tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-79073135792999781092024-03-13T11:45:13.596-07:00Lost in JerusalemA newly Jewish small-town 20-something seeks out the meaning of life in the the Holy Land in the hopes of finding herself somewhere along the way. Hilarity ensues.Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.comBlogger30125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-8100584723805591932015-10-07T11:35:00.001-07:002015-10-07T12:47:49.241-07:00A Note on the State of Things in My New HomeOver the last week, violence in Israel has escalated and resulted in the death of four Israeli citizens, three of them in front of children who are now orphaned because of their parents' tragic murders. I have read, with increasing alarm, the grossly misreported incidents that show not only a shameful anti-Israel bias that express sympathy for the Palestinian terrorists who have shot and stabbed unarmed civilians in a fervor of Jihadist violence and deeply ingrained antisemitism, but shocking ignorance of the context for the ever-present conflict that Israel and the Palestinians seem to be endlessly stuck in. From the BBC to the New York Times, the Palestinian terrorists who have robbed Israeli citizens of their lives and continue to threaten us with more stonings, molotov cocktails, knives, guns and lynchings, have been depicted as victims.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-dcritsBisws/VhVjBmqFfBI/AAAAAAAAB0o/eIZAhk609UE/s1600/Untitled-8_wa.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-dcritsBisws/VhVjBmqFfBI/AAAAAAAAB0o/eIZAhk609UE/s640/Untitled-8_wa.jpg" width="555" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Yes, that's an actual headline from the BBC. That Palestinian who was shot dead, stabbed to death Rabbis Aharon Bennett, 22, of Beitar Illit and Nehemia Lavi, 41, of
Jerusalem near Lion's
Gate in Jerusalem's Old City on Saturday evening. Bennett's wife Odel and
their 2-year-old son Natan were also wounded. Odel woke up in a hospital as a widow and her son is now fatherless. Aharon, Odel and Natan were on their way back from praying at the Kotel. Nehemia Lavi was trying to help defend the victims when the attack occurred. The Palestinian that was shot dead was killed by police on the scene in the middle of the attack. Should we let the BBC know that, since they seem to be unaware of what happened?</td></tr>
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As a Jew, as an Israeli, as a person who values honesty and accountability, this is beyond infuriating. I want to assure my family and friends in the States of a few things, especially those who have not been here and do not know what day to day life looks like in this region:<br />
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1. I am doing okay. I am safe, and staying aware of my surroundings wherever I go. I am avoiding the Old City, where some of the murders and attacks have taken place, as much as that deeply saddens me. Usually, I love the Old City and have spent plenty of time there in the past.<br />
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2. Please don't worry about me--I have a wonderful network of friends, teachers, colleagues, peers and neighbors who are here for me and are an endless source of wisdom, advice and hope. It's one of the many wonderful things that I love about this country and the people in it.<br />
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3. I have lost "friends" in the past for my association with Israel. If your are going to be one of those "friends," I don't really care. However, If you don't believe me when I tell you that I haven't joined a legion of evil in Israel, that we are not an Apartheid state, that we are not killing innocent unarmed Palestinians because we are the new Nazis and we just hate us some Arabs, then please talk to me. I hope I can point you in the direction of honest and unbiased news sources and tell you about my own experiences living here. Maybe we can learn something together instead of perpetuating more misinformation that leads to hostility and hatred.<br />
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4. Honest and open conversations take place in Israel, amongst Israelis, Palestinians, Arabs, etc., all the time. There is a wide range of political backgrounds that make up the conversation and debate, from the far left to the far right, and that's exactly how it should be. <br />
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5. This is not just about religious tensions. If you think this conflict just boils down to a bunch of religious extremists, both Jewish and Muslim, then you have a lot to learn, my friend. <br />
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6. I don't hate Arabs, Muslims, or Palestinians, and I'm not interested in conversations about how evil and terrible you think they are. We are all human, and the moment that I forget that and degrade the conversation to a place of hatred, is the day that I have lost touch with the core of my morals and ethics. You can think what you want--I won't descend into that dark place with you.<br />
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7. Similarly, if you think that the blame of this situation all falls onto the shoulders of Israel and her citizens, please educate yourself. I live here now too. My life could just as easily be taken for the fact that I'm here, I'm a Jew, and I'm an Israeli. Your belief in misinformation fuels this conflict further, and it endangers my life, and the life of every person here, Israeli and Palestinian alike. Think about that.<br />
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8. If you want to know if I'm a liberal or a conservative, I'll tell you now that I'm neither. I find those labels increasingly useless, divisive, and a misrepresentation of what I feel and think, and ultimately how I choose to live my life. I will read, listen to, and consider conservative and liberal sources alike. The point is to think, not to choose sides in the interest of being "right."<br />
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9. Stay hopeful. I know I am.<br />
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10. Breathe. <br />
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Stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and never forget your humanity.<br />
<br />Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-47479458649942193442015-09-19T14:01:00.001-07:002015-09-19T14:04:02.285-07:00A Complicated Love Affair<div style="text-align: left;">
Three weeks ago, I made aliyah. It had been a long time coming, something that I have been thinking about, dreaming of and longing for since I was first faced with saying goodbye to Israel after a year of living in Jerusalem in 2012. Back then, months before I even had to go back to the States, I had already made a plan to return to my new beloved homeland; I knew I was far from finished with life here, and the thought of leaving filled me with the dread of an impending loss; there was a farewell on the horizon that I couldn't bring myself to face. When I did return to study at Pardes for a second semester the following spring, the need for a more permanent solution to the constant longing to be in the land aggressively occupied my thoughts. I didn't want to be an occasional visitor, leaving my heart in Jerusalem every time "the real world" beckoned me back to the States. When I was away I missed everything about being here; from the warm and multi-faceted communities that became like second family to me, to the possibility of treading a richly, Jewishly spiritual and meaningful path in the heart of the Holy Land, to the religious, cultural and political significance thriving right in my backyard, to the street shwarma, and the very flavor of the air I breathed, I knew with utter certainty that I wanted <i>that </i>to be my new day to day life, always.<br />
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There is just absolutely nothing in this world like waking up in the morning to Jerusalem.</div>
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I suppose you could call my experiences leading up to my aliyah something of a
whirlwind romance; I had just completed Jewish conversion two weeks
before my plane touched down in a strange country that I had never been
to, and while many people spend years contemplating taking the plunge
with aliyah, the decision for me, deep down, was rather fast and on the
surface even impulsive. The longing and yearning to be here was overwhelming and all-consuming, and made "normal life" back in the States seem like a shadow existence that lacked substance and deeper satisfaction. Life in Jerusalem on the other hand, was like love at first sight.<br />
<br />
Admittedly, my love affair with Israel sounds like an idealized romance that seems to only be true in Disney fairy tales. While I enjoy such fanciful stories, we all know that underneath the magic and facade of perfection, is the reality of the situation: infatuation disguised as love.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-G6DtCm1GZUE/VfwFvGEgoEI/AAAAAAAABzo/dtoAuR6rC_E/s1600/prince%2Bcharming%2B%25282%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="285" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-G6DtCm1GZUE/VfwFvGEgoEI/AAAAAAAABzo/dtoAuR6rC_E/s400/prince%2Bcharming%2B%25282%2529.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">After all, Prince Charming is about as charming as a cardboard cutout
through anyone's eyes except Cinderella's, and I give their marriage six
months, tops.</td></tr>
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It's true; my love is not without flaws and
blemishes, and ours is a relationship that is complicated beyond
measure. The responses one gets from olim and native Israelis alike upon
aliyah is also complicated, as though there is a certainty that aliyah carries with it an unrealistic infatuation with Israel as an ideal, a fantasy that olim chase with wide-eyed bedazzlement until the honeymoon period inevitably ends, and all that's left is to settle for something far more bitter and ugly than that pretty thing we fell in love with and got oh-so-excited about. Some never seem to get out of that honeymoon stage, and others seem to barely remember it at all as the years go by. In these three short weeks that I have been back, I
have received quite a number of different reactions towards my decision to
make aliyah, on a spectrum ranging from extreme happiness and excitement for me,
to dismay and confusion regarding the status of my sanity. Here is a sampling of
those reactions:<br />
<ol>
<li> "Mozel tov! That's amazing!"</li>
<li> "Kol ha'kavod! Your strength and determination is so admirable." </li>
<li> "Mozel tov! Now what are you going to do to make a living? Because nobody here ever has money. You know that, right?"</li>
<li>"Why are you living in Jerusalem? You'll never learn Hebrew here. You should be learning Hebrew, like, yesterday."</li>
<li>"Mozel tov...any regrets yet? No? Just wait."</li>
<li>"What is wrong with you?"</li>
<li>"Nobody
who starts out on a year program here really wants to make aliyah. They do
it and then they regret it. You don't really want to be here for good.
You'll see."</li>
<li>"No seriously, why would you make aliyah? Are you a masochist?"</li>
<li>"So when are you going back to the States?"</li>
<li>"Are you crazy?" </li>
</ol>
</div>
Many of these reactions, as you can see, are less than helpful. Anyone who has spent significant time in Israel knows that this country is far from perfection. This love affair is not simple and is far from idyllic. For instance, Israeli bureaucracy is a wonder to behold in its Kafkaesque senselessness. A simple trip to the post office becomes an exercise in patience. People run into you with their shopping carts to let you know that you are in the way in the grocery aisles. Israelis are not shy about telling you exactly what they think regardless of how welcome or unwelcome their opinion is, and<i> </i>like any new immigrant coming to a foreign land, language and cultural barriers are bound to jump out at you at every turn. And of course, there's always the precarious political situation we find ourselves in with our Arab residents and neighbors, and Israel will never win a popularity contest among the nations of the world. Nobody would ever make the argument that living here is easy, simple and always like living a dream.</div>
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But in case you are thinking of making aliyah, or you already have and are in the same boat as me, I've come up with a handy list of reassurances for making your "crazy" decision that simultaneously seems to inspire awe and contempt from people who are now your fellow countrymen:<br />
<ol>
<li>You're going to feel an overwhelming amount of anxiety and fear. It's normal, and it will come and go in waves.</li>
<li>You will cry yourself to sleep more than once. You will cry in the shower in the morning as you question the sanity of your decision, and you will cry at random points throughout the day, for no apparent reason. You will feel the urge to cry when it is completely inappropriate, absurd and even comical. Let it out, and then move on.</li>
<li>You will wonder why you made such a stupid and rash decision. Then something wonderful and seemingly small will happen, and you'll remember why you are here, and wonder how you could ever question yourself in the first place. This could happen repeatedly throughout any given day, up and down, like a roller coaster. Just go along with the ride.</li>
<li> Other people's opinions about your aliyah are irrelevant. Don't let jaded, cynical people tell you how you should feel about what you are doing with your life. </li>
<li>It's going to be tough, and you knew that. You aren't here because you think an easy life is automatically the best life. You worked to make this work, and some of the best things in life come as a result of hard work.</li>
<li>Seek out like-minded friends and peers who will support you during this transition. If there was ever a time to say goodbye to the lingering Negative Nancies sucking the positive vibes out of your life, it's now. </li>
<li> Think of aliyah as a chance to start over, or at the very least, a chance to do things the way you want to do, and in your own way.</li>
<li> Breathe.</li>
</ol>
And to the olim who have been here a while and feel the need to rain on the parade of the new arrivals, repeat steps 1-8 yourselves. Maybe you'll rediscover that spark you once had with Israel. Rekindle the relationship and remember why you are here.<br />
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Or don't, but hush up about it. If there's trouble in paradise, maybe it isn't all Israel's fault, and as a new arrival still in the honeymoon stage, it's not my fault, either. It's not me; it's you.<br />
<ol>
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Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-25004654571185136202015-05-20T23:27:00.003-07:002015-05-20T23:58:33.366-07:00Smiling Through AnythingIf there is one thing about me that I don’t think people instinctively pick up on or see in me as much as I would like them to, it’s that I am a true optimist. I'm not naïve or unrealistic; no, indeed I am a realist, and let's not mince words; reality is often a rather grim affair. All the more reason, I say, to cultivate true and sincere optimism to see you through to the next day. The grim stuff in reality comes and goes in waves after all, and it’s all those bright moments of happiness in between the tidal waves of misery that we stick around and keep living for. In fact, I am so damn optimistic, that the very real masochist in me is sometimes capable of finding perverse pleasure in every tidal wave of misery that doesn’t manage to drown me completely, because it makes that calm, sunny eye of the storm all the more satisfying to savor. Plus, I get to look back at the storm that has passed over me and scream triumphantly at it like a half-insane Lieutenant Dan on the mast of Forrest Gump's fragile shrimping boat in the middle of a hurricane. Moments like that just don’t happen for sullen pessimists.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Eudr0B8pALs/VVqfMdZqXUI/AAAAAAAABmg/goaa6-WITTw/s640/lt.%2Bdan%2Bmeme.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"How you like me now?!" and "You sure you want a piece of me?!" have
also escaped my lips after weathering a particularly difficult
life-storm, but I think God and the Universe just roll their eyes at me
at this point.</td></tr>
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But I don’t believe that you’d immediately recognize that truly positive little detail about me upon first glance, or from our first meeting, or even the second or third. It’s just that I don’t, you know, smile all that easily. Or at least, when I think I’m smiling, and the muscles in my face give off the sensation of what feels like a genuine smile, this is apparently what is actually happening:<br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ozyVSOnuaBs/VV1sWWsjt0I/AAAAAAAABoU/_Co_BWKwALE/s1600/grumpy%2Bcat.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ozyVSOnuaBs/VV1sWWsjt0I/AAAAAAAABoU/_Co_BWKwALE/s320/grumpy%2Bcat.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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I'd like to claim that I have some sort of disability or a muscular disorder that makes my facial expressions feel like they are appearing on my face in a certain way, when in fact, the exact opposite is manifesting itself upon my countenance, but I don't think that is the case. Somehow, somewhere along the path of my life, smiling became a very difficult thing for me to do, despite being a friendly, and honestly, rather nice person. Admittedly, I'm not the easiest person in the world, but "mean," "bitchy," and "rude" are not adjectives that commonly get attributed to me, even behind my back. (I think...) I am however, a not completely recovered shy and timid person. And trust me--being shy is the pits. <br />
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This last weekend, I was fired from a job for the first time in my life. The reason? I wasn't smiling enough. I was serving wine at a local winery that is earnestly attempting to recover from bad Yelp reviews and a previous ownership that didn't cultivate a loyal local following in an incredibly competitive industry, and despite being openly complimented for my superior service by my customers themselves, and being told that I didn't seem to be new at all because I seemed so comfortable and natural, I was let go in an email the next morning, after going home the night before and feeling really good about how things were going; talk about a rude awakening. To punctuate the whole unpleasant experience, the assessment of the degree of my smileyness was given by the most unsmiley manager imaginable. Imagine being told to smile and to project overt happiness, rainbows, glitter, and cutesy emojis by MTV's Daria. It just does not compute:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-7DdnGfY-feA/VV1YoPXoHQI/AAAAAAAABn0/WVFDofKL1cg/s1600/daria%2Bportrait.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="244" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-7DdnGfY-feA/VV1YoPXoHQI/AAAAAAAABn0/WVFDofKL1cg/s320/daria%2Bportrait.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Actual portrait of my former manager</td></tr>
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I have held down plenty of jobs since high school, most of them in customer service, or some other sort of position in which I regularly engage with the public, and I always excel. I have always favored being friendly but genuine over creeping people out with fake smiles and awkward attempts to pal around when the situation doesn't call for it, and people generally tend to warm up to that approach. If I were the cheerful, bubbly type, and that kind of behavior just flowed naturally from me, then sure, that would work too. <br />
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But it just isn't me, and being naturally shy, I have struggled with smiling outside of some natural trigger to make it happen all of my life--I smile when I am amused, or when I get a sudden tidbit of good news. I smile when I feel happy, but even then, the upturned lips are not plastered there eerily like The Joker. I have never wanted to be that person; you know, The Constant Smiler, because they have always been a disconcerting bunch to me. We all know the type, and we encounter them from time to time; perhaps like me, you always get the sense that behind the mask-like smile lurks a terrible, sinister monster of a human that is hiding a terrifying secret--like a freezer full of hacked up animal meat that is not of the commonly and socially acceptable to eat variety.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-AnT8NTgYroI/VV1uvVhZXtI/AAAAAAAABog/aV8A-yy3l4Q/s1600/The-Dark-Knight-The-Joker-in-nurse%2527s-garb.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="168" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-AnT8NTgYroI/VV1uvVhZXtI/AAAAAAAABog/aV8A-yy3l4Q/s400/The-Dark-Knight-The-Joker-in-nurse%2527s-garb.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Just stop smiling, already! We all know you have someone locked in the basement, okay? </td></tr>
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I can smile at work when speaking with strangers to show them that I won't bite. I can smile even when I'm dealing with something privately that's tearing me apart inside; I have to go to work and be an adult, after all. Still, I have been told to smile more, to cheer up, and asked "What's wrong?" ever since I was a quiet, introverted little kid. Having adults get in my face and tell me to cheer up and ask (as though I'm incapable of hearing) "What's wrong with her?! Why doesn't she smile more?" only jolted me and made me more self-conscious about the expressions coming to my face. To overcome my once almost crippling shyness, I was often given the conflicting advice to just be myself, and then to smile more than I naturally do, be more energetic, and exaggerate positive emotions, and then that elusive confidence often missing from most adolescent lives would magically just fall into place. And then? Well, then I guess everyone would love and accept me, or something. <br />
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But as I got older, as I grew up, I found some sort of comfortable balance between my naturally reserved "resting state," and the more animated, cheerful me that family, friends and loved ones get to see from time to time. But still, the occasional glimpse of a smile doesn't satisfy everyone, including the people who often sign my paychecks. To this day, well into adulthood, every time some well-meaning person suggests that I cheer up and smile, my heart sinks a little. I am happy. I am cheerful--not always, but who, outside of a manic state, is? Why is it so hard to see those emotions manifest from within me so much of the time?<br />
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I've always told myself, well they just don't understand me, that ominous collective known as They--<i>They</i> think they've got me figured out. <i>They </i>think I'm depressed, <i>They</i> pity me, <i>They</i> think that I'm too sad and miserable to be fun, easygoing, and tender, that I'm just all rough edges and harsh grit. An attractive man smiles at me! I grimace in return, suddenly stricken with self-consciousness over my smile. Does it look genuine? Does it look happy enough? Is it a pretty smile? Does it convey what I actually feel, which is yes, I too am confident, fun, able to laugh, able to let go? Will he actually see that, or does the mocking grimace convey the anxiety, the neurotic worry, the nervousness that comes with years of being told to make my face look differently than it looks? All this in a passing moment floods my thoughts, my emotions, my bloodstream, my fluttering chest, my pulse suddenly in my overly pink ears.<br />
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And just as our self-made fears and anxieties often create our own personal hells, those cozy, confining, familiar little cages where imaginary boogeymen wait at the unlocked doors, all of the confidence that I had, all the easygoing feeling I actually felt mere seconds before dissipates and gives way to the worry. A thought comes to me so suddenly and jarring, it's like it came from outside of me, imposed by some cruel, overly critical little imp--"your teeth are a little crooked, and remember that one photo of you where you tried to smile when you were thinking too hard about it? You look like that. It's just weird." I shrink a little. I give in to that noise in my head and think, "What is wrong with me? Why doesn't everyone just leave me alone and let my face rest from all of this strained, forced smiling?"<br />
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I'm fighting a losing battle with those kinds of thoughts, though. Human psychology tells me that it doesn't matter what my intentions are--impressions mean a lot. And while pouty, moody women might look sexy in some static atmosphere, like a magazine or a Calvin Klein ad, it's not the most welcoming expression to see on someone's face when you're shaking their hand for the first time. My impulse has been to overcompensate, and it's had some success. But sometimes, I just don't think about it--and apparently, that's when I lose out on job opportunities.<br />
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So, what's a somber-faced, truly optimistic, overly neurotic woman still recovering from a lifetime of shyness supposed to do? Rock the pouty, moody look that comes so easily, of course! Hey, if you've got it, you're supposed to flaunt it, right?:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-JtxvlIR6hRQ/VV1lNjI_u-I/AAAAAAAABoI/vaPPxrUjROY/s1600/13206_10205308635534002_1737686366889974601_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-JtxvlIR6hRQ/VV1lNjI_u-I/AAAAAAAABoI/vaPPxrUjROY/s320/13206_10205308635534002_1737686366889974601_n.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Obviously, if you can do this in black and white, it looks way better.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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I suppose I could also take a queue from that optimistic disposition that I keep insisting that I have and just smile like a crazy person and not care how it comes off. The "fake it until you make it" approach has worked for me in other areas of my life, so why not here? It has taken years for me to just get at this current level of comfort with my outward appearance and self-expression, but I suppose such changes can only take root over time. I hate being disingenuous, and not because I am some paragon of the virtue of honesty, as much as I'd like to claim to be, but because I'm just really bad at it. You'd think someone like me would have a pretty good poker face, so to speak. I really don't--my heart is on my sleeve whether I want it there or not.<br />
