Spring 2016

Are These Sufferings Dear to You?

One twenty-something's disability journey. Should the Jewish community fund fertility? Teaching gunhate to grandsons. A Sephardi polyglot chooses a language. When a woman friend dies. Hard to talk to your daughter about God. Can a feminist love a library?

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Why the Jewish Community Should Fund Fertility

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The sun beats down on her as she walks up the steps. Each uphill step a reminder of where she’s been. Each step a physical journey, an emotional climb. You... Read more »

Dressing [and Undressing] the Torah

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I rarely frequent synagogues. Even with my father’s yahrzeit, I disliked being lost in the too-fast romp through prayers that left me continually searching for a familiar word once gleaned in... Read more »

Talking [and Not Talking] About God

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In response to my teasing about her upcoming birthday — a corny, sing-song of “Who said you could be eight?”— my seven-year-old daughter Adina looked up and pointed toward the bright blue sky.... Read more »

So Much More to Sing: On the Death of a Woman Friend

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In spring 1984, Ted Solotaroff invited me to La Mama, the downtown experimental theater in New York City, to see a performance by one of his authors. Ted was an... Read more »

Choosing Which Language to Live In

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“I feel closer to an Arab from Morocco than to a Jew from Brooklyn or Boston.” My mother is a Moroccan Jew, born and bred in Tangier, where she also spent... Read more »

Teaching Gunhate

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I’ve noticed that as soon as a precious newborn baby boy is old enough to play games — maybe when he’s two or three — he might pick up a fork or a stick... Read more »

McDonald’s Coffee

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Gila’s chest constricted. While she is busy thinking what to order coffee online, the feeling is still there. She used to think the first wave of déjà vu might be... Read more »

The Watch

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I knew my mother had truly died when her wristwatch stopped ticking, that cheap little nothing of a watch she bought from a vendor on the street:  watches pinned like... Read more »

Laundry

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Like poetry                      it’s democratic and persistent                             ... Read more »

Lower East Side Library: A Love Affair

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On November 18th, 1966, I got my first library card. I had just turned six. We lived on New York’s Lower East Side and our branch was the Seward Park... Read more »

“Are These Sufferings Dear To You?” My Disability, Its Isolation, and My Journey

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Once, the rabbi of the Reconstructionist shul where I grew up told me of a discussion he’d had with other rabbis about the second blessing of the Amidah prayer, “Blessed... Read more »

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