long days,

and wild strawberries, drops of wine, the dew.

The nettles that methodically overgrow

the abandoned homesteads of exiles.

You must praise the mutilated world.

You watched the stylish yachts and ships;

one of them had a long trip ahead of it,

while salty oblivion awaited others.

You’ve seen the refugees heading nowhere,

you’ve heard the executioners sing joyfully.

You should praise the mutilated world.

Remember the moments when we were together

in a white room and the curtain fluttered.

Return in thought to the concert where music flared.

You gathered acorns in the park in autumn

and leaves eddied over the earth’s scars.

Praise the mutilated world

and the grey feather a thrush lost,

and the gentle light that strays and vanishes

and returns.

p

In the comments on Dawn's post someone cited this poem, which I think I like even better. The one cited above was written right after 9/11, so the darkness is understandable, and the hope is remarkable. In this next one hope and light more prominently assume center stage:

j

Don't Allow The Lucid Moment To Dissolve

By Adam Zagajewski

l

Don't allow the lucid moment to dissolve

Let the radiant thought last in stillness

though the page is almost filled and the flame flickers

We haven't risen yet to the level of ourselves

Knowledge grows slowly like a wisdom tooth

The stature of a man is still notched

high up on a white door

From far off, the joyful voice of a trumpet

and of a song rolled up like a cat

What passes doesn't fall into a void

A stoker is still feeding coal into the fire

Don't allow the lucid moment to dissolve

On a hard dry substance

you have to engrave the truth

n

Translated by Renata Gorczynski

Ghosts of Korachs Past

Wishing everyone a great Shabbos.

Here's an Erev Shabbos post featuring a piece by Hillel Goldberg about Shabbos, called If Only. In the same post I discuss some of my students' (and my) thoughts about a machloket shelo lesheim shmayim.

Here's a Korach link, with links within.

Rabbi Yizchak Twerski develops a connection between Kayin and Korah.
Part I
Part II

Into Great Silence

I first read about this movie in February 2007 when it came out. It got so little hype that I referred to it as "the monk movie" when I tried to convince friends to see it with me at the one art house theater where it played in New York City. The Time's review by A.O. Scott sold me on it, with lines like the concluding one, "I hesitate, given the early date and the project’s modesty, to call 'Into Great Silence' one of the best films of the year. I prefer to think of it as the antidote to all of the others." Throughout the review the critic describes how the film maker remarkably presents the lives of these monks in a way in which you can feel it:

"Like the monks themselves, it is both humble and exalted. And, in its way, eloquent. The idea of removing yourself entirely from the world is a radical one, and Mr. Gröning approaches it with fascination and a measure of awe. At first, as your mind adjusts to the film’s contemplative pace, you may experience impatience. Where is the story? Who are these people? But you surrender to “Into Great Silence” as you would to a piece of music, noting the repetitions and variations, encountering surprises just when you think you’ve figured out the pattern. By the end, what you have learned is impossible to sum up, but your sense of the world is nonetheless perceptibly altered."

That review prompted me to want to see the film, but it played all too briefly. I hadn't thought about it until Netflix recommended it. That Netflix computer program knows my movie tastes better than a lot of people do. It's a long movie, but I hope to get to it soon. The Times' review addresses the length of the film, "Only one monk, elderly and blind, speaks directly to the camera. Appearing near the end of the film, he muses on the nature of his vocation and the texture of his religious devotion. Past and present are human categories, he says, but “for God, there is no past, only present.” Viewed from this perspective — from the standpoint of eternity — “Into Great Silence,” with a running time of 162 minutes, is absurdly short.

I confess that while I want to like long documentaries, I don't always get what I want. After years of looking forward to The Up Series, based on rave reviews, I started watching it and had a hard time buying into it. Also, I'm a bit wary that the fact that I have my own spiritual practice, which I love and believe in deeply, may take away from how much I appreciate this film. More than one of my friends were inspired by the spiritual aspects of Eat, Love, Pray, but that book failed to surprise or touch me.

Still, I have high hopes for this film.

Roger Ebert also thought very highly of this film, ending his review with the following words:

"So, what happens in the course of the picture? As you would expect, everything and nothing. You get the feeling that whatever you witness has probably happened countless times before. Novices are admitted. A clock is re-set, then straightened. On one sunny walk, there's a discussion about the moral implications of hand-washing: how it should be done, and how much. On another walk, the monks slide down a snowy slope. Those are among the action-packed highlights.

But they are not what "Into Great Silence" is about. A movie is always about what happens to you as you watch it, and Groning's stated intention was to entice the viewer to assemble his or her own experience of the film by asking questions and making discoveries as it unreels. Sometimes these questions are elemental: What am I looking at? Is it day or night? At other moments they are experiential: What task or ritual is this? Where are they going? And at others they are more existential: What does it take to find meaning in the physical and psychological discipline of such a life? Are the monks happy, or content? What does the concept of "happiness" mean in this context?

Each of us is left to discover the answers for ourselves."