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But perhaps there is something quietly heroic and impressive about being able to smile through anything, at any time, and even for no reason. My face often feels like a shroud at any given moment, perhaps because I've gotten used to being on guard, like any shy, overly self-conscious person that has had people in her face all her life over the state of her face. I'll try to take a queue from the many facets of cultural wisdom that tells me to shut up, get over it, and smile through every stupid storm that hits us in this crazy thing called "life."<br />
<br />
After all, it was just a part-time job, right?<br />
<br />
<i>Smile though your heart is aching<br /> Smile even though it's breaking<br /> When there are clouds in the sky, you'll get by<br /> If you smile through your fear and sorrow<br /> Smile and maybe tomorrow<br /> You'll see the sun come shining through for you<br /><br />Light up your face with gladness<br />Hide every trace of sadness<br />Although a tear may be ever so near<br />That's the time you must keep on trying<br />Smile, what's the use of crying?<br />You'll find that life is still worthwhile<br />If you just smile<br /><br />That's the time you must keep on trying<br />Smile, what's the use of crying?<br />You'll find that life is still worthwhile<br />If you just smile</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<i>"Smile" </i></div>
Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-86008408674848368382015-01-09T01:40:00.001-08:002015-01-09T01:54:59.180-08:00Once Upon a Time, I Wasn't CharlieYesterday morning, as I was getting ready for work, I was listening to the news like I do every morning, when I learned of the horrific massacre in Paris that left 12 people dead. These newest victims of Islamic Extremism were not the Yazidi minority of Iraq, or Nigerian villagers, or civilians living in countries that all too often see such violence with shocking regularity. No, these victims were cartoonists, a columnist, a copy-editor, a janitor, a couple of visitors, and two police officers, one of whom was a Muslim himself. Not to downplay what we tragically think of as the "typical" victims of Islamic Extremism, or how commonplace their misfortune has become that we almost don't think of it much longer after we hear of yet another attack against them, but yesterday's darkness took on a different character.<br />
<br />
Throughout the day, as the details of the Charlie Hebdo massacre started to come to light, the truly disturbing reality of the attack really started to needle at me--these people were not killed because they lived in war-torn, unstable countries where extremism has taken such a firm hold, or because they were members of a persecuted minority; most of them weren't even killed because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. No, mostly they were killed because they drew cartoons that offended someone. They were killed because they worked for a satirical publication that didn't back off for anyone when it came to being provocative and at times, even offensive. They were killed because the world has become such a place, that Islamic Extremism is getting more and more extreme, and the agents of their toxic ideology are becoming more and more brazen in their attacks on whomever, whenever, wherever and for whatever. I'd be terrified if I weren't so angry and heartbroken.<br />
<br />
On my drive home from work, as I was listening to <i>All Things Considered</i>, they played the recording of the video caught at a nearby apartment complex on a witness' cell phone. The gun blasts somehow seemed louder, more terrifying, more filled with hate than I could remember hearing from any other violent news story that we've all become so accustomed to hearing. I jumped a bit in my seat and gripped the steering wheel a little tighter. In the fifteen minutes that it took me to drive home, they played it again. By this time, I was yelling, alone in my car, "This is such fucking bullshit!" and choking back angry tears. Somehow, this shooting wasn't just a tragic news event that should remind us all how important freedom of expression is to our social, cultural, and ultimately human well being, or that extremism in any shape and form is a vile and poisonous ideology that none of us can afford to be complacent about. Somehow, this attack felt personal.<br />
<br />
Apparently I am not the only one who feels this way. As people around the world, from France to China, to the United States, to anywhere else you can think of took the streets to show solidarity in their belief in the right to express oneself freely without fear of being murdered, the slogan "Je Suis Charlie" popped up on signs across the globe. On my Facebook newsfeed, dozens of friends changed their avatars to "Je Suis Charlie" and article after article about the shooting was posted, and yes, even those terribly offensive cartoons that were supposedly worth killing over--it's comforting to know that those will never go away, just as free thought cannot ever be completely blotted out of the human psyche. But for me it wasn't the "I am Charlie" that made it so personal, but rather, the "Am I Charlie?"<br />
<br />
When I was in high school, and into college in my early 20s, I was not a happy person. I was easily offended and couldn't take an off-color joke without stewing over it for days. I didn't like it when people said anything politically incorrect and saw racism, sexism and homophobia everywhere. My boyfriend at the time was like that as well. Feeling at odds with my family's political beliefs, I sought refuge in his "wisdom" and together, we fueled each other's fires of angry disdain for anyone or anything that seemed to suggest some truth about the world and the people in it that we didn't like. I would like to say that I feel that my heart was in the right place during those years, because after all, I really didn't want marginalized people to feel even more alienated in the big, bad scary world than I arrogantly assumed they must already feel. But at the root of those ultra-PC beliefs that I clung to so obsessively, beyond the B.S.of fighting "the good fight" against the tyrannical majority, down past the self-righteous indignation seething inside of me, was fear.<i> I</i> was the one afraid of the big, bad world, not the persecuted minorities who never asked me to be their spokesperson or agent in the first place. <i>I</i> was the one who couldn't completely face up to the disappointment that you come to realize when you learn that so much in the world is unjust, unfair, and simply not right. Yes, I could acknowledge that bad things happen to good people, and good things happen to bad people, but I couldn't quite face up to the fact that no matter how much I implored someone to not use <i>that</i> term, to not tell <i>that</i> joke, to not say <i>that</i> thing, I couldn't mold the world into my own version of what I wanted it to be. And if I could get you to not say something that offended me, then that meant I could keep on pretending that the world would one day be saved from racism, sexism, homophobia, and all other such vile things.<br />
<br />
I was an idiot.<br />
<br />
What has made the Charlie Hebdo shooting so personal for me, is that today, I'm staunchly against ultra-PC nonsense that seeks to censor and inhibit dialogue, free thought and expression. I welcome situations that make me think, provoke me or even make me uncomfortable and angry, because how else am I going to keep myself and what I believe in check? And here's a thought--maybe sometimes I'm wrong! Now, I can take a joke, and don't take myself and the world so deathly seriously, that you would think that I am followed by a perpetual rainy cloud, like a human Eeyore.I still have my off days, but for the most part, I've grown and changed enough to not fear being offended, to understand that there is a difference between jokes told about uncomfortable subjects at the expense of real victims, and jokes told about uncomfortable subjects to mock the often sick, ridiculous world that we live in, and the horrible place that we human beings can make it just by being our shitty selves.<br />
<br />
Perhaps I never got to a point a of such extreme thinking that I even entertained the notion of violence against another person, but that fear, that dark, selfish, reflexive fear that the world doesn't turn according to what we want or think we need in order to feel in control and in power, is frighteningly similar to the same fear that clutches the icy heart of every extremist who would kill anyone who dares to think, feel, believe, live differently than what they would like. I want to say "I am Charlie" today, and believe that I can, but I wasn't always Charlie. Who knows what I would say today if I had managed to tumble down a different rabbit hole than the one that led me to who I am today?<br />
<br />
Thankfully, today I can laugh. I can brush off offenses and move forward, and I have the courage to tell the people who really are offensive that they are idiots, and give elaborate examples to illustrate just exactly why, and then move on with my life when the heated conversation ends. I can be friends with people that I disagree with vehemently about things near and dear to my heart. I am closer with my family than ever before, even when I think they are wrong about something (which I obnoxiously remind them of with tedious regularity). Today I can look back at my old, angry, fearful, ridiculous self, and let her stay back in the past where she belongs. Most importantly, I can laugh at her. <br />
<br />
Today, I can say "I am Charlie," and tomorrow, I will still be able to say it. I will say it in as many ways as I can, consequences of freedom of expression be damned, because if we don't have that, then all we have left to cling onto, is fear.<br />
<br />
Fear is a stupid, and silly thing anyway, and should mocked at every opportunity.<br />
<br />
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Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-1368665765631669412014-12-28T00:13:00.000-08:002014-12-28T00:13:19.076-08:00It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2Qv8gnG4zTE/VJ-6bILYhCI/AAAAAAAABjI/pOrXbbaeSYA/s1600/Picture%2B7.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2Qv8gnG4zTE/VJ-6bILYhCI/AAAAAAAABjI/pOrXbbaeSYA/s1600/Picture%2B7.png" height="298" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Have a happy holiday, damn it!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Late November through almost the entirety of December is generally a hectic time for me. A week after trying to lord it over my mother and sister for control over half of the Thanksgiving menu and debating with myself if it's even worth trying to keep kosher for the day before inevitably stuffing myself to the gills either way, I get to experience the unrestrained joy of acknowledging that I am a year older, and still miles away from being where I want to be in my life, and yet one step closer to "being old." Sometimes it's also Chanukah, which, here in Southern Oregon, is a relatively quiet time for me, where I make latkes and homemade apple sauce for myself, light candles on my menorah (or "chanukiah" for those of us in the Hebrew know), and sigh with yet more soul-crushing longing for life in Jerusalem. Gazing at the little flames dancing on their candle wicks, I know that I'm supposed to be reflecting on the never-ending-miracle-oil™ and the bad-assness of the Maccabean Revolt, but really, I just find myself wishing to once again stroll the streets of Jerusalem's Nachlaot neighborhood on a chilly night, with sufganiyah in hand while I marvel at all the pretty chanukiot all lit-up and on display in the cozy windows of the picturesque Jewish homes (note: I'm pretty sure I've never actually been merrily eating sufganiyot while simultaneously frolicking through the streets and admiring the lit-up windows of one of my favorite Jerusalem neighborhoods during a brisk Chanukah evening, but I also swear that I somehow have a memory of ice-skating while drinking hot-chocolate, hand-in-hand with jolly old St. Nick from around some Christmas during my gentile youth; pretty sure that never happened. I mean, I've never ice-skated in my life). This year, Chanukah went right up to the eve of Christmas Eve, and then it was suddenly Christmas day. And Christmas is, quite honestly, such a confusing time to be a gentile turned Jew such as myself, especially while living with my family. <br /><br />Christmas is the same holiday today as it was from my childhood; there are colorful lights adorning the neighborhood houses, inexplicable pine trees sitting in living rooms, all decorated and lit up as well. There's a charming, bearded fat man, looking like a Rebbe in red asking kids if they've been naughty or nice while they gaze up in awe of him, perched upon his lap. There are images of reindeer that purportedly fly, and mom's sugar cookies baked in the familiar shapes of snowflakes and sleighs, hot-chocolate with peppermint canes melting in red and green mugs, and every channel on television plays movies with Chevy Chase, Tim Allen and Ralphie hilariously shooting his eye out with the highly coveted gift of a Daisy Red Ryder BB gun. There's a cozy fire in the fireplace where my teddy bear stocking from childhood hangs, holding gifts for me from my enormously giving and loving family, despite the fact that this holiday is no longer mine. There's nostalgia in every scent from the baking Christmas goodies in the oven, and memories that arise like ghosts from the past and haunt every photo put out on display of me and my sister sitting on Santa's lap, looking like the WASPiest set of kid that ever came into existence. From my blazing white-blonde hair, red velvet Christmas dress and shockingly easy smile, the image of my past self bears no hint of the fact that I would grow up one day to realize that, well holy shit, it looks like I'm supposed to be a Jew! There are also little figures of Mary, Joseph, the three Wise Men and a baby Jesus hanging out in a manger and looking all doe-eyed and serene, but I've grown used to Christian symbols all around the house, juxtaposed strangely with the modest mezuzah hanging on my bedroom door, behind which, is where the seemingly random Jewish artifacts are kept with me in my lonely Jewish abode. Like I said, nothing has changed, except for me. Obviously, I've changed a lot since Christmas was one of my holidays. <br /><br />It's hard to let go of Christmas, especially as I remain here with my family for the time being. Like last year, Chanukah comes and goes, while I try to explain to my gentile friends and family that Chanukah isn't the "Jewish Christmas-" that American Jews likely felt the need at some point to compete with the cultural dominance of Christmas, which it happens to share a season with, especially when raising Jewish kids; perhaps they wonder at some point why the Rebbe in Red doesn't come to visit their houses to leave presents like he does at the homes of their gentile classmates ("Are we naughty while the Christian kids are nice? Is Santa an antisemite? I mean, what gives?!") Giving gifts on Chanukah is a rather American thing, and not what the minor Jewish chag is all about anyway. It shouldn't have to compete with the grandiosity of an American Christmas, but by default, it understandably kind of does anyway.<br /> <br />I also find myself standing by the fact that latkes are not glorified hash-browns, and sufganiyot are not just Hebrew doughnuts--not after you've had them in Jerusalem, anyway. I give up on the idea that my family will ever dream of excluding me from the gift-giving tradition of Christmas, because to them, that just isn't right, and it has nothing to do with Jesus anyway. Granted, neither does Santa and his reindeer, the Christmas tree, or about a billion other Christmas traditions, but I still feel awkward as I do my own Christmas shopping for my family, because I can't possibly accept gifts and refuse to reciprocate because of religious differences, can I? What am I supposed to do on Christmas morning, anyway? Sit by myself in my bedroom, gloomily picking the wax off of my chanukiah, while my family gathers in the living room to exchange gifts and happily reminisce about holidays past? Those memories belong to me too after all, and there is a lot of happiness in them. They include my now deceased grandmother, and a simpler time when I was young, happy, debt-free, and not sitting around longing for things currently beyond my grasp, because chances were, those things that I was longing for were waiting for me under the Christmas tree, wrapped and decorated with love. I remember believing in Santa Clause when I left cookies and milk out for him, because believing was a nice thought, and that was good enough to satisfy me at the time. <br /> <br />I also find myself feeling a bit down when strangers ask me if I'm ready for Christmas, if I'm going out of town for Christmas, if I had a nice Christmas--and that’s not because you should buy into the tinfoil-hat wearing extreme Right's paranoia around the fictional "War on Christmas" in this country. Rather, I feel down because it is just assumed that I have easy, simple, fun, happy associations with the season, and that it is, of course, my holiday. Here, Chanukah is lonely, like every other Jewish holiday, and Christmas is some sort of guilty pleasure that I'm not supposed to indulge in anymore, and yet when I do, it grants me momentary relief from that holiday loneliness that I otherwise get to swallow for more than a month. It's not "Merry Christmas" that bothers me. It's not even the intent behind the questions about how "my Christmas" is going. It's that it isn't really my holiday anymore, and at the moment, I've got little else to fill the void here. It's like they're all saying, "Trade in your latkes for ham--who are you kidding? I’m sure it was fun being Jewish and all, but now it's time to take all those steps backwards and embrace reality. Now, tell me that you had a merry Christmas! It ruins it for everyone else if you don’t!" <br /><br />All of these difficult feelings are, of course, due to my own insecurity over my Jewish identity that has gone too long in its half-dormant expression while I trudge through months-turned-to-years of getting back to where I once was, because I wasn’t done being a Jew in Jerusalem, or living in Israel, or settling into the Jewish life that I had chosen for myself. Perhaps if Chanukah weren’t so lonely, perhaps if I hadn’t just turned one year older, I’d have no problems with connecting to Christmas in a real and happy way, because after all, Christmas is a part of my own history. It’s a part of my connection with my family. It has nothing to do with Jesus or Christianity for me, except when I feel like the Jewish alternative of the season means more loneliness, more isolation, more longing for doors currently shut and firmly locked around me. It's disconcerting to have a grand Christmas when your Jewish holidays have been so difficult. I don't mean to compare, but I can't seem to help it.<br /><br />The solution to all of this, of course, is “Next year, in Jerusalem!” Or perhaps, “Next year, in Bethlehem, because it’s right next door to Jerusalem and doesn’t Christmas in Bethlehem sound interesting!?” To be an outsider looking in is fine, if you have other outsiders with you. Otherwise you end up looking at all the happiness around you, surrounded with Christmas cheer, and try to smile while you pretend that something significant isn’t wholly and definitely missing in your Jewish soul. You know that you walked away from this, and you walked away for a reason, and while it’s nice to visit, you know it just isn’t home anymore, and never again can it be. Home is where you aren’t, and nothing can change that in the moment.<br />
<br />Plenty of people feel depressed around this time of year. Perhaps you've lost someone that you no longer get to share the season with. Last year, a childhood friend of mine killed himself just days before Christmas, and I think about him, his family, and that bitter dose of reality invading the general cheer of the season. Maybe you don't have the money you wish you had to give your loved ones the holiday you would like to give them; after all, extravagance is pushed on us from all directions during this time of year, even if that shouldn't be the spirit of things. Maybe you have no one to be with, and nowhere to go. Things could be so much worse, and I acknowledge that.<br />
<br />
Perhaps next year Christmas can be my holiday again, because I'll have had a better Chanukah with fellow Jews in my life, because turning a year older won't be such a big deal, because other things will have finally fallen into place, because I will have made this Jewish life of mine work the way I envision it being. There's always the hope of next year, which is a very Jewish thing, indeed.Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-36010479173405259552014-10-01T15:42:00.001-07:002014-10-01T16:24:18.709-07:00On Self-Forgiveness<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Yom Kippur is supposed to be the most somber and difficult day on
the Jewish calendar. For me though, the days that weigh heaviest with
significance are the ones leading up to that apex of repentance and atonement: the
Days of Awe. Yom Kippur itself is but one day. Anyone can live in physical
discomfort for a little over 24 hours, unless you are too delicate a flower to
have ever endured hunger, thirst, a day without being at your most hygienic,
and depriving yourself of carnal relations—not that being parched, starved,
smelly and unbathed exactly puts one in an amorous mood. Of course, the day is
also supposed to be marked as a time when the heavens are said to open up, and
us puny, imperfect, sinful little humans must tremble before the King of Kings,
as though on trial, though not to plead our case, but to beg forgiveness for
our self-acknowledged sins. It can be an intimidating and daunting task for the
faithful, but that is, I would argue, the point of Yom Kippur. We take a day to
get that out of our systems and start over for the year, cleansed after
repentance, and ready to be the good people that we know we can be, and that we
have just spent an entire day in shul begging God to let us prove we can
be. In Judaism, we believe in a merciful God that we can trust enough to grant
us our forgiveness after sincere teshuvah, and the whole exhausting day should
be spiritually rewarding in the end. Seeking forgiveness from God is one thing,
but seeking forgiveness from others in the days leading up to our collective
trial date is generally uncomfortably humbling, and can even feel undoable at
times. Each year, there is always one person I can never seem to forgive and
never know how to apologize to: my own damn self.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The theme of asking for forgiveness from those we've wronged as
well as being open to accepting forgiveness from others is absolutely one that
I can get behind. I am really good at being apologetic. As a matter of fact,
I'm downright British about it. It doesn't have to be my fault, and I'll still
be sorry. And it's not that I'm insincere--I really am sorry for any hand I may
have played, even peripherally, in any unfortunate turn of events that I might
happen to witness. If I'm the recipient of an apology and true forgiveness is
sought from someone who has wronged me, I cannot wait, literally, cannot wait
to accept said apology, breathe a sigh of relief, move on and let the anxiety
of encountering conflict with another human being keep me from having another
panic attack (a trait which I do possess in spades and am, incidentally, quite
sorry for). But if I've done something that I really am sorry about on a deeply
personal level, something that I have to take full responsibility for and
ownership of, I generally have enough humility to recognize that, and to
apologize.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Self-forgiveness however, is, not too surprisingly, one of the
most difficult things for many of us. Anyone with a conscience is well aware of
that overly critical voice playing over and over in our heads each time we make
a mistake, feel foolish, experience regret, or struggle with something that we
feel we should have a better handle on. Anyone who stays up at night listening
to the loud voices of anxiety and worry over what has already happened and
passed, and what hasn't even happened yet, is really listening to the voices of
self-criticism and the self-flagellation that follows. If we knew how to
apologize to ourselves after </span>we've<span style="font-family: inherit;"> beaten our psyches to a bloody pulp over
what we have done, we would be able to put the forgiveness band-aid over our
own wounds and allow true healing to take place. If we knew how to forgive our
own transgressions, we </span>wouldn't<span style="font-family: inherit;"> feel the need to beat ourselves up in the first
place, and the never-ending cycle of self-inflicted abuse and neglect could
actually end. We would even be more forgiving of others and sympathetic to the
needs of those we have wronged. It’s kind of like not being able to love
someone else until you learn to love yourself, as clichéd as that sounds.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Why do we have such a hard time forgiving ourselves? So many of us
can forgive the worst actions of our loved ones, and even strangers who act out
of line can get our sympathies. You can forgive the person you are in love with
to an obscene degree, and you can forgive a neglectful family member, even
after years of their transgressions. But when it comes to the self, we are
often so much crueler than we would ever be to another person who makes the
same mistake or commits the same crime. Perhaps because the only two beings who
ever see every single thing that we do, who knows every single thought that
makes a blip in our minds, and every fleeting feeling that passes through us,
is God and the self. We know how we are at our worse, because we live with it.
We can hide, mask, and disguise much of ourselves from everyone and everything
else, but we can’t hide from ourselves any more than we can hide from God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">My first Yom Kippur was easy enough--I was in Jerusalem, a new
Jew, dressed all in white and wearing some hideous plastic flip-flops that I
had bought at the corner store for a few scant shekels because I wanted
something to wear on my feet in my dorm shower stall that I shared with four
other girls. They were too big for me and slid off my feet when I walked if I
wasn't careful, and they had huge, gaudy wads of cloth hot-glued to them in
order to resemble, I guess, flowers. I knew that I was only supposed to shun
leather shoes for the day, since the point is to not be too comfortable, but I
really went all out with those awful flip-flops. I didn't eat or drink
anything, of course, and though my lips were chapped and killing me, I denied
myself the use of Chap Stick, just in case the use of it was halakhically off
the table for the day too. I didn't brush my teeth or use mouthwash (which my
not quite as religiously observant friends found rather disgusting), and I let
my hair do whatever it felt inclined to do without the aid of a brush. I looked
a mess and felt a mess, and since it was my first Yom Kippur, I thought that I
must be doing it right. I spent the day in shul and napped at a friend's place between
the marathon services, and walked through the carless streets of Jerusalem,
marveling at all of us Jews dressed in white, strolling casually down the
middle of Emek Raphaim. When I broke the fast with a large group of friends at
a party (where some of us thought it a good idea to drink vodka on our 25-hour
empty stomachs, because that's what you do when you are in your early 20s), I
really did feel a sense of renewal and joy. Maybe that was the bourekas and
vodka kicking in, but I like to think that Hashem had a hand in it too. All in
all, I felt really good after the long and tiring day of seeking atonement from
God, like it really was an opportunity to start over, tabula rasa.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Fast forward a few Yom Kippurs later and I have not been able to
find that same sense of serenity in the spirit of the season. It’s not that I
have done anything that I find deeply unforgiving since my first Jerusalem High
Holidays, but perhaps it’s the mistakes, regrets and missed opportunities that
have stacked up since </span>I've<span style="font-family: inherit;"> become a self-aware Jew, along with my own propensity
to be too hard on myself that has made the season particularly burdensome.
Other people come and go in our lives, and they may choose to apologize to us when </span>they've<span style="font-family: inherit;"> hurt us, they may not. They may be receptive to our apologies when we
cross the line, they may not. God is merciful enough to see every single
blemish on our souls and still seal us for the year in the Sefer Chaim after we
seek atonement. We have to live with ourselves though, and true teshuvah means
really cleaning the slate each year, and leaving the mistakes and regrets in
the past. That’s why this year, I am making the effort to look in the mirror
and say “I’m sorry” to the one person who will always be with me, and to
forgive the one person I cannot walk away from, cannot shut out, cannot lie to
myself about. It’s about time, and there’s no time like the present,
especially when the present is now, in this Jewish season. After all, if I
can’t even do that, then what is the point of seeking atonement from anyone
else? If I deserve forgiveness from others, than surely I just deserve
forgiveness, plain and simple. I'd be willing to bet that that goes for all of
us. In fact, I know it does. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">So gmar chatima tovah, and my apologies for this long and
ponderous post. Please do forgive me.</span></div>
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Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-31578770245727747832014-06-08T22:02:00.001-07:002014-06-08T22:16:39.073-07:00Pieces of HomeIt has been almost a year to the date since I left Israel. I have neglected this blog almost shamefully in the months since, feeling that I don't have the head space or energy to push it forward with updated posts and the desperately needed new look that I keep meaning to give it. I had the thought some months back that perhaps what I needed to do to light a fire under me to keep the blog posts coming is to change the title. After all, when I started this blog, I was in Israel and <i>Lost in Jerusalem</i> had a nice, if a bit overly romantic ring to it. The whole blog was supposed to be about me chronicling my adventures and misadventures in the holiest city on the planet, while perhaps saying something insightful by happy accident, or at least something witty enough to keep a few people interested in reading. I mean, my time in Jerusalem was a quirky situation for a small town ex-Christian-longtime-devoted-Atheist-turned-Jew to find herself in, right? Certainly, I would have plenty of writing material!<br />
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Now the blog is about me longing for Israel and bemoaning the fact that I'm not there anymore, and losing my religion, identity and sense of self in the mean time. Turns out that I wasn't really lost in Jerusalem after all. Now I'm lost on the other side of the planet, in my home town. Being lost at home can only really happen if you grow so far away from who you once were that you can't really say it feels like home anymore. Perhaps if I were visiting, I would have warmer feelings about it. But I'm not visiting. I live here. Again. What could I possibly have to write about here? Months and months of silence speaks volumes all on its own.<br />
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I keep thinking that while I live here, while this is home for the time being, nothing here is really <i>mine</i>. The house isn't mine and I'm not paying rent for the room. The room isn't even my old room--my parents took that space as their own as soon as I moved out, because truthfully, it is the better of the two rooms in this quaint, cramped little house. The bed that I'm sitting on while I write this isn't mine, either. The chest sitting at the opposite wall is full of my mother's linens, and is not mine. The dresser over in the corner belonged to my grandfather when he was still alive. The desk, the nightstand, the out of place gun safe and the fisherman's hats piled on top of it--needless to say, none of these things are mine. It seems that I am either borrowing or co-existing among other's people's stuff.<br />
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To be clear, the accumulation of stuff is not really the measuring stick that I use to determine how much of my life is really my own, or how successful I have been. I've never been terribly materialistic, and material things tend to come and go with such ease throughout life, that when I first moved to Israel, there was something liberating about just taking the essentials with me. I stuffed my one checked bag full to the allotted 50 lbs. limit and my carry-on until the zipper on the backpack nearly burst, and lived in unfamiliar furnished rooms for the next year. I didn't even come back with all of it. I repeated the process when I returned to Jerusalem seven months later, and I was happy to do it. I was doing what I wanted to do, seeing and experiencing things I grew up believing I would never see or experience firsthand, because I had convinced myself, that that's what other people got to do. Other people, with their plenty of money, their important people connections, and the guts that gave them the confidence to go out into the world and do things they hadn't done before, nerves be damned. Who needs stuff when you're living an interesting and fulfilling life?<br />
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But something funny happens when your life changes again, and morphs into the familiar and "normal." You start to feel like your independence is slipping away, that you're backsliding, losing something that you only just started to grasp, failing. When you feel like you've failed at something, you start to cling to things and resent what you do have while longing for what you don't have. I don't have my own house or apartment, or furniture, or bed, or things that somehow will ground me into believing that I have something to show for living that life I never thought I'd get to live, especially now that I'm back here where I started. Sure, I do have a sizable amount of debt to show for it! If only success could be measured is debt dollars, I'd be a fucking rock star.<br />
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Of course, I'm not totally without possessions. I do have a few things that I can call my own. For instance, there's a beta fish swimming around under a blue light in an octagon shaped tank with fake, brightly colored plants and glass pebbles decorating it. This fish is named Bowie after my beloved David Bowie, so obviously, he must be my fish. I got him after my grandmother died last autumn, suddenly hit with the urge to take care of some living thing and give it a good life. I wanted something vibrant and beautiful, and somehow, that meant getting a bright red fish named after one of my favorites musicians. Funny how grief works.<br />
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I have way too many clothes, including a fetishist sized collection of underthings--I never have to worry about needing clean underwear, because I can't leave a store with a lingerie section and <i>not</i> get something. It's a stupid quirk, but it is my quirk.<br />
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I have a lot of books, some of which I still haven't read, and yet, I like to complain that I don't have anything to read.<br />
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I have a few collages that I made in a fit of boredom last summer before I found a job, and I actually like how one turned out and would like to frame it. Sure, it's all sex and death imagery cobbled together in an obvious state of frustration and misery, but it's mine; I created it, a crazy visual representation of something within me, some voice that needed to say something.<br />
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And there's this laptop that I'm typing on, decorated with my "Na Nach Nachma Nachman M'Uman" and "Thank an Israeli Soldier" stickers, and leftover Hebrew decals that haven't yet peeled off of the keys (Which reminds me, I've got to get those replaced. Which reminds me, I've got to get back to studying Hebrew). And I have an iPod that seems to survive no matter what manner of abuse I put it through, filled with Depeche Mode, 80s pop, 90s grunge, The New Yorker fiction podcast, and Kabbalat Shabbat tunes that I am slowly starting to forget as Shabbat after Shabbat seems to pass me by.<br />
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I have a mezuzah nailed at the entrance to my room which I, hilariously enough, got from my mother for Christmas. There's a kiddush cup sitting in front of a chanukiah over on the shelf where Bowie's tank sits, the stems of the chanukiah wrapped in the Magan David necklace that I bought in Jerusalem with the last of the money I had to my name the day before I flew back to the States. It's joined by another necklace that was gifted to me on the day I completed my conversion by someone who will no longer speak with me (A good memory, intertwined with a bad one--certainly, these must be mine). The Judaica is flanked by two ugly cat figurines with gaudy fake gemstone eyes that I've had for years, ever since I asked my mother to please pull them from her booth at the antique mall where she was selling them, because I just had to have them. A couple of colorful and cheaply made chopsticks that I bought at a chachkie store for tourists in Beijing sit awkwardly in front of where I light my Shabbat candles, alone, with nobody but Bowie the fish to wish a Shabbat Shalom to once I uncover my eyes and gaze thoughtfully at the flames (but Bowie is generally unimpressed, and just wants me to feed him more blood worms as his Shabbat meal).<br />
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I have a grey Pound Purry Kitten (remember those?) that I've had since I was five years old sitting on top of a bag that says "Megan's Toys" from around the same era, along with a good luck Care Bear that my mother tearfully gave me when I left home for the first time when I was 18 to live with my then-boyfriend up in Portland. She handed it to me and said, "He had better always treat you right." Well, I survived along with the Care Bear, so it must have been doing something good for me.<br />
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On my nightstand there is a framed black and white picture of my sister and I on her wedding day, my sister looking happy and lovely, me looking ridiculous with my gothy short black hair from high school and an oddly juxtaposed cheerful ring of flowers perched on my head. I also have what looks like a genie lamp holding some of my jewelry, a glass pot with birds painted on it that my mother gave me, simply because it was made in Israel, and that's the kind of thoughtful person she is. It sits next to an antique mirror that flips over and reveals a magnified mirror on the other side, just in case I want to see every pore of my skin in upsetting detail while I put on make-up in the morning. It's also a gift from mom.<br />
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I have a Lawrence Olivier's <i>Hamlet</i> DVD that my sister got me for my birthday because I couldn't find that version of my favorite Shakespeare play anywhere in town. It's sitting next to an absolutely beautiful Pesach Haggadah by Jonathan Safran Foer, which was thoughtfully given to me by a friend who was gracious enough to invite me to her family's seder last Pesach, where I sat as the somewhat uncomfortable and lone non-Messianic Jew at the table. My well-used yoga mat that my sister gave me because she had an extra one leans against the wall, opposite my exercise ball, and the out of tune guitar that I haven't played since I was probably about 15 years old and lost the nerve to play because I thought I'd never be any good at it. The guitar is from dad.<br />
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I suppose, these things are really <i>mine</i>. Most of them have been given to me over time. If they've made it through the ten different moves that I've made in as many years, then, is it a stretch to say, that they must mean something? Even the large collection of knickers and strange collages? My things have been lost, stolen, and destroyed, either by me or someone else in a fit of anger, so these are the real troopers, the real pieces of home that I'll take with me when I get up and run off again.<br />
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In the mean time, I suppose I really do have some wonderful things. They aren't just things, after all; they're pieces of my home, and they always come with me, or are waiting for me when I get back.<br />
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Maybe I have more to write about than I thought.Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-79319201834449177792014-02-22T22:37:00.002-08:002014-02-23T00:18:05.734-08:00Falling off the Kosher WagonEven before the completion of my conversion three years ago, keeping kosher seemed relatively simple and came surprisingly easy. Sure, the BLT was my favorite sandwich once upon a time, and the spectrum of the many delicious treyf Italian meats were a goyish treat that I wouldn't have dreamed of saying no to if offered the chance to partake in their consumption. But other than that, ham has never been the most appealing of meats to me (it looks a little too...human), and I found out rather quickly that, apart from the occasional but incredibly strong craving for the forbidden seafood of my gentile youth, there were still plenty of fish in the sea, so to speak. I used to think of the burger as being woefully incomplete without a slice of melted cheese, a concept that has now become so foreign to me, that I find myself wondering just what it was that I saw in the cheeseburger in the first place. Even keeping separate dishes came to me with ease; crossing a meat utensil with a dairy one by accident was a rare occurrence, and when it did happen, I would notice my mistake immediately (think of your first childhood reaction to that horrible buzz that comes with failing to successfully remove the wishbone in a game of Operation...man, I hated that game). Even with so many new restrictions to my eating habits though, I took to keeping a not too lax degree of kashrut the way a Polish bubbe takes to whipping up a bowl of matzo ball soup during Pesach. It just felt natural.<br />
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Since the beginning of my Jewish journey though, keeping kosher represented so much more than just doing what my rabbi told me I should do. I liked the idea of putting religiously mandated parameters around my eating habits; it seemed to infuse even the most mundane and ordinary day to day practices, such as eating, with significance and meaning. It also became a marker of identity for me. The more Jewish practices that I began to adopt as my own, the more I felt like I was becoming my true self. For many of us who have chosen this life, conversion certainly does feel like stepping into a role that we were born to play. For me, adopting Jewish practices into my lifestyle helped flesh out that role more completely. I’m not saying that this is true for all Jews, by birth or by conversion, but I certainly didn't cross the BLT off of my diet just because I’m into self-denial and masochism--there’s something rewarding in it for me, even more rewarding than the pleasure of eating tasty food.</div>
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Keeping kosher came even easier while living in kosher households during and after my conversion, especially after living in Jerusalem for a year and a half, where I would actually have to go out of my way to fall off the kosher wagon (or go to Tel Aviv for a day). Now that I am back in the States and currently residing in a place with a very small Jewish community and living in a non-Jewish home for the first time since my conversion, I have begun to compromise my kosher eating habits along with the rest of my Jewish observances, little by little. Having a kosher kitchen is not viable at the moment. Keeping separate dishes is also not only impractical (not that there is anything "practical" about it in the first place), but would create a hassle that would involve unwilling participants in my household. As a result, I have modified my kosher diet a bit here and a bit there. I still won't eat treyf animals, I still will only eat certified kosher meat, and I don’t mix my meat with my dairy. It may seem like the kosher-lite diet, but when you lack a community, Jewish practices start to fall to the wayside. The system-shock that comes from the change between a vibrant Jewish life in Jerusalem, to the lackluster reality of living as the rare Jew in Anywhere, U.S.A. also has the unfortunate effect of feeling like such practices start to ring hollow. It also has the side effect of stubbornly holding onto what you've got until the situation can feasibly change; I have to eat to survive, so keeping kosher is what I've got. But then there was The Hamburger Incident.</div>
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The Hamburger Incident, as I have come to think of it, involved me, my persuasive hunger for something not mashed together into a patty to create the illusion of real meat, and my now fluorescent exasperation with my living situation, which has disrupted what was a satisfying Jewish existence in the Holy Land. I had conceded that eating at non-kosher restaurants would not weigh too heavily on my conscience but that eating non-kosher items would, so I would just eat vegetarian or permitted fish when eating at such a place. This was something that had been my practice before I moved to a place where kosher restaurants are more than just a nice idea. So as I stared resentfully at the veggie burger option on the menu at a local burger joint one particularly frustrating day, I suddenly heard myself say, without even really thinking it through, “I’ll have a hamburger and fries, please,” to the lady behind the counter who had no idea of the inner-turmoil those seven words had suddenly sparked within me. I stopped short of ordering a cheeseburger, although the thrill of considering doing so made my heart thump as though I was getting ready to rip my clothes off and streak through the place with my hair on fire: “I’m not supposed to be doing this! This is wrong! This is bad! I’m breaking the rules! Wee!” <br />
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As the kind woman at the counter passed me the fittingly plain, conspicuously trying to look inconspicuous brown paper bag, I felt like we were conducting a public drug deal. Not looking her in the eyes as she cheerfully thanked me for my business, I snatched the bag from her outstretched hand, and got out of there as though I couldn't flee from the scene of the crime quickly enough. I got into my car and drove back home with every muscle in my body rigid and tense as the heavenly aroma of the burger filled my car with the clear evidence of my transgression.<br />
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I ate my meal in my bedroom with the door closed, like a criminal hiding with stolen goods. It was delicious, and hit the spot like no other meal had in a long time. I savored each bite, and the whole event was over much too soon. How could something wrong feel so right?<br />
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After the meal though, guilt and remorse started to set in. Not because I had fallen off the kosher wagon for the first time in years—it happens, and it isn't the end of the world when it does. Indulging in a treyf treat on a rare occasion wasn't really the issue for me. It was the fact that I had crossed a line that I insisted that I not cross for my own sense of well-being. It’s like having a cigarette after going for months smoke-free. Maybe it’s one slip-up, one moment of human weakness, just one step back. Or maybe it’s the one thing that leads to another, and before you know it, you’re buying another pack, knowing full well that it won’t be your last. Remember when you said that last time? And sure enough, a couple of weeks later, I had a treyf steak. And so that important sense of self, true identity, and deeper meaning begins to fade a bit more. The line begins to blur. The feeling of liberation is replaced with a sense of unease. Is this going to be my life now?<br />