Not Long, Not Road, Not Home

Some books, despite relative obscurity, remain with you. There's a book like that, which I found years ago in my local library. It's about a Jewish, intermarried, radio therapist who finds Yiddish letters from her long gone grandmother. She gets the letters translated and starts on a journey that she hopes will reveal to her the secret behind the hidden wedding gown (in the attic) that she got in big trouble for donning as a child. I remember it being poetic and insightful, and I bought into the story.

The funny thing is that I often try to recall the name of the book, perhaps to recommend it. And I start thinking that it's something about the road home or the journey home. The Long Road Home? No. The Long Journey Home? Path? Still, no. I google around and become increasingly determined to find the answer, even as the results seem further and further off. After a while I remember that the phrasing is original. Yes it's something like "the long way home," but uses a fresher turn of words. Not long, not road or journey, probably not even home. But what are the title words used to convey this cliche' in an original way?

Eventually I find it. I just succeeded in this familiar ritual/scavenger hunt. I'm posting the name of the book (and recommending it) here, in part so that this post will serve as a reference for me the next time I think of this wonderful work and struggle to remember that it's The Slow Way Back. by Judy Goldman.

Courage

Courage can be

the quietest one

in the room

p

She's funny

(not ha-ha)

like that

Tonight: A Photo Journal

Here's what happened... I was ready to leave school at 7:10, then remembered that after 6:40 the bus comes on the hour instead of every half hour. I went out at 7:35 for the 7:41 bus. With the new school building to my right, the Roy Bossolt Park to my left and a lawn and flag behind me, I waited.

Holy P.M.

Tonight, while staring at the house across the street from the bus stop in front of work in Pasaic, and waiting for 70 minutes for the bus to arrive I wrote this poem:

Holy P.M.

A friend of mine lives

next door to a bus stop

and knows each of the

"cleaning ladies" and "nannies"

in her neighborhood by their first

names

because she regularly drives these

people

to the Englewood homes

where they are

workers.

An Ouch Poem

Up in the deceptively bright morning
5:35 and I want to be sleeping instead
of sitting and writing these words, again
these angst sated words, as I mine for hope

But if I was not here, and was in bed, I think
I'd wish that I got up from here to sit and write
"If only I'd get up I'd be writing The Great Poem"
I'm going back to bed, see how that works out for me

Breathing and Blogging and Linking...

I am busy with end of school year related work. Still, one needs to breathe, and part of my breathing is writing and part of my writing is blogging.

A dear friend recommended that I watch The Last Detective. He said that the character reminds him of me. I read up a bit on the show and wasn't sure how backhanded this compliment was. Then I found this quote, and now it's all good: "Frankly," one captured criminal tells him, "it's a pleasure to be arrested by you."

Speaking of quotes, I really liked this question, posed by David Baird in A Thousand Paths To Happiness, "Why is it we so hate being taught when we're so happy to learn?"

In the same book, the author raises this paradox, which I've wondered about, "Is there a humble person who isn't proud of the fact?" I've asked myself, "If someone considers someone else arrogant, is there some arrogance in that judgement? Similarly, "Is it iffy to think you are humble?"

While we're on books and quotes here's a quote by a man who was moved by a book many years ago and went out to find the author and made a movie about it called Stone Reader, "Like all secret hopes...when they vanish, you realize you'd done too little to make them happen" - Mark Moskowitz. (It's a remarkable movie.)

That film opens with these words of Ernest Hemingway (in an extended version that doesn't seem to be on line), "All good books have one thing in common - they are truer than if they had really happened."

While I was looking up that saying, this line caught my eye, "All things truly wicked start from an innocence." - Ernest Hemingway. There is something very original, insightful, and striking about those words.

On the topic of character, there's a story I've quoted several times, and it seems to always garner 6 comments. It's passed on as a Cherokee story, or simply as a Native American tradition. I cited it here, in a post that I wrote right after a friend mentioned the idea of my facilitating a presentation on middot and teaching. A nice comment exchange with Neil Harris followed.

I just went onto Neil Harris' blog and found that he links to this amazing short video presentation of Rabbi Avigdor Miller talking about the miracle called an apple. (I don't think that Rabbi Miller would have approved being put on Youtube, and he probably wouldn't have backed the smoothly produced and marketed video. This is not to say that I'm not pleased to have watched it. I am.)

I also cited that Cherokee story during my question period of blogging. And I posted it straight up in this one called, Two Wolves. I've also mentioned (not sure if it's in one of these posts or others that reference the story) that President Richard Joel and I tend to use some of the same stories, and this is one of them (another one is The Kite Story, which I write about here, and tell here.

A very recent post included thoughts on the mishnah's statement regarding kinah, ta'avah, and kavod. A reader asked where the mishnah was and I referenced it in the footnote, along with a bit of commentary (which I would have phrased differently had I written it myself). That reminded me of the following, different take on that statement:

The Gemorah in Sanhedrin (102a) tells of a moment when Yerabam ben Nebat was grabbed by the robe by G-d and told - "Do you turn back in teshuvah, and I, you, and the son of Yishai (i.e. King David) will stroll together in the Garden of Eden?" Yirabam asks - "Who will go first?" And G-d says, "The son of Yishai." And to this Yerabam says, "No thanks."