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I am not writing this piece to look for sympathy from Jews who are satisfied with their degree of observance, strict or lenient, or from Jews living in situations where they can comfortably live their Judaism with the support of a community and not having to constantly explain and excuse themselves for their practices. The Jewish world has experienced significant anxiety for generations over how easy it is to lose one's identity in the assimilation of living in the non-Jewish world. I am not saying anything profound. Perhaps I am just confessing my own anxiety regarding a loss of Jewish identity and the fear of the encroaching reality of re-assimilation. I've been on both sides of that fence, and really, while I don’t mind visiting, I don’t feel at home on this side. Home is where you can be yourself without feeling like it’s a battle.<br />
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I miss being myself. I want to come home.</div>
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Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-36785816034704599782013-07-09T22:04:00.003-07:002013-07-09T22:35:44.537-07:00This Just In: I'm Not Dead!Wow, folks. It's been a long, long time since my last semi-hopeful sounding update in this blog. In fact, it's been over two months. One might think that my long absence from my attempts at "positive perspective" blogging and the resounding silence that followed my empty promises of recording my newly cultivated productive lifestyle as a writer-reader-runner (catchy, right?) could mean one of two possible things: either I've died or I've given up.<br />
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Rest assured though, gentle reader (not stated in the plural for obvious reasons), I am not dead, and my disembodied spirit is not haunting this blog in order to take care of some unfinished blogging business before I pass on into the Great Beyond. No, nothing quite that intriguing has happened; I am quite alive, even though some days require that I slap myself in the face just to make sure. As for giving up, well, I'm afraid that I'm far too obnoxiously stubborn to do that. Still, my past blogs where I erroneously pledged to run every other day, read a book a week, and publish a blog entry every week as well, seem laughable at this point. After all, as might be all too-obvious at this point to qualify as a confession, self-discipline is not a quality that I possess in spades. Diligence? Perseverance? Hell, I've got those! But strict self-discipline, while something I find downright sexy and highly admirable, is not a personality trait that I can claim to exhibit naturally, and it's not for lack of trying on my part.<br />
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Now, don't misunderstand me. That lack of discipline isn't because of laziness or a sloppy disposition; I feel useless and depressed when I'm not being productive, and genuine disgust with myself when I approach something with a non-committal, lackluster drive. I've always been a hard worker because I hate letting people down, and my ego is too delicate to cope with open, public failure. The kind of discipline that I'm talking about, is the self-discipline where I am my own boss, and have only myself to answer to. And since I am my own boss when it comes to setting these lofty goals, the biggest enemy of my attempts at a disciplined attitude comes from a basketcase-like neurotic disposition that would make Woody Allen look well-adjusted and confident in comparison. Worry, anxiety, brutal self-deprecation, and a fear of failure is what stands between me and my desired militant mindset. You would think all that mental masturbation would bring some sort of pleasure, but mental masturbation is nothing like physical masturbation. It really is genuine self-abuse.<br />
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The degree of activity that my neurotic personality trait exhibits at any given time, is directly connected to my happiness with my general lifestyle and well-being. When I'm happy, I feel confident enough to write something worthwhile. I read voraciously and get excited about the next book I'll get to read before I'm even done with the one I am currently reading. And when I run, I run like the Devil is hot on my heels. The last couple of months that I was in Israel, I was doing all of those things, even if I don't have the blog entries to prove the writing component. I do, however, have the journal entries and clumsy poems as evidence (and no, you can't see them). And now? Well, I'm back in the States, and have been for almost exactly a month. I have no money, I'm living in my home town with my parents at the age of 27, I've just found employment at a local cafe (every English major's dream...excuse me, did I say dream? What I meant to say was, <i>eventual fate</i>), and my Jewish observance has suffered tremendously. I have vague plans for the future, all of which I'm staring at like this:<br />
<img height="601" src="http://www.goingbeyond.com/sites/default/files/blog/Picture4.jpg" width="640" /><br />
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So as a result, I haven't been very good at keeping up with any goal that doesn't have to do with money, taking the necessary steps to return to my beloved Israel, making money, student loan debt, finding a real job, and of course, money. Big life changes and transitions, along with the anxiety caused over them, are all sucking my happiness into a compressed psychological tube where, if I don't write, if I stop feeding my brain the nourishment of a good book in favor of easy distractions (I've been getting pretty good at Civilization II on my laptop, for instance, which is useful in exactly zero ways to exactly no one), and if I forgive myself for putting off running for another day because I'm too exhausted from a a day of worrying, then I only have myself to kick for it. And believe me, I can take a pretty mean kicking. If I don't find a decent job, pay off my student loans, make aliyah, and become someone worthy of all the support, help, encouragement, advice, and investment that the good people in my life have put into me over the years, then I let them down. So therefore, how can I care about these silly personal goals?<br />
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Of course, this is a ridiculous way to think about things. These smaller goals are tied into the bigger ones, they help me keep something of a grip on my sanity, and of course, my sanity affects everyone. And no matter how good I get at Civilization II, playing strategy games when taking a break from the job hunt, in no way actually means that I can carefully plan, develop and conquer my own life, now, does it?<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="389" src="http://101videogames.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/civ-ii-greek-empire.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="640" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Majestic, isn't it? It's like I really <i>am</i> building Rome in a day...but with Greeks. If only I were doing this in the real world, that would be pretty cool. </td></tr>
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Well, this is what being away from Israel for a month has done to me. But there is hope! And believe it or not, it starts with my new cafe job. I keep telling myself, "well...it's better than nothing." And I am so sick of saying that to myself, that I have half a mind to do something about it. And while the writing-reading-running trinity of personal goals may not be the big fish that I'm fishing for to get my life where I would like it to be, they are the obviously neglected tools that I've been too distracted to put effort into that will turn me into the kind of person that I need to be in order catch the big fish.<br />
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Now, if only Gandhi would stop threatening me with nuclear weapons, and if Abe Lincoln would stop sending his diplomats to steal my technological advances in my capital, I'd be a lot happier.</div>
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...on second thought, I think I'll read another few chapters in Moby Dick before bed instead. Virtual Gandhi and Abe Lincoln will just have to wait until I really have time to deal with them.*<br />
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*If you have no idea what I'm talking about here, good for you. I admire people with lives. And if you do get what I'm talking about here, I mean no offense. Now, stop playing video games, go outside, and do something productive, nerd!<br />
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Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-7503814798606750082013-04-28T09:17:00.000-07:002013-04-29T13:12:04.823-07:00Okay, so setting goals isn't my strong suit...Previously, on Lost in Jerusalem, I made the grand pronouncement that I was setting for myself no less than three goals in an attempt to be healthier, happier, and perhaps something more of a writer than a poser who talks about how nice it would be if I were a writer. If you tuned into that episode, you'll recall that I was going to read a book a week, run every other day, and publish a blog post by the end of said week, whether I had anything worth saying or not (and if I didn't have anything worth saying, I'd make up for it by providing my hapless readers with a gripping book report on whatever novel I had decided to read that week). Well, it's more than one week later, and I can report with certainty that I've already failed in all three of these lofty goals. If only my goals were to set goals and then abandon them at the first sign of an obstacle, I'd be in great shape.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-C8DyV2TI-M0/UX0s3hNQetI/AAAAAAAABTs/vio5tHO0SgY/s1600/goal.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-C8DyV2TI-M0/UX0s3hNQetI/AAAAAAAABTs/vio5tHO0SgY/s640/goal.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This helpful diagram depicts exactly what I do when attempting to accomplish something more difficult than clothing and feeding myself in the morning. Just put the freakin' puzzle piece where it goes, idiot! It's in your <i>hand</i>!</td></tr>
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Now, to be fair to myself, I haven't been a complete failure when it comes to actually achieving my goals--not yet. Indeed, I did finish F. Scott Fitzgerald's <i>This Side of Paradise </i>in<i> </i>audiobook format on time, even though that wasn't reading so much as listening to someone read it for me. Still, I experienced the story word for word from some very nicely voiced readers, all while doing mindless household chores, grocery shopping, or sitting on the city bus--In fact, I was so into it, that when Amory, the protagonist (who is clearly based on Fitzgerald as a young man) goes on a socialist tirade in the concluding chapter, I exclaimed to no one at all, "Oh, come on! Fuck you!" only to remind myself (also aloud, because I talk to myself, my books, my movies, and any inanimate object that I happen to interact with, on a far too-regular-to-be-normal basis), "Now, now, it was 1919 and he was a young, disillusioned man after the Great War, so let's be fair..." Upon finishing the novel, I am happy to say that I am hungry for more Fitzgerald, especially since learning about how <i>This Side of Paradise </i>was semi-autobiographical, and that his charismatic debutante wife, Zelda, also wrote an apparently under-appreciated novel called <i>Save Me the Waltz</i> after living in his shadow during their intense and tumultuous marriage.</div>
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I also have been writing poetry. Clumsy, clunky, rusty poetry, but poetry none the less. I have even sent a few trusted confidants the drafts of those poems, and self-consciously shared a number of them at a salon that I participated in with some friends, and nobody pointed at me and laughed, and as far as I know, I'm still friends with the people who were present at the reading. My awkward lamentations about the complications of relationships, sex, and how my bizarre brain insists upon processing those things hasn't made anyone turn suddenly and walk the other way when they see me coming down the halls of Pardes or the sidewalks of Jerusalem...at least, not yet. So far, so good.</div>
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As for running? Well, I had a few days where I was under the weather, then Jerusalem got confused and thought it was winter for about a week (and now it's suddenly summer...like, Middle East summer), and I've been so stressed about finances, the Sword of Damocles that is my student loans hanging over my head, boys, and my inability to handle stress in the first place, that all of my life energy had been sucked into whatever deep abyss it disappears into whenever I attempt to work up the nerve to take care of myself. That energy is coming back, just now today. So, I'm going to publish this little update and go run around the Valley of the Cross for a while. No time like the present.</div>
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But before I go and try to get this show of life back on track and on the road, I guess what I'm trying to say is that even if I haven't been keeping up as much as I'd like with my new reading/writing/running goals, I have been working at them, and with some success. I may feel inclined to get myself a custom made t-shirt that states "I Put the "Suck" in "Success," and wear it on days when I don't measure up to my own expectations, but maybe I should be a little easier on myself. </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Zsiyu3Mgdvc/UX1GDV4FstI/AAAAAAAABT8/LOec2Cd5N_4/s1600/i+hate+myself.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="480" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Zsiyu3Mgdvc/UX1GDV4FstI/AAAAAAAABT8/LOec2Cd5N_4/s640/i+hate+myself.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is coming from someone who once ordered and publicly wore this exact shirt in my early college years. I am, unfortunately, 100% serious.</td></tr>
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I am, after all, not doing so bad. I could do better, and as long as I realize that and take my own life seriously enough to realize that the alternative to not striving for better is the compounding sense of personal failure that drags me down all too often, well, then it's quite an incentive to start reaching those goals and making new ones all the time to strive for something better. </div>
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There you go. A blog that isn't a book report, my running shoes are on, and Philip Roth's <i>Portnoy's Complaint </i>awaits me when I get back from my run. See? This isn't so hard after all!</div>
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Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-54662676403621934572013-04-11T08:16:00.000-07:002013-04-11T08:36:15.207-07:00In Pain, but Numb.Monday was my second Yom HaShoah in Israel. I was standing in the middle of the partition in the road on Rivkah and Pierre Koenig to get a good view of the people stopping their cars and getting out to pay their respects to the dead when the wail of the memorial siren sounded. Another woman stood with me, her phone out for video taping the streets during the two minutes that all of Israel stops on its tracks, and hopefully, takes the moment to remember what the world has lost. Last year, I was standing in a similar place, quietly battling an inner turmoil that comes with the day, and had been carrying around an ache that had settled from my throat to my chest, like I needed to let out a good cry, when I witnessed the unified mourning of a country at a standstill, even if only for a few moments. This year though, something happened that deeply disturbed me.<br />
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During the siren, a single car, a worker's vehicle, came careening down the road, as if the driver not only refused to stop for those two minutes, but was driving in such a way that indicated that he wanted the rest of us who were standing and acknowledging the siren to know, that he was in no way with us on this. The woman with the camera on the partition stepped out into the road in front of the car to get him to stop, which he was forced to do, and at that point, he was caught at the red light. She shoved the camera close to his smug face through his open window, where he proceeded to present his middle finger to her, and then made an exaggerated shooing motion with his hand. The red light changed before the siren ended, and the car sped away, leaving the rest of us there, motionless in our stagnant and perpetual grief.<br />
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Some of us watched the interaction between the callous driver and the angry camera woman--since I was standing right next to them, and was close enough that I could have reached out and pounded my fist on the hood of his car, I couldn't help but watch in quiet anger and frustrated disappointment with such a display of blatant and proud disrespect. But after the driver shattered the moment of necessary silence that we can afford to offer the dead, I forced my attention back to what remained of that moment; people standing outside of their cars in the middle of a busy street, heads bent in respect, and Pardes students lining Pierre Koenig with solemn faces, some witnessing Jerusalem's Yom HaShoah for the first time, just as I had last year. The wind blew a man's kippah from his head into traffic, but he didn't budge an inch to get it until the siren had ended. People had stopped on their tracks on the street, as if frozen in that moment--their lives on hold, just for those two minutes. Most of us were not like that driver--most of us were decent enough to show some indication of respect to millions of lost lives, and to the countless lives that such a loss continues to affect, even decades later.<br />
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As we collected ourselves and went back into Pardes, I mentioned what I had seen to a couple of people. One person who had overheard me seemed upset about the whole encounter with the driver and the woman with the camera, and he asked me to repeat what I had seen as if he couldn't believe it. So I told him the story again. Without responding, he turned away from me with a look of anger on his face, and walked stiffly back inside. So I shut my mouth about it and went back to my day, too. Back in the classrooms and beit midrash of Pardes, we watched a documentary about survivors and immigrants discussing what life in the shtetl and big cities of Eastern Europe was like before the war. We then listened to Warsaw ghetto and death camp survivor, Morris Wyszogrod, tell us his story. Both of these programs were meaningful, both important to preserve and to remember as we commemorate and mourn every year. But I have a confession to make; I felt a numbness the rest of the day after the incident with the siren that not only disturbed me, but made me wonder if there might be something wrong with me. Was it possible that I had ceased to be affected by one of history's most tragic chapters?<br />
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The answer is of course, no. Feeling numb to the events of the Shoah, I would argue, does not necessarily make one unsympathetic or indifferent. Some students with a Hebrew school upbringing and Israelis that I've spoken to have described a certain sense of overkill on their Holocaust education from their upbringing, or such an awareness of it from a very early age, that eventual desensitization was the result. After years of being pummeled with stark Holocaust imagery, harrowing stories of death and survival, staggering statistics and numbers of an entire world devoured by sheer evil and inhumanity, quite understandably, at some point a person might shut down a part of themselves from over-stimulation to the shock and the pain, and what replaces it, is numbness. It's a human reaction to trauma, in any case, a built in emotional defense mechanism that makes us resilient enough to even have such a thing as a Holocaust survivor.<br />
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I am aware of this basic human response to such trauma, but this is the first time that it has really happened to me when it comes to the Shoah. Personally, I didn't start learning about the death camps, the mass shootings, the mass graves, the gas chambers, the ovens, the death marches, the forced labor, the starvation, the disease, the ghettos, the yellow star patches, the medical experiments, the Nazi hatred and evil, until junior high, where I was in a secular, public school, with hardly a Jew in attendance. The rest of my education has been picked up over the years here and there from various history and literature classes throughout high school and college, my own foray into Holocaust and genocide literature, and involvement with the Jewish world since the beginning of my conversion process four years ago. It hasn't been "drilled" into me, so to speak, despite the fact that I know a lot about it and certainly don't shy away from the topic. So perhaps you can sympathize with my feelings of guilt as I listened to Mr. Wyszogrod tell us his story, while I felt detached and aloof.<br />
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How could I feel such a way during such a remarkable story, told to me right from the mouth of the man who had lived it? Morris Wyszogrod is small in stature, perhaps shorter than myself at 5'4", and is old enough to warn his audience, that if they have questions for him, then they need to shout or get up and come ask him to his face because, "his hearing aide needs a hearing aide." And there he stood, in the middle of the beit midrash in Pardes, in Jerusalem, the capital of a Jewish state that did not exist when he was suffering through the war, speaking to a room full of mostly young Jews embracing the Jewishness miraculously afforded to us in the post-Holocaust world, and with great enthusiasm, a kippah clipped onto his silver hair, and with a humble disposition, despite his harrowing story of survival. Wyszograd is a graphic artist by trade, and he brought us some of his sketches of the horrors that he'd witnessed in the ghetto and camps, each with their own ghastly story. Usually, I'd be fighting back tears at a lecture like this.<br />
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The one thing that seemed to snap me out of my inability to really feel much during Mr. Wyszogrod's presentation, was when he choked up a bit while discussing a friend of his who didn't survive the war, and when he told us that his mother didn't make it, but he would spare us the details because, in his words, he didn't want to make us cry. I suppose it was seeing the emotion on his face, and hearing it in the break of his voice, even after all this time since his loss, that got to me. A wave of emotion hit me, and just as suddenly as it hit, it quieted down again. His emotions came back under control as well, and he continued with his story. That was when I wondered, does he feel a certain degree of numbness too, a detachment that is perhaps necessary when one experiences trauma, in order to move on from it?<br />
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It makes sense. If we were to constantly feel the effects of trauma all the time, in their most vibrant, intense forms, then how could we ever carry on? As I pondered this, I thought back to the driver from that morning. That incident had angered me, and to a certain degree, that anger came from feeling powerless. I can't make someone show respect in a situation like that, and what's more, I can't make them <i>feel</i> respect for the situation, either. I know with certainty that the driver was not a Jew, and while I appreciate and have a good grasp of the tensions that exist in Israel, and the reasons behind those tensions, and the fact that real people on all sides of the issue suffer unjustly for it, there is a limit to my ability to be understanding and sympathetic--six million Jews were killed in the most inhumane undignified way possible. Perhaps I live in an area of the world that commonly dismisses our narrative for political reasons as a lie/embellishment/propaganda/"Jews are evil, so who cares anyway?" kind of sentiment, but all reasoning behind such open displays of contempt like that driver showed are rooted deeply in antisemitism. It's not for the same reason that a Haredi person might decide to ignore the siren--he or she is doing it for a much more complex reason that illustrates the tension between Haredi and secular Jewish establishments and ways of life in Israel. The reason this driver decided to not only ignore the siren, but show such utter contempt for the situation, and did it with unmistakable intent, with his middle finger extended, stems from a dark, sinister place, where antisemitism comes from.<br />
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After that incident on Yom HaShoah, I sort of shut down, emotionally for the rest of the day. While it was nowhere near the type of shutting down that one experiences after suffering through intense trauma, I think it was a way for my psyche to take a deep breath, swallow down the anger, and keep going. The numbness and detachment eventually faded, like a drug used to mask the pain of an injury. The pain is still there, underneath the numbing effects of the drug, but perhaps duller, more distant, and easier to manage. If antisemitism is a chronic condition that the world seems to suffer from, then we have to manage, somehow. I only hope that, if Mr. Wyszogrod noticed a stone faced, glassy eyed member of the audience sitting with her arms and legs crossed and her back hunched as he told his amazing story, he understands that I'm grateful for the hope that he gives the rest of the world and for the fact that he can share his life with us. I just had to watch him from behind a wall that was necessary for me to erect in the moment, a safe distance from the darkness I had confronted in two short minutes that morning, despite the fact that all around me, where I wasn't looking, nearly the rest of the country had the decency to acknowledge the Holocaust.<br />
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Perhaps it's a good thing that I witnessed that driver's actions during the siren. We always say, every year, "never forget." I won't ever forget that driver, that look on his face, that crude gesture he made so proudly, the way he sped off, the siren still blaring through the air. He may never know it, but he is one of the sad reasons why I know that I won't ever forget.<br />
<br />Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-30034117582083655892013-04-04T15:50:00.003-07:002013-04-04T15:50:20.448-07:00Reading, Writing, Running: A Personal ChallengeWith only a little over two months left in my second round of adventures in Jerusalem, I've been disappointed in myself for not keeping up my reading and writing habits as a part of my day to day life. I have been clinging to the romantic notion that living in the Holy Land would inspire my creative side, and that perhaps my study of Torah and my so-called yeshivish lifestyle would instill the discipline necessary to keep up good habits, like reading and writing every day. But alas; bad habits are so much easier to keep up than good ones, and though the environment that surrounds me inspires all kinds of meaningful emotions, thoughts and impulses, it would appear that I still have to get off of my ass once in a while and take the initiative to be productive in my literary practices...or rather, to sit on my ass, but with a pen and paper in hand, a laptop with an open Word document in front of me, and a new book sitting at my side, waiting for me to turn the next page.<br />
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Where have I gone wrong? It's not as though I don't love writing and reading, so why have I not been doing it all the damn time? I've been battling the same aversion to good habits when it comes to running. I used to be a runner you see, just on my own time and for my own pleasure, and after doing it several times a week for a month or so, it started to feel really good. To get outside and beat the pavement, to feel the runner's high flooding my body, ear buds blasting my own personal, triumphant soundtrack to propel me along, to feel like I'm treating my body well for once, instead of depriving it of sleep, filling it with tar and nicotine, skipping meals that would feed it, and letting it atrophy from too many hours spent behind a computer screen (not spent writing, of course)...running was a good thing that I could have kept doing. But you see, there are a lot of YouTube videos to watch for cheap amusement, a lot of news articles available online to yell at, and a lot of obligations and responsibilities in the rest of my life to give me the necessary excuses as to why I've been choosing the way of the lazy loafer, instead of a path that would surely lead to a more fulfilling, healthy lifestyle.</div>
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So, it's time for a change. The weeks in between blog posts have gotten too long, and my "to read" list hasn't had a title crossed off of it in an embarrassingly long time. My thin body has gotten flabby in places that I find flab to be most unflattering, and my lungs screamed in protest when I went on my first run in over two months last night, reminding me that my once-in-a-while smoking habit has ballooned into a pack-every-couple-of-days habit. While it feels very Israeli to smoke a cigarette after a good, invigorating run, it's not necessary for me to 'go native' in that sense. In an attempt to remedy all of this, I have come up with a new set of goals:</div>
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1. Read a book a week. Doesn't sound like much, right? It's not, really, if I consider all the time I waste on the internet, or when I'm sitting on a bus, or pacing around feeling bored and wondering what I should do with such moments of free time when I'm not entirely up for going out, and the fact that bed time stories are great segues into sleep. If the book is on the shorter side one week, then I'll start a longer book right afterwards and make finishing that book the goal for the following week. Those who are more voracious in their reading habits might scoff at this fairly simple goal, but it's a start, and is just the pace I think I can keep up with for now.</div>
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2. Publish a blog post every week. For the weeks when I am uninspired to write about my life here in Jerusalem (and there's plenty to write about, though I don't always have the focus to put it into words), I'll write about the books that I'm reading. I don't necessarily expect people to actually read such posts, but I mean, who knows? Maybe you're really bored and have nothing better to do than read about me trying to think of something witty to say about Jane Austen, or ponder if Henry James got paid by the word, or complain about I.B. Singer's horrible female character depictions, oddly juxtaposed with my begrudgingly admitted adoration of him. This is an exercise that I need to do just to make sure that I am actually writing <i>something</i>, and have something to show for it. The idea here is that by making writing a habit in this way and feeding my brain with books, I will be inspired to write more elsewhere, and start longer projects that will actually be worth working on to completion. You know...to actually be a real writer before I dry up and die.</div>
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3. Run every other day. I can do this. I used to do it, and I loved it, so there is really no excuse for me to not do something that I once loved so much. To top it off, I have a shiny new obsession with audiobooks. That means, I can cram more bookstuff into my head, even when I can't sit and focus with a book physically in my hands, due to my body being otherwise occupied with other endeavors. I rediscovered the magic of audiobooks quite recently while I was cleaning my apartment for Pesach a couple of weeks ago, after getting tired of listening to my iTunes play the same songs on an endless loop while I turned the place upside down, looking for traces of chametz to destroy. The lovely audio of Librivox recordings kept me company, their volunteer readers telling me the story of Gaston Leroux's <i>The Phantom of the Opera </i>while I scrubbed my cupboards and mopped my floors, feeling something close to being content. It made the never-ending cleaning go by more or less painlessly. Of course, remembering my love of audiobooks from last year when I used to listen to them frequently, does make me stop and consider the kind of trouble I could get into while focusing intently on a story being told to me through my headphones while I run in the streets of Jerusalem. Listening to G.K. Chesterton's <i>The Man Who Was Thursday </i>was something I couldn't comfortably do in public, since it would, at times, make me burst into sudden fits of raucous laughter. And listening to I.J. Singer's <i>The Brothers Ashkenazi </i>would literally make me gasp aloud at some shocking new development in the plot, and, at least twice, brought a blur of tears to my eyes, along with the accompanying ache to my chest that one gets when they are about to sob. I can see the possibility of me running head first into a car while getting absorbed in my stories becoming a true threat to my safety because of my ridiculous emotional reactions to listening to audiobooks. At least my running shoes are bright blue, and my running shorts a disgustingly head-turning shade of garish orange--maybe the drivers will see me coming well before I fling myself obliviously into their oncoming vehicle. Putting such trust into the hands of Israeli drivers may be nothing short of insane, but what can I say--I've got a book quota to meet, damn it. This is important.<br />
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So to start off my book a week goal, I'll be reading Solzhenitsyn's <i>We Never Make Mistakes </i>novella, which I bought impulsively last time I was in a used book store--I kind of can't leave a used bookstore empty-handed you see, and since I enjoyed <i>A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich </i>when I read it a couple of years ago, the only Solzhenitsyn that I am thus far familiar with (although "enjoyed" might be an inaccurate way to describe the experience of reading about the grim world of Soviet gulags), I thought, what the hell? And because of how short it is, I'll surely get a second book in before the end of the week. And if I have nothing better to share with the class when my weekly blog deadline approaches? You'll all get to hear about my reading experience, which is sure to be riveting.<br />
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Stay tuned. </div>
Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-82720242216896837062013-02-09T20:16:00.000-08:002013-02-09T15:30:17.427-08:00What's in a (Jewish) name?With the tenth of February just around the corner, it's hard to believe that I've been in Israel for a month already. I have big plans for my time abroad, and while I've mostly been happily consumed with Jewish studies at Pardes, I feel like there's still just so much for me to accomplish and experience in the short months that I have here this time around. Either time really does fly by too quickly when you're enjoying your life, or I'm just not taking the initiative to make it all happen in the allotted time that I have to be a Jerusalemite, until that distant, undetermined date of aliyah arrives. More than likely, it's a bit of both.<br />
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Now that I've returned to Jerusalem, several of the things that I had planned to do or decisions I'd planned to finalize have crept up on me and now stare me in the face as they remain unresolved. Moving abroad for five months takes some serious planning, and hopefully I've learned a thing or two from my previous trips abroad, like how to not run out of money; turns out, you need the stupid stuff to live on. For me, most planning involves crossing things off of lists that were hastily made in a late night panic after unsettling nightmares that remind me that things need to get done--things to shop for, things to not forget to pack, and things to take care of before leaving the country and find you should have done too late, such as notifying your bank that you are leaving the country, and will use the ATM while you're gone, so please, please, please, don't block access to my account and then tell me that I need to physically sign papers that I don't have and fax them to you in order to confirm this when I call you up in a state of agitated confusion at the airport in Montreal without a dime on me (not that I ever did that, or anything...) Other things require mental and emotional planning, such as dealing with missing loved ones, homesickness, and the possibility of escalating tensions in a country such as Israel. Lately though, I've been thinking of this seemingly trivial thing that I was considering before I left the States: should I go by my given name, or my Hebrew name while I'm in Israel?<br />
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This might seem like an odd consideration to take into account for some, and it's admittedly unique to Jews who travel to Israel and have the option to introduce themselves as, in my case, either Megan (the name I was given at birth) or Maayan (the name I chose for myself as I came out the mikveh, reborn in a sense). It's something of a tradition that some Jews like to partake in when we step into the Holy Land. It's not just about blending in, especially when you may very well receive unexpected attention and compliments on your "exotic" name if you stick with your non-Jewish, non-Hebrew one--I've met a number of Israelis who have oohed and ahhed over my "interesting" and "beautiful" name, which is immensely flattering, since when I was born, Megan was in the top ten baby names for girls in 1985 in the United States. But what does it matter, anyway? What is in a name, after all?<br />
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Choosing a Hebrew name for myself wasn't easy, and I went through a long list of names before finally settling on one. Actually, that is to say, before settling on two names. For a while, I thought I'd settle with Emuna. Phonetically, I love the way it rolls off the tongue, and the meaning of it, "faith," seemed like a good fit for an enthusiastic new convert such as myself. When I excitedly told everyone about what was to be my new Hebrew name as soon as my beit din could get it down on my official conversion papers, I was not met with the favorable responses that I was expecting.<br />
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Emuna, I was told, is a "settler name," one that makes me sound frum, and would immediately give off a certain kind of impression to any Israeli that I might want to, not be friends with, but actually date. Emuna is too pious, they said, and really, who was I trying to kid with the sudden piety schtick? It would be a perfect name, I was told, if ever I decided to move to Meah Shearim (the infamous ultra-orthodox neighborhood in Jerusalem, where not dressing modestly can get you spat upon or called names...though, that's never happened to me there, and I once shopped around there all tarted up in a t-shirt--you could see my arms past my elbows!) and get married to a Haredi man, chosen for me by a matchmaker and decided after a couple of coffee dates to test our compatibility as a couple. Yes, I'd better start shopping for my modest curtain skirts and ask myself if I'll be covering my hair with a snood or opt for shaving my head and wear the fashionable sheitel, a wig of someone else's hair, once I'm betrothed to a bearded, sidelocked, black-hatted man who will spend most of his days at shul and yeshiva, pouring over the Talmud (because Talmud scholars are sexy).<br />
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Exaggerations aside, since I had yet to experience Israel for myself at that point, I took everyone's advice seriously, and searched for another name. In retrospect, the warnings I received seem utterly ridiculous now; I can think of no one I have met in Israel, religious or secular, who would give a damn that my name would have been Emuna. But naming a person is serious, and once you have it, you're stuck with it. You can't go naming yourself something in a foreign language that might give everyone the wrong impression, especially if you're going to possibly want to live amongst them for good at some point. And for the record, with a better, more nuanced understanding of term, I don't care if I'm perceived of as a "settler" these days.<br />
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Maayan became my next choice. Totally secular, Maayan is a unisex name that means "fountain," or "spring." It has a nice symmetry to it with Megan; both start and end with the same sound, and are similar enough to compliment each other: Megan, Maayan. You see? They even look good sitting next to each other.<br />
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Everyone agreed that Maayan was the better choice. Still, I couldn't let go of my attachment to Emuna. Finally, someone asked why not just hyphenate the two names, and choose Maayan-Emuna? I have a middle name too, after all (Dolores actually, which is about as non-Jewish as Christina, and the point was really humorously driven home to me last Good Friday when I decided to walk down the Via Dolorosa with a bunch of Christians during their procession to the Holy Sepulchre). Besides, what a neat meaning the two names would have when put together: "spring of faith." It sounds about ten times more religious than Emuna ever did on its own (and a friend of mine recently pointed out that "spring of faith" would make a great name for a band, and I have to agree), but I loved it, and that's what is written on my conversion papers: Maayan Emuna, bat Avraham v'Sara. Or, in English, Spring of Faith, daughter of Abraham and Sara. Okay, now that's just really religious sounding, don't you think?<br />
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But recently, my Pardes friends have been calling me Maayan, after an Australian teacher of mine called me "Meegan," and even though I automatically responded with correcting him, I didn't mind, given his charming accent, but he wanted to know my Hebrew name and if he could call me that instead. Turns out, Maayan is a name he has long since loved and wanted to name a daughter (but alas, his wife has never been keen on the idea), and a good number of my classmates wanted to know if it was okay for them to call me Maayan as well. The topic came up again in another class, and since it's Pardes, people are enthusiastic about these Jewish things (go figure!), so more and more people have come around to calling me Maayan. And I have to say, I quite enjoy it.<br />
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On a related note, after studying chapter 15 of Genesis last week in my chumash class, we discussed a portion of the text where Avram (before becoming Avraham, or for my non-Hebrew speaking readers, when Abraham is still referred to as Abram) tells God that his inheritance of the land and being blessed with wealth and a great name for himself is meaningless without an heir, and God comes to Avram in a vision and tells him to go outside and count the stars, for that will be the number of his descendants. Rashi comments that God changing Avram's name to Avraham not long after this during the covenant with the circumcision, and the renaming of Sarai to Sarah, is related to their fortune changing when God blesses them with a child. What this has to with God renaming them was lost on me, until our teacher explained to us that there is a practice in some observant Jewish circles, where people who have been sick or especially down on their luck will change their name in order to change their "fortune" or lot in life. It's not exactly a surprising practice--the name of a newborn baby boy is not often announced until their bris, eight days after they are born, and in many other traditions, a baby girl's name isn't announced to a community until the Torah is read at services in shul--Mondays, Thursdays and Shabbat morning. Even though there is some superstition surrounding this practice (warding off the Evil Eye or the Angel of Death by not identifying the new baby, especially a boy before a bris when he becomes "complete" in his initiation into the Jewish people), it also does have to do with God renaming Avraham at his brit millah, according to some commentaries on the text (Zohar – Lech Lecha 93a, Ta’amei Minhagim 929, to be precise...I looked it up!) And in Ashkenazi circles, it's considered bad luck to name a child after a living relative. So this whole name business in Judaism, to put it mildly, is a big deal and does have significance.<br />
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While I'm hesitant to get all mystical and suggest that changing one's name will affect their lot in life (Rashi and other commentators also put stock in astrology, and while I respect our great biblical scholars who are vastly more knowledgeable than I am when it comes to the Tanakh, it is hard for me to not make a derisive scoff at the mention of astrology...but I digress), I do think that something as big as changing one's name can change a person's mindset, and there's a lot a of power in the human mind and how it perceives something. Becoming Maayan since I've been here has had a positive effect on me. Perhaps there is something in it that makes me feel more wholly accepted and welcome into my still relatively new Jewish life. And since my Pardes community has "renamed" me in a sense, I do approach my studies and interaction within that community with a different point of view. Collecting new perspectives and experiences is all a part of the reason to keep doing down this unlikely path that I've chosen, after all.<br />