Irving Bunim applies this tale to the mishnah which states that "Jealousy, desire, and honor remove a person from the world." He cites Avot DeRabi Natan which specifies that the world these traits takes a person from is The World To Come. Bunim puts it this way in his Ethics From Sinai Vol II - page 194: "If the twisted, morally vitiated inner self cannot live in this world but will be removed, no more will it be able to live in the Hereafter, where it will arrive quite intact and unaltered." (You can read more about this here).

Recently at a Se'udat Hoda'ah the Cherokee story came up and someone mentioned that it inspired a song called Two Wolves. I like the idea that it was made into a song, but I didn't enjoy the actual song as much as I'd hoped I would (available at Youtube). Does it remind anyone else of this song?

Speaking of animals, on June 22nd someone googled the words "whittling a horse" and then went to the third response, which was this haiku post. I like that one, and the responses.

Someone in the film Stone Reader referenced the first italicized words in the quote below. It's interesting that Frost himself rails against this, in this late in life interview (Paris Review, Summer 1960) quote by Robert Frost:

"So many talk, I wonder how falsely, about what it costs them, what agony it is to write. I’ve often been quoted: 'No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise for the writer, no surprise for the reader.' But another distinction I made is: however sad, no grievance, grief without grievance. How could I, how could anyone have a good time with what cost me too much agony, how could they? What do I want to communicate but what a hell of a good time I had writing it? The whole thing is performance and prowess and feats of association. Why don’t critics talk about those things—what a feat it was to turn that that way, and what a feat it was to remember that, to be reminded of that by this? Why don’t they talk about that? Scoring. You’ve got to score. They say not, but you’ve got to score, in all the realms—theology, politics, astronomy, history, and the country life around you."

The second half of Stone Reader is introduced with this quote on the screen, "The present moment is unlike the memory of it. Remembering is not the negative of forgetting. Remembering is a form of forgetting" -Milan Kundera. Wow. I think about that a lot. Memory is about how we react to an experience. People tell me that I have a good memory, but it feels more to me like I experience things strongly - that's what I'd call it.

I've been writing this post in stitches over a couple of days. Along with this I've been finishing up marking, dealing with late work from students, and watching Stone Reader. The movie came out in 2002 and I watched it online via Netflix, which I started recently. The movie is about reading and thinking and searching and longing and and and. I liked it. After the movie came out the book at its center was republished after 30 years of being out of print. I checked it out on Amazon and a funny (not ha-ha) thing happened. There are 4 books listed that people who bought The Stones of Summer went on to also buy. One of the books (and I don't know the connection) is one which I'd never heard of until it was just recommended to me (The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.)

With Feathers

Lately I feel that I have been more cautious and cryptic here than once.

I am fascinated by the connection between jealousy and hope. Five months ago I wrote this tanka on the topic, which I posted together with some other things, such as excerpts from Debra Winger's memoir. That post had a nice thread of comments.

When one is jealous

One seeks to destroy that thing

That makes one jealous

Unless there is hope that is

Then one learns from jealousy

Nine months ago I conceived this paragraph, based on the insight of a friend, which later led to the tanka:

Jealousy is most destructive when hopelessness runs high. Jealousy is human. If one is jealous and has hope then one can combine the information gained from the jealousy, i.e. what one really wants, and then with the surrounding hope make positive efforts. If, G-d forbid, hopelessness is pervasive, then one destroys that which one is jealous of, both in others that have it in a developed form as well as whatever amount of the desired trait one has within oneself.

Over this Shabbos I thought of a chidush:

The mishnah says that kin'ah, ta'ava, and kavod - jealousy, desire, and honor remove a person from this world. If these things can remove a person from the world then that means you need to be struggling with them - to some extent - to be in this world in the first place.

This poem just came to mind:

Hope

By Emily Dickinson

0
Hope is the thing with feathers

That perches in the soul,

And sings the tune--without the words,

And never stops at all,

And sweetest in the gale is heard;

And sore must be the storm

That could abash the little bird

That kept so many warm.

m

I've heard it in the chillest land,

And on the strangest sea;

Yet, never, in extremity,

It asked a crumb of me.

Ghosts of Shlachs Past

This year on parshapost I present an essay by Sherrie B. Miller. I learned from it and I hope you do too.

I remain intrigued by the observation I mentioned here about the fact that 3 parshiyot's names are a form of the word shlach - to send. I also kind of enjoyed revisiting this entire post and its comments.

In this post I write about Shlach as well as a topic I think about often and was just discussing tonight; is it possible to (legitimately) reframe our conception of lashon hara?

Here, I cite a great piece by Rabbi Leibtag and, speaking about ghosts, I remember my dear friend and mentor Aaron Bulman Z"L - "his lips speak (Torah) from the grave" -Yebamoth 97a (see this blog for an interesting essay on this concept), who first introduced me to the Torah of Rabbi Leibtag.

This post deals with the idea that the meraglim were expected to learn from Miriam's mistake. The question could be raised; she spoke about a man, they spoke about a land, so how were they supposed to know the same rule applied (and does it really?)

Wishing you an early Shabbat Shalom. May we be blessed to grow from this week's parsha.

I've Got A Need For Sleep

"Zeh hayom asah Hashem..." "This is the day G-d made let us rejoice and be happy in it." King David doesn't say which day he's referring to. I think this is because he is talking about every day.