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So, I'll cross the whole, "what name should I go by?" issue off of my "List of Things to do While I'm in Israel," then. Now, onto learning how to speak Hebrew with any real proficiency, and to put those travel plans for Pesach break into motion...<br />
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<br />Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-8686398730849984672013-01-19T03:56:00.001-08:002013-01-19T03:56:13.089-08:00Lost (and Found) in JerusalemAfter seven months in the States, living a solitary Jewish lifestyle (meaning, an incredibly hollow one, sans community), day after day of ten hour shifts of packing candy on assembly lines, sitting on my tuchus in a call center selling fruit baskets and truffles to rich elderly folks, and waitressing a few hours here and there at a local Indian restaurant, I've somehow found my way back to the Holy Land. It's been a journey, mostly one of monotony and a perseverance of the type that I didn't realize I was capable of, and at long last, I'm back; back in the Middle East, in Israel, in Pardes, in Jerusalem, in Rachavya, in my old apartment, with the Israeli president, Shimon Peres, as my unlikely neighbor. I think I'd be a better fiction writer if my life weren't stranger than fiction.<br />
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Because Israel is a place of surprises and unlikelihoods converging together to make up an entire country of simultaneous contradictions that somehow function in a strange, kind of symbiotic harmony that on the surface doesn't appear to function at all except by happy accident, I find myself surprised, and yet not, by the way in which I've reacted to my familiar, but new surroundings. When I began my day long trek from the West Coast of the United States to Israel, I expected myself to be a bundle of excited nerves and emotions; after all, I had dreamt about Jerusalem every day since I'd left, and had been pining away and longing for the vibrant Jewish existence that allows converts such as myself to fall in love with Judaism all over again in every enriching moment that we're here. I romanticized my return to an almost absurd degree, expecting myself to burst into happy and exhausted tears during the final descent into Tel Aviv, and to feel an immense amount of pride in myself for tirelessly striving for the moment that my feet would hit the hallowed grounds of the Holy Land, even the parts beneath the pavement of the Ben Gurion airport's runways and streets. Surely, the heavens would open up, angels would sing, I'd kiss the dirty, holy ground without shame, and my happiness would burst forth from the very center of my nefesh, enough to power the sherut cab all the way to Jerusalem.<br />
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Of course, this ecstatic state of being, didn't happen to me--not exactly. My emotions, though always a bit more intense than I'd like them to appear, stayed in check, as I was too grumpy from lack of sleep and was nursing a slight hangover from the night before, as my sister and I had one last hurrah in the wee hours leading up to my early morning flight. I boarded four different planes over the course of 20 hours or so, tried to sleep, failed, watched two good movies (<i>The Fighter,</i> and quite fittingly, the Israeli film<i> Footnote</i>), suffered through half of<i> Dinner for Shmucks</i> until, in my half-confused exhaustion, I wondered why I was subjecting myself to abject torture in the midst of a 20 hour long trip half way across the globe, turned it off, bored myself with a dry documentary on the Great Wall of China, watched two episodes <i>The Big Bang Theory</i> that I've seen at least a billion times, chatted with the excited and bubbly Birthright kids that I was sitting in between, and tried to focus on Joseph Conrad's <i>Lord Jim</i>, until I realized that my brain stew was not retaining enough of the novel to actually recall a word of it, and then tried (and failed) to sleep some more. Just between you and me, it's hard to be a bundle of excitement and happiness under such circumstances.<br />
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Still, there were glimmers of incredibly happy moments along the way, especially on the last leg of the trip from New York to Tel Aviv, such as when I found myself smiling at the busy and obviously excited crowd at the terminal. Amid the buzz of the crowd, there were dozens of Birthright kids chatting noisily about their typically Jewish, over-achieving academic aspirations, brimming with excitement over the prospect of partying in Israel, and the cute IDF soldiers and lowered drinking age laws awaiting them. There were large Haredi families that I couldn't help but watch later on with quiet fascination as they davened Shacharit, the morning prayers, right in the aisles of the plane while the rest of us dozed restlessly or stared at our movie screens with glassy, tired eyes. Then there were the tourists who have been to the Holy Land dozens of times, and yet think of it as a second (if not first) home. And of course, there were the Israelis heading back to their country and, in typical Israeli fashion, doing their part to turn the line to board the plane into a crowded free-for-all, all while shouting in Hebrew into their cell phones.<br />
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Such moments I've come to expect after living in Israel for a year, and from becoming familiar with the ways in which this country works, how Jewish life here exists both in Israeli and visiting Anglo terms, what it means to be a part of it, to be swimming in it, to be an extension of it, and how absurd, amazing, frustrating, exhausting, trying, fulfilling, rewarding and strangely normal it can suddenly all be. I know from experience that it can be impossible to explain to people who haven't been afflicted with Jerusalem Syndrome (the kind where you fall hopelessly in love with the place, not where you suddenly think that you're Jesus or a biblical prophet) what it's like to be here and feel more at home than anywhere else in the world, even with the language and cultural barriers, even with the political situation, even with the existing tensions, and even without all the luxuries of living in most places in the West (public transportation and open businesses on Saturday and readily available hot water are a couple of things that come to mind). It's not a paradise if you're looking for a slice of an idyllic and relaxed life, where people and the environment are easy going and life seems to hand itself to you on a silver platter. Life here in Israel is far too complicated for that, and being here does require a thick enough skin to appreciate Israeli brusqueness (a friendly kind of bluntness, in my opinion), a sincere and realistic understanding of the political situation in order to realize that living here isn't nearly as treacherous as the media in the West would have you think, and perhaps of course, a love affair with Judaism that is as complicated as every other love affair that I've been involved in (love is never so simple, is it?)<br />
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But it was all so normal for me to come back to, as though I was simply picking up my life where I'd left off after taking a long pause. That isn't to say that I didn't enjoy being with my family and friends back in the States, or that I didn't value the time that I did have to collect my thoughts about my next move in my life, and the direction in which I'd like to go; far from it. Whatever steps I had to take to get back to this life that I ultimately want to call my permanent, settled, day to day living, they were a part of a larger learning process where I was, more or less, figuring things out. My parent's home will always be the home that I grew up in, and Oregon, from Medford to Portland, is also a place for me to call home--and there's a certain kind of security and comfort in the familiarity of it all. But the difference between those homes and Jerusalem as my home, is that I'm all grown up now, and being grown up means to leave the nest and build one of your own. This nest will take some time to build in its entirety, but I've found the tree to build it in, which is the first step. That tree is called Jerusalem. Perhaps my quiet happiness over my return to Jerusalem, as opposed to the grandiose emotional display that I was bracing myself to erupt in, is a signal of my settling in. I don't feel as panicked this time about missing out while I'm here, or what I'm going to do about aliyah, or if the perceived legitimacy of my conversion is going hinder my ability to be as freely Jewish as one who was born into their Jewishness. This time, I feel much more Israeli in my approach to my life here: "yihyeh beseder...le'at, le'at" (it'll be fine...slowly, slowly).<br />
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After landing in Tel Aviv, I had an extraordinary turn of good luck and spent only minutes in customs, which was not the case last time I came to Israel, ("Are you Jewish? What was the last Jewish holiday you celebrated? Can you speak Hebrew? Why are you in the country? Do you know people here? Did anyone ask you to bring a package into the country? Why are you traveling with a Tanakh? Do you know what your "Na Nach Nachma Nachman Me'uman" sticker on your laptop means?"), found my bag almost immediately, and hopped on a sherut just minutes later, and was on my way to Jerusalem. A rare morning snow had blanketed the city, and as we careened into the city limits (what other way do you travel with an Israeli driver, except to careen madly down the road?), a white carpet greeted me as I became reunited once again with the city that I've come to think of as home. For the next five months, Jerusalem will be my home, and is there ever anywhere better to be?Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-6367123963649556272012-12-09T18:09:00.001-08:002012-12-09T20:16:25.389-08:00Why Can't We Be Friends?A couple of weeks ago, I posted in this very blog about Operation Pillar of Defense. I expressed my dismay at Hamas aiming rockets towards the holy city of Jerusalem, of the continued assault on Israeli civilians without a care in the world for civilian life, my concern for my friends taking refuge in bomb shelters, and my worry about the escalation of tensions, and what that means for peace on both sides of the conflict. I also expressed my desire to be in Israel and to stand with her and the people I care about, because I'm one of those wacky people who sees Israel as an actual functioning democracy in a sea of extremism and violence, imperfect as it may be, and love it so much, that I don't want to see its destruction. After having lived there for a year and having many friends and loved ones there who call it home, and actually possessing a non-biased education on the conflict itself, I sort of feel, you know, entitled to my opinion.<br />
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Entitled or not, I am usually pretty quiet about my political beliefs these days, meaning, I don't bother to preach them; I just live them instead. I've learned that some things cannot be discussed calmly and rationally with some people, and no matter what your intentions might be, you can't change a mind that doesn't want to be changed. But what can I say? Every once in a while I go out on a limb and talk about the things that I think and feel to people who may not be so sympathetic, or with one of those rare people who can disagree with me without hating me. Since I'm not the best at handling confrontation (I tend to get flustered and either sound like I've forgotten how to speak English or I start crying pathetically once the confrontation gets tense), I bite my tongue a lot. In some ways, it's taught me to let things go, shrug things off, and keep friends from all across the political, religious, and social spectrum. Still, I have had moments where I've felt personally attacked, and a bit disappointed in myself for not "saying something." There's something to be said for not saying anything sometimes, though. We are taught to"stand up for ourselves" so much in our culture that we seem to disregard that you can do that without starting an argument. We're also taught to pick our battles, but for some reason, we're never told how to actually do that; a battle is a battle well fought as long as we walk away feeling that we've won, and we've been vindicated through our perceived victory. We may walk away with one less friend or with a gaping wound in the relationship that is sure to only fester due to a lack of personal resolution, but damn it, who cares as long as you're still so sure that you're right?<br />
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So, I dared to discuss what was troubling me during the conflict, and it costed me a "friend." And I endured the loss of that friend in the most insulting way possible: I was unfriended on Facebook.<br />
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That's right! Unfriended. In this day and age, you might as well kick someone in the shins to express your dissatisfaction with them if you're going to remove them from your friends list. And since I was sort of anticipating less than positive feedback from some people, I kept an eye on the number of people on my friends list after posting a link to my blog, just in case someone was so disgusted with my views that they no longer wanted to even peripherally be my friend via a social network site that claims that we have hundreds of friends, simply because they are on a list of people that we know really well, went to high school with, are vaguely acquainted with, or met at a party once. Sure enough, that list changed to one number less, and I was filled with that ever familiar sense of anxiousness, because I was sure that it meant that someone had unfriended me due to my blog, and because it's pretty exciting to think that someone actually took the time to read my blog in the first place. Hey! Did this mean I had written something "controversial?" How thrilling! I felt an odd blend of pride in my rebelliousness and disappointment in what I was sure was someone unfriending me over my different opinion.<br />
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I had the culprits of my unfriending narrowed down to a few likely candidates, and pretty soon, I found out who it was. The predictability of it only compounded my sense of disappointment; I was hoping someone would surprise me, or that the unfriending wasn't due to what I knew it was over, but instead over something like someone realizing that we had met at a drunken party three years ago and had no reason to be friends with me, because I barely exist in the fuzzy, drunken memory in that person's psyche. But I was right, and I knew who it was almost immediately. Usually, like anyone, I love it when I'm right. But sometimes, I hate it because I don't want my assumptions to be correct. I messaged the culprit and asked him if I'd done anything to offend him. His only response was, "I support Palestine."<br />
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It's an interesting response because I support Palestine, too. I would support a Palestinian state, just like there was supposed to be one during the UN partition that was going to ensure an Arab state and a Jewish state in British mandate Palestine 65 years ago, before the Arabs declared war on the new Jewish state that supported them. I support them so much, that if I could be given any kind of reliable reassurance that such a state could co-exist peacefully with Israel, I'd be the first to wish a sincere mozel tov to my new Arab neighbors in their new homeland. Since it's been 65 years and we've been shown time and time again that that is not the aim of a Palestinian state as of yet, I don't have high hopes. Hamas says it will never recognize Israel, and I believe them. I also support a theoretical Palestine so much, that I care about Palestinian safety, freedom and well being, that I don't support Hamas, an extremist terror organization that rules the Gaza Strip with an iron fist. I support Palestinians so much, that I'd love to see them overthrow violence, extremism, propaganda, censorship, corruption and hatred in their governing bodies. I support Palestine, but nobody knows what that means in practice. You have to actually know what the reality is first before you can say that you support or don't support Palestinians or Israelis. People are baffled when you say both, because they don't know that it doesn't have to be an Us vs. Them situation. So far, the Palestinians give Israel no choice. Israel defends itself, the world watches while it gets pummeled with rocket fire, and somehow, Israel is the villain. Call me crazy, but that's crazy.<br />
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In any case, nuance is not a strong suit of a lot of people, especially in regards to such a polarizing issue, in the very polarized country that we live in. Being moderate tends to get looked down upon, no matter how moderate people claim to be. I've met true blue extremists who insist that they are so moderate, that they can't understand why everyone thinks they're crazy.<br />
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I used to be extreme in my views as well. I was very far left, and believed in ideals more than I believed in reality. I have nothing against ideals these days, but at some point, you have to take in your experiences as you grow, and understand that it is a rare treat when life presents you with such clear cut, black and white, right and wrong, good guys and bad guys situations. Life is so complicated, and yet, we seem to be unable to resist the urge to simplify things down to a yes or a no, or a right or a wrong. We're all guilty of that sometimes. I used to live that way, too. I didn't want any friends who could challenge my notions of the world, and because I was in my early 20s, I was sure that I knew everything, and was beyond impatient and intolerant of people who didn't agree with me. Needless to say, I was angry a lot, and my friends started to bore me, and my life started to bore me, and I started to bore myself. Sometimes, you need someone around who will challenge and push you to question all those things that you are so sure of. Once I started to allow those views into my life without fear of being proven wrong (and those views started with an academic interest in Judaism), life became a lot more colorful and I became a lot more open, and less angry. I made more friends, and they came from all over the spectrum of human experiences and thought. I began to value disagreements, and was humbled to be proven wrong from time to time. Turns out, it can be really satisfying to be wrong. Victory is not everything, especially when you're still angry after you've won.<br />
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So, why can't we be friends? I can't speak for the person who no longer wants to be my friend over my blog post, and it's tempting to assume what his reasons are. Whatever they are though, it makes me a bit sad. I still hold out hope that one day, the conflict will come to a peaceful resolution for both Israel and the Palestinians, even though it, as always, looks grim. It feels even more hopeless when you realize that this is an issue that some people cannot agree to to disagree upon, and that friendships can break to pieces over it. If we can't peacefully disagree with each other over a political situation and there are no rockets, or suicide bombers, or bus bombs or military operations standing between us, then I wonder what we can expect from the people who do have these things between them, and between conflict and peace?<br />
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This is one of those things that I'd love to be wrong about.Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-77283831673247055792012-11-24T19:20:00.001-08:002013-01-19T04:24:07.364-08:00Times like these....Dear readers (all three of you), as you can see, it's been almost four months since I've written for my blog. I could blame writer's block or the typical day to day distractions as the reason behind my silence. For instance, I've been getting into<i> Lost</i>, because my parents have Netflix, and I'm a sucker for TV dramas. This is like <i>Star Trek: Deep Space 9</i> all over again, when watching five episodes in one extremely late night became a common occurrence. That time, I believe my addiction nearly destroyed my Hebrew classes in college, because I lent the series to my professor; I managed to hook he and his wife both, like a junkie looking for fellow junkies to connect with as we slip further in between the cracks of the productive parts of society, boldly spiraling to where no man has gone before (except for millions of other hopeless Trekkies). Talk about distractions. But the reason for my virtual silence is really quite simple; I'm exhausted. I'm exhausted, and thinking of my beloved Israel and Jerusalem is even more exhausting. I miss being there so much, that it drains me to think about it. I then get sad, and when I get sad, it looks very similar to anger, and my poor family has had to put up with my sad/angry shit for years. I'd rather not be sad and angry, if for nothing else, to save my family the headache of my bellyaching.<br />
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However, my exhaustion isn't just from my perpetual state of longing for Israel; it also comes from what has been my job for the last couple of months. You see, I'm a candy packager. I get up at 4:00 in the morning to work from 5:00 in the morning until 3:30 in the afternoon. And yes, I work full time, standing on my feet for seemingly endless hours, placing truffles into boxes on an assembly line, putting lids onto boxes, tying bows onto boxes, folding boxes, labeling boxes, taking things out of boxes only to put them into new boxes, and taking the old boxes out to the recycling to make room for the new boxes. This job is the definition of monotony, the most concrete example of tedium that I can imagine, so much so, that I've fallen asleep on my feet while doing it (my hands never missing a beat as I nod off and jerk back awake, startled and disoriented), and I've cried in the women's room in the middle of the day, hiding in a stall and talking myself down, while making a mental list of why I'm voluntarily doing this to myself (It's all for my return to Israel! Israel, my cruel, tormenting mistress! I love you dangerously close to insanely)! I start a new job tomorrow where I'll sit on my butt in a cubicle, dealing with customer complaints for our company's products via the phone. Right now, I should be practicing my "I'm smiling widely and am so happy with you yelling at me, sir" voice, which I've cultivated from all my years in customer service positions, having reverted back to my naturally occurring Daria-style cadence of speech after spending months imprisoned in a candy factory, away from civilization. I know that I have a whole new level of monotony and tedium in store for me until January 10th, when I make my way back to the Holy Land, and resume this thing called "my life." See? It's exhausting to even type it all out.<br />