Today was a good day for me and I hope for you too. I had great company and conversation for both dinner and lunch. My lunch friend told me a great story about how he was in Psych grad school and gave a class presentation and sat behind the big desk and the teacher asked him if he enjoyed the feeling of power... There's more to the story. Let me know if you need to know.

How do you define need? That question came up at dinner. The halacha - ruling seems to be that if something needs to be said then it's allowed to say it without worry of lashon harah - improper speech. What I see as a need and you see as a need are very different creatures, so the plot thickens.

Amidst much pleasant talk about talk and about thought and about perception (and and and) this quote came up at dinner, "Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, small minds discuss people." My friend heard it at a shiur, in which the rabbi said it in the name of Eleanore Roosevelt. I've heard this before without any attribution. I am always curious about stories and quotes and find that it's often hard to know for sure where these truisms originated. Most important is to try to live them. Still, I was inclined to poke around regarding the source of these words.

In a Wikiquote (which I'd never heard of till a minute ago) entry on Roosevelt it puts the quote under Disputed, stating, "This has been quoted without citation as a statement of Eleanor Roosevelt. It is usually attributed to Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, but though Rickover quoted this, he did not claim to be the author of it; in The World of the Uneducated in The Saturday Evening Post (28 November 1959), he prefaces it with 'As the unknown sage puts it...'Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, and little minds discuss people.' In this form it was quoted as an anonymous epigram in A Guide to Effective Public Speaking (1953) by Lawrence Henry Mouat. Several other variants or derivatives of the expression exist, but none provide a definite author: 'Great minds discuss ideas, mediocre minds discuss events, small minds discuss personalities.' 'Great minds discuss ideas - Average minds discuss events - Small minds discuss people.' 'Small minds discuss things - Average minds discuss people - Great minds discuss ideas.'"

In googling the quote I came across this entry by fellow bloggers, NorthofAndorra. I find it fascinating that what friends of mine and I tend to think of as a local issue of loshon hara, is for some, a universal concern. I really liked this post and the light it sheds on the origins of this quote. I'd never heard of Tobias Wilson, one of the purported coiners of this adage. I learned more about him here. I have heard of, seen, and read Fran Leibowitz and just recently was wondering what she's up to these days.

In seven hours I need to be on my way to work, "I got a feeling I'm not the only one." Can you identify that quote? (And while you're at it, care to name what quote referenced by this post's title?)

Good night and G-d bless

you and I and the rest of

the world to sleep well

and to wake up and speak well

about truly deep ideas

2 By B.C.

I am very taken by Billy Collins' work and am also moved by how this animator melds his words and voice with these images:

1. Budapest
2. Forgetfullness

Chilled

I'm here at work, trying to do work - thus the name. I've tried to break the habit of saying I'm going to or coming from school. It's work. And a calling. I just filled out a questionnaire for someone doing a thesis on why teachers become teachers. The questions were interesting; were you dissuaded from becoming a teacher, do you think teachers are respected, etc. It was well done, if a bit too heavy on a certain type of educational jargon and mindset for my taste.

A student just walked in and noticed that I was blogging. He was curious about my blog so we perused it together. He liked the picture in the Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan post and we watched a bit of the video. I think it's a remarkable piece, and this student was taken by it too.

Earlier this morning I was returning homeworks and a student said that my office is so chilled and that she hopes when she's older her office is just like mine. That comment made me feel good, reminded me of the time that a Spanish teacher I shared a classroom with told me that I brought good karma to the space. These comments mean a lot to me. We should all see the good in each other and when we see something say something (hey, that's catchy).

In giving back the homeworks, I said with regret that one student lost 15 points on one question. "That's OK," she said, "I really struggled with that one and knew I didn't get it right." Teachers (and insightful others) reading this will understand what an outstanding response that is - particularly from an honors student. To me that kind of contrition and respect reflects true honor.

I must be going, promises to keep, deadlines to meet - that sort of thing, you understand? Yesterday in a fast food store I ordered and said I was stepping next door and would be back in a minute. Then I added, "Is that OK?" (like I just wrote, "You understand?"). The worker snapped at me, saying something like, "You're the customer, don't ask me." Where does one buy a thicker skin? Where does one buy a first layer of skin?

Haiku Of The Day # 1175

Small things and big things

I thank G-d for all of them

Today is the day

GNAGB #1175

A dear reader told me that the WSJ link didn't work, so I fixed that.

I've been writing lately and may post some of it here.

I am the first kid on my block to own the Sachs - OU Siddur. I have a lot to say about it. Maybe later.

I am going to free associate. Soon it's time for sleep.

Five big things I'm grateful for -
G-d,
Parents/Family
Friends,
Roof Over Head,
Job.

Five "small" things -
these salmon meals you can pop in the microwave,
mechanical pencils,
air conditioning,
music,
taps on my shoes.

------------------------------------------------

I wonder who reads this
I wonder why I write
I wonder what's come of this
Oh, what did I ignite?

Why do I write poems

That sound like seventh grade,

Rhymy rhyming poems

Haven't I grown with age?

The answer is outside of me

To give to others beyond myself

I shouldn't think it's all about me

that's one secret for happiness & health

And I Taught His Best Friend's Sons

Couplehood, which I purchased in hardcover at Strand for $5 starts on page 145. Paul Reiser explains, "It's just that when I'm reading, I love being smack in the middle of the book. Pages behind me, pages ahead of me. It's too overwhelming to know there's so much left and you're only on page 8. This way, you can read the book for two minutes, and if anybody asks how far along you are you can say, "I'm on 151- and it's really flying. It just sails, baby." You'll feel like you're accomplishing something, and I get credit for writing a bigger book. Everybody wins, and it costs us nothing."

Trivia Q - In what film is Reiser's character always being kind of passive aggressive/apologetic, doing things like asking for a ride, but "only if you're going that way anyhow," or eying a sandwich that he'd be happy to finish but "only if you weren't going to eat it anyway?"

Self Criticism

Click on image to enlarge to a more readable size.

I recommend the article that accompanies this quiz from today's Wall Street Journal. I thank a fellow blogger (not the same one who recommended the Peanuts/Outcast video) for passing this on. I'll link to it and post it as the first comment for your convenience and reading pleasure.

Wishing everyone a great, meaningful, growth filled day.

P.S. Trivia Q: Who wrote and a sang a song with the word accompany in the title (and name the song).

Good Morning World

This commercial song just came to mind. Wishing you (= plural, i.e. anyone reading this) a good morning and a good day.

"Good morning, and in case I don't see ya, good afternoon, good evening, and good night!" (Can you identify that quote?)

It's Rhetorical

I read a lot of - for lack of a better term - self help books. It just dawned on me that I could write one. And I don't think I want to put it out there for you to buy, or even to gift you with it (though parts of me would want to do both of those actions). I want you to write and live your own private self help book. That's why we're here.

Hey Ya

I had never, to the best of my recollection (I sound like I'm testifying for Watergate) heard this song till a blogger friend (you know who you are) alerted me to this Peanuts video set to the song.

I'd embed the picture if I remembered how. Till then, click on the word cliche'.

10 Are

My last day of classes with my tenth grade Chumash class was a day before the last day of school. And I missed the photo op. The other day a few students from that class were hanging in the old Admissions Suite (where my Torah Guidance office finds its home). And we took this impromptu picture.

"We'd talk about the Rashi, the Tosfos, and the Mets"

This was the last day of classes with my eleventh grade Gemorah class. Chumash meets four periods a week, Gemorah meets eight periods a week. Five of these students were also in my Gemorah class in ninth grade. That's a lot of time together, and I'm so glad we had it.

"T For 2"

Last day of classes with my ninth grade Chumash class.

"Out Till Fall"

This was the last day of classes with my eleventh grade Chumash class.

Rabbi David Weiss HaLivni On Jewish Humor - Part II

(Click For Part I )

What surprised me most was how free these jokes were from constraints, religious or otherwise. The rule was: Anything goes. What generally would have been considered heretical or immodest was, in the joke,utterly forgiven or even encouraged. One of the "hit" jokes was the story of a Jew who was trying to convince his friend of the importance of monotheism, of One G-d who rules all. "What do I care?" said the other Jew. "Do I have to support them? Let there be many." Unintentionally, the joke cheapens the belief in monotheism, the cornerstone of Judaism, but it was nevertheless tolerated and enjoyed. I once tolerated a lecture on this kind of joke "Irreverent Jokes in a Reverent Society."

Rabbi Fleischmann Is Here (Click For Link/Reference)

It's almost 5 on a Friday. The teaching has ended. Why am I still at work? One of my classes was here today and I was here for figurative handholding. That went till 2. Then I had to finish up my major Gemorah final to submit to the office today because it is to be given and taken on Monday. That took a while. Then I finished what are hopefully my last 4 recommendations (though if a kid needs to ask at this point I'll find it hard to add to their burden by saying no). Even though I did 44, I got a note from up top today saying that if I'm getting this note then I'm one of the people who's done most of my recommendations and yet...

It's cool that the parshiyot that I taught this year are the ones we're in now. I'm thinking ahead. Chukat is about two things - death, and on a related note - that everything comes from G-d. Perhaps when Chazal say that Bilam was a prophet for the nations the way that Moshe was for us they mean to say that they taught the same lesson - that all comes from G-d. This may be why Balak follows Chukat. (That's my words but Rabbi Yitzchak Twersky's idea)

Ghosts of Beha'alotcha Past

On Complaining

Chanukah In June

Four Lashon Harah Lessons

The first two of these divrei Torah appear in the middle of longer posts. Remember when I used to write really long, really open posts like those? Belated thanks to Pesach for cutting yourself open and kindly sharing that comment. Belated thanks to Miriam and Anne for your always warm and present thoughts. Anne, if memory serves me right - it was B.B. King (Freudian slip, I first wrote Bibi, then realized it didn't feel right). Miriam, whenever you want I'm ready to hear the previous life monastery story.