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"My life" in Israel is not as I left it, though. Last week, Israel's IDF eliminated top Hamas operatives in Gaza in the interest of maintaining Israeli safety. This prompted Hamas to do what they apparently love to do more than anything, which is to shoot rockets into Israel, with not a care in the world for Israeli civilian life, or even Palestinian civilian life. Well, actually it was more rockets than usual, because Hamas has been tempting fate by doing what every country in the world would call and act of war, by firing into Israel as though it's Hamas' way of saying "hello." Rockets reached Tel Aviv. They reached the outskirts of Jerusalem, a first in Hamas' history of terror and violence. Apparently, Jerusalem isn't as holy as declaring jihad on normal, every day civilians, whether they be Jewish, Christian, Muslim--just whoever happens to be in the line of indiscriminate fire. Sirens went off as the rockets were fired in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, and other Israeli cities. This is unusual for these cities, while places in the south, such as Ashkelon and Ashdod, are used to the sound of air raid sirens and rocket attacks from Gaza; this is how they have to live their lives. The sirens are not common in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem though, and my stomach churned each time I read the news. I know what those sirens sound like from drills and tests that occasionally took place in Jerusalem while I was there last year, just in case the unthinkable were to happen; those sirens are terrifying to hear. They wail like the end of the world is upon us, and we all need to act quickly, if we hope to save our lives. When I heard those sirens though, Hebrew class went on as normal, and we practiced grammar as they howled forebodingly throughout the city. This time though, when the sirens went off, my friends and loved ones were ducking into bomb shelters and stairwells, posting about their safety on Facebook, flooding my news feed with reassurances, calls for prayers for a ceasefire, and new headlines would pop up with the breaking news of where the rockets had landed. One of them landed in Gush Etzion, a settlement (as much as I hate to call it that, it is what the media has decided we need to know this community as) just outside of Jerusalem, where several teachers of mine live. I've spent time in Gush Etzion, had Shabbat dinners there, strolled through the peaceful streets of a quiet Modern Orthodox neighborhood in the summer, when little kids were running around outside, playing in the middle of the night, because it's so peaceful and quiet there, it truly feels as though there's no reason to be concerned about their safety. I imagined the rocket exploding there, my teachers, their children, their grandchildren, all scurrying for shelter, just as their Arab neighbors would be doing at the same time. And all last week I packaged candy, feeling like I live in another world.<br />
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As I chatted and emailed with friends, some of them in the IDF themselves, some of them students, some of them long time Israeli citizens, some of them new Israeli citizens, I was, quite understandably, asked over and over again; well, now what am I going to do? Am I really going to go back there with all the rocket fire? What if, even if things quieted down, it all started up again while I'm there? Would I come back to the States? Would I stay? Considering how easily the conflict can explode, how suddenly things can escalate, am I sure I want to go back? Aren't I scared? Worried? Anxious?<br />
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The truth is, it didn't even occur to me to <u>not</u> go back. It didn't occur to me to cancel my plans for five months of my life between January and June, to cancel my aliyah application with Nefesh b'Nefesh, to rethink my plans to study creative writing at Bar-Ilan University, to find a new place to call "home" after falling in love with Jerusalem. These considerations did not come to me, even as I watched the rockets above Tel Aviv's skyline on the news--I still love swimming those beaches and walking those busy streets, marveling at the modern, secular, cosmopolitan buildings, billboards and people, just a 45 minute bus ride from the ancient, religious, cobblestone streets of Jerusalem. I love Tel Aviv so much, I'll put up with her disgusting humidity in the summer, because she's worth it to me. These considerations did not come to me when my chats with Jerusalem friends were interrupted because a siren went off, and they needed to get to shelter, just in case. These considerations did not come to me even when a city bus exploded in Tel Aviv, a city that I've bussed around in numerous times. These considerations didn't come to me when the terror suspect for the bus bomb was apprehended in Ramat Gan, where Bar-Ilan University is, where I want to hone my writing skills, and obtain my Master's degree. These considerations didn't come to me because I've been sitting here fuming over the fact that I'm not there right now.<br />
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Sounds crazy, right? I want to be in the middle of a war zone. But I can't help it. I love Israel and feel that Jerusalem is my home. If your home was under attack, wouldn't you want to get back home right away? Wouldn't you want to see the people you care about with your own eyes, and have the comfort of having them at your side? Wouldn't you rather huddle into a bomb shelter with them and get through it together, rather than feeling that you live across the universe now, passing your days by putting truffles into boxes and counting down the minutes of your unbelievably long shifts until you can run to a computer and get the latest news on what's happening at home? Call me crazy (it's probably partly true, anyway), but I want to be there. I wouldn't abandon something that means so much to me, something that I love when things are at their worst. I'd stand by it, and what's more, I truly believe that I could live like an Israeli, cautious and concerned, but still able to sip coffee in a cafe after the sirens stop and we get out of the shelters, still going to the shuk to shop for Shabbat dinner, still heading to the Kotel to pray for a ceasefire, and hopefully, a long lasting peace for all of us, Israeli, Arab, immigrant, sabra, Jewish, Muslim, Christian, whatever. I think I could live my life, even without the reassurance that most of us have in the States, that we're mostly safe from rockets, from bombs, from terrorism, from suicide attacks, from hatred, and a blindness that has turned conflict into a propaganda-ridden political issue, with such misinformed blowhards screaming ridiculous solutions to a problem that they don't understand, one would think that exploding from frustration is just as likely as dying in an explosion on a bus or from a rocket. Sure, anything could happen anywhere. But there's a difference between calling Israel your home and calling the United States your home; one is constantly under threat, the other is peripherally under threat. And while the U.S. will always be my home, it will be my home from my childhood, so to speak. Israel is the home you find when you grow up and have to leave the nest.<br />
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So what does one do in times like these? Certainly, Hamas will not succeed in changing my life by scaring me off with rockets and saber rattling. The ceasefire has quieted things down, which means of course, that things are back to the status quo: Israel ceases, and Hamas still fires, although they've gone back to their usual, sporadic rocket fire, and not their constant barrage of rocket fire. I suppose I'll just start my new job tomorrow, earn my paycheck and put it away for my life in Israel, which is rapidly coming upon me. It's what an Israeli would do. What else can you do with your life except live it?Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-17787283009226641022012-08-04T19:22:00.000-07:002012-08-06T01:34:36.088-07:00Trying to Mourn by the BookLast week was Tisha b'Av, the "saddest day of the Jewish calendar." Commemorating the destruction of the Temple, observant Jews fast for a full day, restrict Torah study to the sad books of Lamentations, Job and Jeremiah, and mourn in typical Jewish fashion. This was my second Tisha b'Av as a Jew, and even though I was in Jerusalem last year for my first one, I just couldn't get swept up in the sorrow associated with the day. This year, in a small American town with so few Jews that you think you'd sooner encounter a unicorn than a fellow Semite, I struggled for a few days with the idea of fasting for the full day before deciding against it. After all, the Olympics were on and it was my father's birthday, too. I wasn't exactly in a mournful mood.<br />
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While I understand and can get behind the fact that a large portion of Jewish observance is based on tradition and ritualistic practices, and participating in them enriches one's experience as a Jew, and I certainly am not the only Jew who feels emotionally disconnected from mourning events that happened a couple thousand years ago, Tisha b'Av sits uneasily with me for a number of reasons. Some of those reasons are personal, some are political, and some...I can't quite put my finger on.</div>
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Politically, I'm ambivalent about the idea of mourning the destruction of the Temple while Jews have since found their way back home to our ancestral holy land once again. I don't care how volatile or controversial the state of Israel is--it's ours, and as it exists, that's nothing short of a miracle. The fact that people are speaking a revitalized Hebrew as their mother tongue when the language was nearly dead and relegated to religious and academic usage for a thousand years, is remarkable. A country that is home to Jews from Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Americas and virtually every other pocket of the world along with a historically unprecedented number of converts, is profound. The existence of a country where Jews outnumber all other groups would have been unheard of a half a century ago, and only fantasizing, idealistic Zionists would have ever believed it would one day be a reality. Modern day Israel is a testament to the vitality and endurance of the Jewish people. It's hard for me to long for the restoration of the Temple, or Judaism as a sacrificial and centrally located religion. I long for the Israel that I left at the beginning of June this summer. Sure, it's imperfect (as is every nation on the planet since the beginning of time), and the challenges that Israel and Judaism itself face in a modern, largely hostile world, are massive, to say the least. But it is what it is today, because after the destruction of the Temple and the Jewish exile that followed, Jews were forced to adapt throughout the world and throughout time, maintaining their rituals, customs and traditions, and therefore, their identity. And here I am, a 26 year old WASPY small-town ex-religion-basher who only began to learn about Judaism a few short years ago, embracing a Jewish identity and faith as though it's what I have been missing my whole life...because it is. If Jews had not been dispersed throughout the world, who is to say that I would have found my way to Judaism, and my beloved, sorely missed Jerusalem?</div>
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This is not to say that observing Tisha b'Av is useless and the day is irrelevant. It's a part of Jewish history and the events the day memorializes could have very well destroyed the Jewish people. But Jews and Judaism were not ultimately destroyed, and given the present day circumstances of the existence of the state of Israel...well, there's something redemptive about that, right? Isn't it evidence of a Jewish renaissance? A kind of salvation?</div>
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Of course, many Orthodox Jews would read this (and they probably aren't) and label me an ignorant convert (that is, if they even considered me a legitimate convert in the first place). True redemption, the end of mourning the loss of the Temple, thus rendering Tisha b'Av obsolete, will only happen when the Messiah comes, all exiles are gathered out from the diaspora and back in the Holy Land, and all with the guidance of God's willing hand. Yes, I'm aware of Orthodox views of the state of Israel (some of them favorable, some of them insisting that Israel is a blasphemous example of Jews forcing God's hand before it is time for our redemption), and I'm aware that deeply religious Jews may actually be capable of mourning the destruction of the Temple and the Jewish exile that resulted from them (both Temples, that is) with a real sense of, well, mourning. But the saddest day on the Jewish calendar? What about Yom HaShoah?</div>
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Yes, Yom HaShoah is a new addition to the Jewish calendar, and was only established in 1953 by the state of Israel, and has been more controversial than the electricity vs. fire on Shabbat debate. Why don't we fast on Yom HaShoah? Why don't we engage in traditional Jewish mourning rituals? Why do ultra-Orthodox Jews in Israel refuse to stand in silence during the sirens like the rest of Israel does in honor of the dead? Why are they inclined to go to the Kotel on Tisha b'Av and grieve the destruction of the Temple, but not to stand for a couple of minutes out of respect for the 6 million Jews that were brutally murdered only a few short decades ago? Are they heartless? </div>
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Of course, the answer is no, they are not inherently heartless, and like most things involving Jews and Judaism, it's complicated. While I was struggling with observing Tisha b'Av last year in Jerusalem and figuring out what exactly that meant to me, I pondered these same questions. As it turns out, the way in which Yom HaShoah was established is a perfect example of Jewish modernity butting heads with Jewish tradition, and the schism in Jewish thought over how Judaism should thrive in the modern world.</div>
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Yom HaShoah happens to fall in the month of Nisan, a month that traditionally forbids some mourning rituals and is supposed to be a festive time. Why did the Knesset, then, decide that (against the suggestion of the Rabbinate to designate the Tenth of Tevet as the official day to memorialize the Holocaust) Nisan would be the month that Yom HaShoah was to occur? Perhaps there's something kind of poetic about observing the solemn Yom HaShoah right after Pesach, when we celebrate our freedom from slavery in Egypt, followed shortly by mourning those who fought and died for the establishment of Israel or were killed in terror attacks on Yom HaZikaron (Israel's Memorial Day), to immediately (seriously, the next day) celebrating our freedom again on Yom Ha'atzmaut (Israel's Independence Day). Or maybe the Rabbinate and the Knesset just really didn't like each other and often bickered over how much say one should have over the other...seems plausible. </div>
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But there's more to it than that. Standing at attention during a nationwide sounding of a siren, observing a moment of silence, flying flags at half-mast, showing Holocaust documentaries on television and playing somber music on the radio, are all fairly modern and goyish ways to commemorate the dead. It's understandable that some ultra-Orthodox Jews would have reservations about mourning in such a way, especially if there is a disconnect between how they do mourn, how they understand mourning, and how they feel when they mourn. Imagine being expected to mourn someone close to you in a completely foreign way, and how uncomfortable and even meaningless that would seem. In ancient Egyptian culture, mourning Egyptians supposedly shaved their eyebrows when their cats died. Wouldn't it feel strange, if not absurd, to engage in such a practice after your beloved kitty passed, if you were, say, not an ancient Egyptian? Wouldn't you do more than raise the eyebrows that you refuse to shave off at the mere suggestion of it? And as your deceased cat is given a lavish funeral before being embalmed and mummified and lovingly placed in a tomb with cream and mice for the afterlife, you would protest. After all, you probably didn't regard your feline companion as a deity (much to the chagrin of your cat), and these rituals would feel meaningless...even offensive.</div>
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Some of the ultra-Orthodox in Israel also claim that their way of life commemorates those killed in the Holocaust. They continue to live just as they lived in Eastern European shtetls before that world was wiped out of Europe, and at every moment, they are remembering and honoring the dead...but I can't help but wonder what that means as far as remembering and honoring the Jews who didn't live in Eastern European shtetls, such as the assimilated and cosmopolitan Jews who were killed simply for being Jewish, even if they looked and behaved like their non-Jewish counterparts. </div>
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And finally, Tisha b'Av, some opinions hold, is the official Jewish day of mourning, and the Holocaust, while horrific and still so fresh in the memory of the Jewish people, is just another tragic episode in Jewish history, like the destruction of the Temple. It's a hard argument for me to accept, especially if the destruction of the Temple is so far removed from our understanding of tragedy, while the entire world, Jewish and non-Jewish, is still reeling from the trauma and repercussions of the Holocaust. I was in tears all throughout the day on Yom HaShoah. I was feeling guilty for sitting in an Aroma cafe drinking Turkish coffees with my laptop open in front of me, researching and pondering how much Tisha b'Av should mean to me, on Tisha b'Av. But I don't see Judaism as a guilt-based religion, hence the lack of observance of something that I am ambivalent about. It's important to me to find a balance between meaning in my observances and rituals so it doesn't feel like hollow, just-go-through-the-steps tradition, but to also recognize the worth in engaging in such traditions and rituals as a Jewish person. The ex-atheist in me tells me to tread lightly and consider what my religious observances mean to me, and the newly spiritual side of me tells me not to shrug off observances that remind me of who I have chosen to be. I can keep kosher while I cook on Shabbat, drop f-bombs as though I suffer from Tourette Syndrome all throughout my pining for Jerusalem blog, and appreciate and value modesty while I love wearing fishnet stockings with heals and a mini-skirt. Not every Jew would agree with me, but I see nothing conflicting or contradictory in my behavior. I want to be Jewish, but I want to be Megan as a Jew, more specifically. If the day ever comes where it feels right to trade in my mini skirts for ankle-skirts, keep food on the hot plate on Shabbat and to clean out my filthy mouth, then I'll still be Megan as a Jew. But it has to feel right.</div>
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And of course, the subject of mourning for me as a convert is also complicated. A week before Tisha b'Av, was the one year anniversary of the death of my best friend from my childhood. When he passed away, quite suddenly and unexpectedly, I was in Jerusalem. I had been there for about a month and was living in the dorms at Hebrew University, exhausting myself in ulpan. I had few friends since I was one of a handful of students who were there for the whole summer, and it was months before I found my circle of friends at Pardes. I was also having trouble disengaging from some relationships that I left behind in the States. I was lonely and still settling into my new environment, still settling into my Jewish skin, and then suddenly, friends I had hardly spoken to since grade school were emailing me about Ryan's death. </div>
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I didn't mourn, not completely, anyway. I cried a bit, reminisced about my childhood, felt remorse for the reasons why we eventually drifted apart, unburied some dormant, unresolved issues from that time, contemplated my own mortality, panicked over the thought of wasting my life, second guessed everything I'd been doing for the last several years, and then cried some more. I didn't come to terms with any of it, though. I didn't know how to. So instead, I pushed it all away, shoved as many of the worms back into the can as I possibly could, and stared at Hebrew textbooks and flash cards until I thought my eyes would bleed. Somehow, a year passed, and the occasional sense of sadness that comes with loss would suddenly boil up to the surface, even as things improved for me, and I'd panic a bit and worry that everyone and everything I love might suddenly disappear from my life, and loss after loss from the whole year stacked up on themselves. Then I came back here. Another loss.</div>
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I am relatively ignorant when it comes to Jewish mourning. I haven't been faced with a close death in a Jewish community and my confusion over how to simply mourn someone even outside of a Jewish context, only makes it more difficult to wrap my head around. As the anniversary of my friend's death approached, I started to wonder what I should do; do Jews mourn non-Jews the same way they would mourn a Jew? How would I mourn my parents and other family members when the time comes? How would they mourn me? Will I be laid to rest in Israel? What about my Conservative conversion? What will the Rabbinate say about that? Will I be married and have kids? Will my grave be separate from them? Does Mom know that I shouldn't be cremated? What do I do?</div>
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After speaking on Skype with a teacher of mine from Jerusalem, I was comforted a bit to be told that, while such questions are big questions and are important, there are some satisfactory answers to them. It also became apparent that I obsessed over Jewish mourning rituals around the anniversary of my friend's death in place of actually mourning <i>him</i>, and coming to terms with his death and all of the things that his death had conjured up for me. "I'll visit his memorial," I told myself. It's been a few weeks. I can't bring myself to visit it, even though I know that I need to. Maybe confronting it in some concrete way will keep me from tearing the scabs off, and will finally allow some old wounds heal.</div>