Why Is Avot In Nezikin? - A Graduation/Siyum Thought

The senior class made a siyum on 3 sedarim of mishnayot at their graduation. The student speaker in honor of the occasion wondered aloud why Avot is in Nezikin. She referenced Kahati, who cites the Rambam, who says that the lesson is that judges must sympathize with the involved parties, or they will not be able to judge fairly, in addition to losing the respect of the litigants. This represents the idea that Nezikin is largely technical and one can lose sight of the meaning behind the laws. Avot was placed in Nezikin as a safety valve, which reminds us of the values behind the rules. Avot is the glue that holds all of Nezikin together.

It's kind of cool that 4 years ago at the start of this student's first year of high school, at her freshman Shabbaton she offered to help carry my bags to the car. She is a true baal midot/bat Torah who reiterates what she says through how she lives.

Kein Yirbu.

Besides Everything

One of the student speakers at graduation last night cited an interesting study recently reported in the New York Times. As Tara Parker-Pope puts it in her piece on the affects of friendship on long life, "Last year, researchers studied 34 students at the University of Virginia, taking them to the base of a steep hill and fitting them with a weighted backpack. They were then asked to estimate the steepness of the hill. Some participants stood next to friends during the exercise, while others were alone. The students who stood with friends gave lower estimates of the steepness of the hill. And the longer the friends had known each other, the less steep the hill appeared."

Wow.

Mind The Gap

In the comic strip Kudzo there was once a strip in which a boy asks a preacher why there is suffering in the world. The pastor answers, "It's a G-d thing, you wouldn't understand." Far from being a simple joke, or - worse - a cop out, I think this is a profound truth. The fact that G-d is not man is the answer to our questions concerning G-d. Everything we ask and everything we suggest as an answer is within our realm. The only things we can do is try to get the gap and try to bridge the gap. The more we understand that G-d is not one of us and the more we try to be like G-d and to be close to him as best we can, the more the questions go away.

But that's not what I wanted to write about. I felt, though, that before saying what I felt like saying at this moment, I needed to present the above idea. Now I can proceed.

Do you think that G-d is an artist? I do (although it's complicated, because really G-d is above any human conceptions, but within our world, as we perceive G-d, I'd say He's an artist). All this came to mind recently when Steg linked to this comic strip.

On a related note, it bugs me that poetry so peripheral in all circles today, specifically in Jewish "intellectual" circles. The Torah is a song, and it is wrong to turn a song into something burdensome/long. There's nothing like a good song, poem, or good art of any kind.

Recently I returned to an old habit. I was tired, didn't think I'd make it through my last period of the day/ Then I remembered The Art Room. I got myself some pastels and a big, thick white sheet of paper. I filled in with multi-colored flame like stripes. I returned several times until I deemed it done. Perhaps I'll post a photo of it. There's no place like art.

Tonight was graduation and the talk always turns to religious ideals, to family, and friends (depending on who's speaking). The school has a lovely custom of honoring one of the parents of a graduate with delivering the keynote address. I won a bet with the daughter of the speaker.

Minutes before the ceremony as the 165 students lined up outside the gym, this student told me that she made peace with the fact that her father was speaking. She only had two hopes. One, that he wouldn't mention her. Two, that he wouldn't mention the Holocaust. I assured her that he would definitely mention both. We made a bet. Guess who won.

Within the first two minutes of his speech (I thought it took three, but she said it was two) he mentioned his daughter and how proud he was of her. Then he said that his family's history reads like the book of Job and spoke about the Holocaust. He spoke really well, mostly about the responsibility that rests on the students, ending with the words, "Truly, our future is in your hands."

The speeches were all good, and the principal does a great job of keeping it relatively short - done in an hour and fifteen minutes. I sat taking notes. It's what I do. Perhaps another time I'll share more of what was said.

Good night and G-d bless

he prayed for himself

and like he did as a child

for all the people he loves

A Minchah Offering

It's the middle of the work day

A time ill-suited for prayer

Kind of like a coffee break

Mid performance of a bypass

`

Early morning, late night

We make time and pray

In the vein of exercise or

other early and late musts

2

But the Minchah Amidah's

Against the grain interruption

Standing still in the afternoon

Let's admit how awkward it is

t

t

I'm in the middle of a life-span

(Almost comically, so called)

An unpopular time to pause

Pen poems, hum new tunes

3

In my youth, in my old age

It was, will be O.K. to play

Like my not driving a car

my lacking a power position

3

In what's called mid-life

Running is all the rage

Yet I'm thrilled to sit and

Share this poem with you

Is That All There Is? - A Link Heaven Post

About 40 years ago Peggy Lee recorded a song that I discovered yesterday. It's called "Is That All There Is?" It's unusually philosophical for a pop song, especially considering that it was penned by the people who brought us "There Goes My Baby," "Hound Dog," "Smokey Joe's Cafe," "Yakety Yak," "Charlie Brown," and many more tunes that lacked the existential punch packed by this one. There is some great insight about this song at this website (better info, in this case, than Wikipedia - i.e. the answer to the mystery of how Leiber and Stoller came to write this song). It's based on Disillusionment, a very short story (the complete text is available for free online here), written by Thomas Mann (when he was 20). The song was made famous by Peggy Lee in 1968 (but her version is incomplete on Youtube). You can see, if that's acceptable to you, Bette Midler (when did her hair turn blonde?) singing the complete song here.

I believe that there is more than these wonderful, bittersweet, human experiences. And yet...

True That, Mr. Ebert

Roger Ebert's reviews contain living wisdom that is rare in most reviews (or anywhere else).

In his piece on The Grocer's Son, he notes,

"'The term 'coming of age'

always seems to apply to teenagers.

But you can come of age in your 20s, 30s, 40s

or maybe never.

I define it as

beginning to value other people for who they are,

rather than what they can do for you."

"Plink, plink, plink"

There's nothing like buying a new album (or a CD, if so it must be) and putting it on for the first time. I just got Steve Martin's banjo album. I think he's great and generally comes through; he certainly does here. He does stand up, acts, writes, directs, plays music and even sings well.

"Years ago, in my old comedy act, I said, 'You just can't play a sad song on the banjo.' This was for comic effect only, because I knew the banjo had a capacity for mournful melodies and the 'high, lonesome sound.' As I was sometimes mournful, sometimes lonesome and sometimes high, this suited me perfectly....I can't imagine the vacancy I would have in my life without this peculiar instrument running through it. The songs I have written for this record represent the influence of a dozen players and a thousand tunes, and I thank them all, but it's the banjo itself I thank most, this musical and geometrically beautiful object, a circle with a stick attached, four strings running up to its end, and a droning fifth string stopping halfway up the neck. It shouldn't even be playable, but it is... I recently took a photo of my wife sitting on the floor reading a book. Later, I realized it inadvertently contained three things I love most in my life; my wife, my dog, and my banjo. The only thing missing were all my friends, whom I could not have crowded into the picture..."

Here's a lovely song called Pretty Flowers, featuring Steve on banjo and vocals by Vince Gill and Dolly Parton.

Nothing Up My Sleeves

How can I best describe the last day of classes for a teacher? You know that trick where the magician pulls the cloth out from the table and the settings remain perfectly in place. I don't believe that most people can do that trick. Try it. When you pull out the cloth, the crash will follow; I pretty much guarantee it. Imagine how the spoons and saucers feel. My guess is that they yearn to stay firmly on their marks, but someone just has to come along and pull out the cloth. I bet you they were only now becoming comfortable with the texture of this cloth they were set on just a heartbeat ago. That's how I feel as a teacher every year. Around August 19th, I make peace with the fact that my old cloth rests in a basket in a corner of the laundry room and I sit stacked in a kitchen cabinet. When I finally come to terms with this arrangement a new cloth and setting (which includes me) get placed on the table and we start all over again.

Nice Message

I like this video called Risk=Life.

Twitter-esque

Every time I visit with my parents (as I am doing right now) I think of the saying - "You can't go home again." Then I think of the expression, "You can't ask a kashia on a maiaseh."

On The Film My Architect

I am in the middle of watching My Architect: A Son's Journey. It is remarkable. Don't take my watching it in spurts as a reflection of the movie, it's not her - it's me. One of the people interviewed (one of the many pluses of this film is that it doesn't have the typical close up talking heads, but shuffles things around and plays with suspense) says that it's tempting to say that it's the shame that the architect that the movie is about was X or Y or Z. Richard Saul Wurman says that the way life works is that all the given pieces of our life experiences, including those that seem blatantly negative, come together to bring out the positive of who we are. As he puts it regarding seeming bad draws in the departments of both nature and nurture, "We're made by those things." What an important truth to take to heart.

Tweaking

This post about a wedding I performed comes to mind. The couple just had their second child, poo poo poo. The bris is tomorrow. To my surprise the link to the Times' wedding announcement still works (for me).

Today was the last day for one of my classes. For the rest, the last day is Monday. I worry and wonder a lot about labels in all directions and contexts. This was an honors class and I really enjoyed my time with them. They groove on ideas. Today we did a little review and then I gave a little speech and provided some food and then we did a little trivia via my head and sporcle.

My spontaneous farewell speech, which took 25 years to write was this about hearing G-d's voice, how that's the key. Some of us are tall, some short. We're different in other ways too, right from birth. But the goal for all of us is to get close to G-d. To the extent that, perhaps, the things I taught them, help in this process, I am grateful for the experience.

Dear Diary, Dear G-d,

Dear World, Dear Blog,

Why do I write the way I do;

Who is it for? Who are you?

In truth, are we all alone?

Except for G-d - on our own?

Shabbos; Jewish People's bride,

Do we take this concept inside?

As the bride approaches,

My years encroach me -

"Bo'i kalla, bo'i kalla."

Nassa / Time

Every year I rethink the idea that Parshat Nassa repeatedly mentions families and homes. It also includes the episode of Sotah. Rabbi Frand cites an approach, which suggests that the connection between the refrains of "mispechotam" and "beit avotam" is that our nation is only as strong as our families. As Allen Wheelis put it, "There are no individuals, only fragments of families." I first wrote about this on the blog here and logged in more comments on this subsequent post, which included the same thought one year later. It's funny (not ha-ha) that this parsha comes around as the school year is ending and thoughts regarding the balance of school and family in the forming of a person come to the fore.
________________________

I put on the radio upon awakening and the first tune playing was The Secret of Life (is enjoying the passage of time). Then in the reading room, I picked up A Broom of One's Own and read this when I opened the book randomly to page 71 - "Time is the comforting blanket that cloaks all our days, and the rug that we are constantly pulling out from under ourselves. The most important things to remember about time are that you need it and that you have it."

"Did You Restart Your Computer?...OK..."

My computer wasn't working. I kept trying the same steps over and over again. Finally it worked. I guess the lesson is tenacity. On the other hand, I've heard it said that craziness is doing the same thing that doesn't work over and over again. How does one differentiate between an appropriate measure of "try, try again" and denial of the reality that something is broken and you, alone, simply don't have the means to fix it?

Rav Aryeh Kaplan Zatzal - On TV

My friend Avi Kunstler alerted me to these amazing videos. I was taken by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan at a young age through pamphlets and books, though I never heard him live. I wish I had seen him firsthand. This is a rare opportunity to see a one in a million kind of person in action.

Part 1, Part 2

"...Like A Fragrance"

Taking a mid-day breath break, this Who song came on Pandora. A good friend of mine once told me about it. Chachmah bagoyim taamin. This one cuts me deep.

GNAGB

It's 8:20 PM. I'm at work. I did a movie night tonight, like last night. It's all part of the job...for me. Someone I was close to once, told me that the greatest gift you can give adolescents is to be with them at a distance. That's what I did tonight, let them be...with me around. Dougie's, movie, eachother, an adult on the side. I'm heading home. My work here is done, for today. Goodnight and G-d bless.

I Stand By My Words

Over Yom Tov, my hosts and their neighbors made a block party. They got official permission to close off the street. For Shabbos lunch everyone brought out their own tables and food and walla, a block party. One of the people involved told me that moving the barriers was either easy or hard, depending on how you carried them. My response was, "Just like life."

Dovid HaMelech's And And And

Na'ar hayiti,

vegam zakanti,

velo ra'iti tzadikne'ezav,

vezar'o mevakesh lachem.

~

The line cited above was written by King David, "I was once young, and I have also grown old/wise, and I have never witnessed a righteous man who was abandoned, his children asking for bread." This is a favorite line of people use an excuses to attack and question the Tanach.

I think that key word here is ne'ezav - abandoned. Being abandoned is not an objective reality, it is an emotional feeling. Dovid HaMelech is not saying that he never saw a poor tzadik, but that he never saw a tzadik - even in a situation where his children were wanting for bread - who emotionally experienced this situation as marking abandonment from G-d. (Perhaps, also, the word mevakesh reflects a certain kind of questioning to which there is no answer. Dovid HaMelech may be saying, in the latter part of this verse, that in a vein similar to the parents' attitude the offspring never sense despair.)

I thought of this explanation some time ago and it came back to me as I read Gil Student's recent post, which cites another take on this pasuk. The suggestion he passes on is that the word to see is being used here in novel manner - that it doesn't mean to simply see but to see in an uncaring way. I think (in contrast to re-explaining ra'iti in an unusual way) my take offers a plausible, sensible way to explain the word ne'ezav here and elsewhere.

Another verse which includes the word ne'ezav is, "Al kein yaazov ish et aviv ve'et imo..." - "Therefore a person should abandon his father and mother and cleave to his wife." Would G-d tell a person to abandon his/her parents? The word is reflecting and penetrating the way the parents - to varying extents - will feel.

P.S. Dovid uses the word "and" (the connective letter vav) three times in this verse.

Shavuos Night 12:30 -12:33 AM

It's Shavuos Night, in a Shul in a city that could be any Shul in any city, in a downstairs room, that could be any downstairs Shul room. A rabbi and 6 students sit around a cracked wooden collapsable table. It is 12:30 in the morning. One of the students challenges the rabbi, "We'll give you 5 words, you make a story using these words. And it has to make sense." The rabbi is happy to have this restless crew, settled, still, talking with him.

He accepts the challenge: Wheelbarrow, squirrel, bumblebee, cheese, and bubble (the last one is inspired by the gum a girl is chewing, the others seem to be picked as difficult challenges - not that bubble is easy). The rabbi just starts talking. He is home. As he speaks, he thinks ahead of his words realizes that the way he wants to go is to do separate stories with a connected themes. One story is do-able but would come out hokey. Five meaningful anecdotes and analogies (utilizing each of these words respectively) quickly come to mind.

Wheelbarrow - I heard this story many years ago, but it was new to every one of the kids. A guard at a factory stopped a worker who was walking out of the building pushing a wheelbarrow. The wheelbarrow was empty.The next day he stopped the same worker who was again pushing an empty wheelbarrow. This happened for thirty one years. When the worker retired the guard finally said, "OK, I give up. I know you are up to something, but I just can't tell what. Please, I won't arrest you, but put me out of my misery; tell me what you were stealing all those years." The man smiles and replies, "Wheelbarrows." (This written version was adapted from http://www.guy-sports.com/humor/stories/story_wheelbarrow.htm)

Sometimes we look at things one way and we get nowhere. As long as we stick exclusively to one train of thought we won't reach the truest conclusion. If we think out of the box we may realize that the empty wheelbarrow itself is being stolen before our eyes.

(To Be Continued) (Maybe)