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Which brings me to my final thought on mourning, rituals, and Tisha b'Av. Mourning a past that is only mine in a collective sense while I live in an exciting, miraculous, amazing time that allows a country like Israel to exist in a post-Temple destruction, post-exile, post-Holocaust world as a Jew who does not have the distinction of being born as such, feels...weird. Not weird like, "wow, you Jews are weird with your sack cloth and ashes, your fasting and sitting on the ground style of mourning...you guys wear black all the time, so isn't that, like, a symbol of mourning and stuff?" But it feels weird on a personal level. When I participated in the minor fasts like the Fast of Gedalia and the Fast of Esther, I did so because I was living in a Jewish environment where it felt enriching and meaningful to participate in such observances. But Tisha b'Av carries so much more weight with it, that I have to pause and consider what it means. It's certainly possible to glean meaning from Jewish holidays even if there is a bit of a disconnect between the actual thing it's based on and your life as you live it. Judaism is, after all, an ancient religion filled with codes and laws, and yet it has stood the test of time precisely because we are so hesitant to throw out the old and welcome in the new, redefining Jewishness and pushing boundaries that lead off into no man's land...or no Jew's land, as it were. That kind of attitude is a double edged sword; on the one hand, it means preservation of a people and its culture, but on the other hand, it means a lot of strife and clashing with the changing world, and the Jews who want to change with it while bringing Judaism with them as they go. Tisha b'Av, because of it's weightiness and because of it's association with mourning, and because of my disconnect between mourning and being observant, it feels weird for me.</div>
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In any case, Tisha b'Av isn't going anywhere any time soon, and hopefully, neither am I (except to Jerusalem, of course). Perhaps I'll have enough time on the planet to come to terms with the fact that, at this point in my life, I can't feel the meaning of Tisha b'Av in my soul, even if I try to translate the day into something personalized for me. So many things to come to terms with, so little time. Maybe all I'm really trying to say is...I've mourned so much lately, that adding a day of even existential sadness, is too much. I want to be happy that there is an Israel in this world, and I was there, rather than lament the many years of exile that seemed to destroy Israel altogether. That in itself, like the personal losses we can't get over, seems unbearable and impossible to come to terms with.</div>
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<br /></div>Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-12100020619996254112012-07-22T17:11:00.000-07:002012-07-22T20:08:42.467-07:00Nazis Caught in The Twilight ZoneSo, instead of writing fiction to smear all over my blog like a child smears feces on what would otherwise be a passable crayon sketch to put on the fridge (I still suck too much to show my fiction to the wide world, is what I'm trying to say), I've decided to climb out of my "why am I not in Israel, I'm going to die here, oh God!" mood for a bit and, you know. Live. And what would life be without good stories?<br />
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I love stories. It's safe to say that I'm probably addicted to them. Whether it's books, movies, history, poems, songs, people with interesting lives or thoughts, the crazy guy on the street corner, my own bizarre, half-cocked ideas and fantasies, or even television, I love stories. Sometimes I make up stories about people's lives when I don't know much about them, just because it makes the ho-hum moments of the typical day a little more interesting. Sitting next to a weirdo who won't stop talking to you about God knows what on your morning bus route? Well, what if that weirdo was really an undercover agent playing up his cover to blend into the type of scenery we commoners expect on a city bus, such as the typical weirdos who won't leave us alone, no matter how far we shove our noses into our books or how loud we crank up the volume on our iPods? Well, what if he was a secret agent on some sort of risky, confidential mission that only people in the higher echelons of politics and crime know about? What if he knows all the things that conspiracy theorists have wet dreams over, and he's just in disguise because he has to keep his holy-shit-worthy knowledge to himself until he gets paid a gajillion dollars to get that information into the right hands?<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-mrwrA8y9hXo/UAkn-Y4Fh2I/AAAAAAAABRI/7sDd_unLB7I/s1600/val.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="414" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-mrwrA8y9hXo/UAkn-Y4Fh2I/AAAAAAAABRI/7sDd_unLB7I/s640/val.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">You know, like Val Kilmer in<i> The Saint</i>.</td></tr>
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This scenario gets weird and borderline creepy if you let it run away with you, and you have to remember that the smelly meth-head on the bus is, well, just a smelly meth-head on the bus...as boring as that is.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">But what if...okay, just hear me out. What if the meth-head <i>was</i> like Val Kilmer in <i>The Saint</i>, and you're totally missing your chance to be his Elisabeth Shue love interest? What if?</td></tr>
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Bizarrely placed day-to-day fantasies aside (seriously, I might have an undiagnosed psychological issue or tumor, so if you don't do this kind elaborate and extensive daydreaming in your daily life, you're totally normal and healthy, and probably function much better than I do), I do love me some stories. And lately, I've been getting into the stories of <i>The</i> <i>Twilight Zone</i>.<br />
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Yeah, that's right. <i>The Twilight Zone</i>. The late 1950s-mid-1960s television show about all things creepy and bizarre. The paranormal, sci-fi, post-apocalyptic world scenarios (we were in the throes of the Cold War then, after all), mind over matter, life after death, missing time, and that creepy motherfucker that William Shatner saw out on the wing of the plane, all have their special place in the stories of this beloved classic television series, and in our psyches.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0-b6ZpApoHc/UAku7Lr7btI/AAAAAAAABRc/ShRzQe_4MwE/s1600/nightmare.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="502" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0-b6ZpApoHc/UAku7Lr7btI/AAAAAAAABRc/ShRzQe_4MwE/s640/nightmare.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Seriously, WHAT THE FUCK?</td></tr>
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But what I really love about <i>The Twilight Zone,</i> is not just that it can legitimately give its viewers the creeps 40+ years after its airing, long before our culture decided to dive off the deep end of the creep factor and into the gratuitous gross-out, sociopathic, depraved cheapness that are movies such as <i>Hostel</i>, <i>The Human Centipede</i>, and other over the top cinematic crap that I refuse to waste a second of my life indulging in. (Yes, I have an opinion about those movies, and I've never seen them. When a movie or story is known more for its reputation of ickiness rather than what it actually is, like say, <i>American Psycho</i>, which I have seen and don't care to read, then I think I can skip the hour and a half of mindless brutality masquerading as something deep and profound, and get right to the judgment and condemnation part of the movie-going experience). No, what I love most about <i>The Twilight Zone</i>, is that it goes into the depths of the human psyche and explores our fears, emotions, memories we'd rather forget, and really, the darkest parts of our humanity--the things that, for better or worse, make us human. It does a damn good job of doing this, too. It's impressive that a show dating back to the infancy of a new storytelling medium, the television, can so consistently and successfully examine difficult human experiences and emotions in both a nuanced and bizarre fashion. Or maybe not. Perhaps I give modern television too much credit. While there are some good series out there today, so much airtime is dominated by the never-ending stream of "reality" television shows that basically have millions of viewers watching to see who will fuck who at the end of (or during) whatever stupid competition they are involved in. Seriously, these shows are all an elaborate mating ritual for us to watch like a bunch of voyeurs who forgot that you can just as easily access free porn on the internet, and get to the final outcome of the show's premise, and in more detail to boot. The existence of these shows are only here to feed us a sad slice of the crap pie that we've made of our pop-culture. It's all so hollow. </div>
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So the other night, while I was staying up way too late yet again, I was looking through the premises of the <i>Twilight Zone</i> episodes available on Netflix, and came across the one called "Death's Head Re-visited." This episode is not quite like the other episodes, at least for me and probably many other Jews, because of it's subject matter: the Holocaust.</div>
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"Death's Head Revisited" was written and aired in 1961, during the infamous Eichman Trial. In the story, a former SS officer returns to the Fatherland from his exile in South America, convinced that enough time has passed for him to return and wax nostalgic over his days as a brutal officer at Dachau during WWII. The officer, Gunther Lutze, checks into a local inn and the woman at the front counter is clearly shaken by his presence. She reluctantly admits to him, after he intimidates her, that he reminds her of an SS officer from the war, as the SS commonly used to stay at the inn. Lutze insists that he was battling on the Russian front during the war, and she must have him mistaken for someone else. Still, clearly getting off on her obvious fear of him, he implies rather heavily that he is that former SS soldier that she suspects him to be, but what is she going to do about it?</div>
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Lutze decides to go to the Dachau camp to revisit his glory days of absolute power. A true sadist, Lutze wanders about the ruins of the camp, and reminisces fondly of hangings, denying water to a dehydrated man begging on his knees, and rousing exhausted prisoners from their slumber early in the morning in freezing temperatures to go outside into the snow and do "some exercises." The imagery used during Lutze's recollection of the days from the war are quite convincing. By this time, seventeen years after the end of the WWII, the world knew what those death camps looked like, and what the prisoners suffered through within their walls and electrified fences. It's somewhat alarming to see it in the context of a <i>Twilight Zone</i> episode.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lutze imagines his victims as they were in their last moments.</td></tr>
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Then Lutze encounters a familiar face when a former inmate, still clad in his striped prisoner's garb, shows up. They discuss the war and the past a bit, with Lutze nonchalantly considering the past to be nothing terribly offensive, that a few silly mistakes were committed, and of course, he was only following orders, just like any good soldier would. The man from his past, Alfred Becker, is calm in his demeanor...as calm as the dead. He reminds Lutze that ten million human lives were extinguished in the camps and that the tortures and inhumane evils they were subjected to are a bottomless pit of human depravity and injustice. When Becker informs Lutze that he's there to be put on trial, and Lutze suddenly remembers that Becker was among the many victims killed by his brutality, he panics and tries to leave. The Dachau gates close; Lutze can't leave, because you see, he is to be put on trial for crimes against humanity by the very people he tortured and killed. </div>
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Lutze, of course, flips out. But there's nothing he can do, and within the blink of an eye he finds himself on the floor of one of Dachau's bunkers. As he looks up, the camera lingers on his horrified expression before revealing to the audience what he sees:<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lutze's jury</td></tr>
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Gripped with panic, Lutze attempts to plead his case ("Let me go! This is inhumane! I was following orders!"). He tries frantically to escape while Becker reads from a list of charges, all that Lutze is on trial for. He numbers the murders, the tortures and the human experiments while the faces of the victims look on solemnly and hauntingly real. Lutze begins to scream in protest as Becker continues to read, almost drowned completely out by Lutze. His screams are so piercing, so convincing, that there's an uncomfortable moment as the viewer, where you almost feel sorry for him. Almost: "What, feel sorry for a Nazi? What's wrong with me?" But that's the point: most of us, I like to think, have a heart, and naturally deplore the sound of the tortured screams of another human being. And yet there's some satisfaction in it as well, because we know what kind of man Lutze is. Many like him got away with murder and so much more after the war, and were never brought to trial. This realization makes the whole story that much more compelling. Lutze, of course, has no remorse for his actions. The remorse he feels comes from being caught and to face punishment for what he really knows was beyond wrong.</div>
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Lutze passes out, and when he comes to, only Becker is there. Lutze begins to run all over the camp like a wild animal caught in a cage, while Becker reads him his sentence: a lifetime of insanity. What's more, is that he can feel the pain he has inflicted upon his victims; he feels the bullets that pierced their bodies, he feels the fear that gripped them and he feels the torment of the medical experiments. He writhes and screams while Becker tells him, "This is not hatred. This is retribution. This is not revenge. This is justice. But this is only the beginning, Captain. Only the beginning. Your final judgment will come from God." </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lutze writhing in pain while Becker looks on.</td></tr>
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At the end of the episode Lutze is found on the grounds of the Dachau camp and has to be sedated before they take him away to a sanitarium. Meanwhile, doctors try to understand what could make a man unravel so quickly. As they stand in the Dachau ruins, the doctor wonders aloud, why Dachau is still standing. The innkeeper from the beginning also mentions wanting to burn the place to the ground. In Rod Serling's closing monologue, he states, "There is an answer to the doctor's question. All the Dachaus must remain standing. The Dachaus, the Belsens, the Buchenwalds, the Auschwitzes - all of them. They must remain standing because they are a monument to a moment in time when some men decided to turn the Earth into a graveyard. Into it they shoveled all of their reason, their logic, their knowledge, but worst of all their conscience. And the moment we forget this, the moment we cease to be haunted by its remembrance, then we become the gravediggers. Something to dwell on and to remember, not only in the Twilight Zone but wherever men walk God's Earth."</div>
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I sometimes have a difficult time with anything revolving around the Holocaust. I've never completely explored Yad Vashem despite my year in Jerusalem; one walk through the Children's Memorial after visiting other parts of the museum knocked my spirits too low to continue through the rest of the place. I attended only half of the day of classes at Pardes on Yom HaShoah, knowing that there is only so much I can stomach. I am consistently disappointed in, and sometimes disgusted with Holocaust movies. I have accepted that Hollywood is not in the business of telling historical truths or striving for accuracy, nor should it be. And I am, for some reason, more receptive to theater productions that touch on the Holocaust. But most movies, no matter how well-made and well-acted <i>The Pianist</i> is, no matter how sensitive and respectful <i>Schindler's List</i> is, I just can't watch them with any sort of cathartic satisfaction. What actually happened is too awful for me to wrap my head around, so watching a movie about it seems ultimately absurd.</div>
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But I do also recognize that people tell stories, whether through cinema, stage, music, text, or conversation, to try to understand, analyse, describe and express the wide variety of human experiences and emotions. We're complicated, we do complicated things for complicated reasons, and we don't always fully understand why. And yet, isn't that what people are always trying to answer? Who, what, when, where and how are easy enough most cases. It's the why that we understand the least, but try so hard to. </div>
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I was really surprised by and impressed with "Death's Head Revisited," perhaps because it doesn't ask why. It's simply the story of a sadistic brute who thought he got away with murder a thousand times over, but was ultimately caught, tried, judged and punished. That is satisfying catharsis. I had the same feeling, (but a bit more exhilarated), when I watched <i>Inglorious Basterds</i> (the many times I've watched it). Sometimes, I just want to see Hitler get his face blown to bits by a machine gun, and clap my hands in triumph over a theater full of Nazis exploding. Sure, it sounds awful, but hey, I'm human. We can be pretty awful. Better to satisfy that desire for revenge via fantasy and storytelling, especially when feeling so powerless. Revenge stories help us cope. We get to imagine taking down evil and bringing it to justice. It's great a story, and we tell it over and over again. </div>
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Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some more stories to watch, read and listen to. I'm always living my story, so I might as well escape from it for a bit and tell myself another one. Storytelling and fantasizing, if you do it well, can be rather illuminating and thought provoking, after all.</div>
</div>Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-64263246583951304242012-06-30T19:52:00.002-07:002012-06-30T22:50:30.763-07:00Still Lost in Jerusalem...It's bizarre to physically be in one place, and the rest of you in another. As new problems, revelations and uncertainties arise, I've become single-minded in my focus to get back to Jerusalem, and it has become an all-consuming obsession. Sometimes I think I'm running away from something. Sometimes, I think I'm running towards something. In either case, as things currently stand, I'm running in place. I'm sure I'm not the first or last young Jew to fall in love with Jerusalem only to be brokenhearted by forced separation from her, but for those of us who have experienced it, we know that one may fall in love dozens of times throughout an entire lifetime, but Jerusalem is the love that takes your breath and your heart away. I'm just not the same person now.<br />
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People spend years deciding and carefully planning on moving to a foreign country, permanently. Me? I dive in head first with reckless abandon. My impulsive nature has caught up with me and my recognition of it has had no effect on alleviating my desire to go back to Jerusalem. Start over. Begin a new chapter. The current story arc has become tiresome.<br />
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So, while my days are pretty much the same, and my mind is set on one, single goal, I've decided to escape for a while from this...whatever this is that I'm doing in this blog, and wander off into the land of fiction. I used to be a daydreamer, so it shouldn't be too hard to conjure up that old behavior again, and put it to use with my writing. Fiction is not something that I do all that often, so I'm terribly rusty, but I need to put my mind somewhere else for a while before I snap, and I might as well throw it onto this blog. So, it's story time, folks. Stay tuned...Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-16664913500849287872012-06-17T01:16:00.000-07:002012-06-17T02:19:06.671-07:00Losing My ReligionTwo weeks have passed since I said goodbye to Jerusalem and hello to an old familiar foe, Medford, Oregon. The job hunt continues, and the sudden realization of how far away the nearest shul is, a mere ten miles, seems as though it might as well be a thousand miles, considering my lack of mobility. The only kosher meat I can find here are the Hebrew National Franks in the supermarket, and believe me, I know from experience that those get old really quickly. Israel is practically another planet, and I feel like an alien that has been away to see what's on the other side of the galaxy, and has forgotten what the home world is like. The air is different. The sun doesn't even shine the same way here. And then, of course, I've always felt a bit out of place here. The memories of those feelings are still with me, and every time I walk down a familiar path from my past, those memories rise up to the surface of my psyche and overwhelm me.<br />
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But I'm not a teenager anymore and I've changed considerably in the eight years it has been since I've lived here. There is some comfort in this realization, but still; old habits die hard, and instead of sticking with the positive attitude that I have been cultivating to guide me through the challenge of living a Jewish existence on a non-Jewish planet, my old friends from the past, good old Self Doubt and Despair, have shown up on my doorstep, and they have been overstaying their welcome. But since they are old friends, just because they have been around for so long and we know each other so well, I've been having a hard time telling them to go away and leave me alone. This was me before Judaism. This is miserable me.<br />
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It would be easy to blame the environment that I find myself in for my sudden regression but I share a good part of the blame as well. It would appear that my old habit of sitting and staying stuck with a bewildered sense not knowing what to do, so I'll do nothing, has never really left me. I don't think people every really break old habits. I think they're always there, lying dormant, and once something triggers them to wake up again, getting them to go back to their slumber takes a monumental, single-minded effort. There it is again, that old habit staring you in the face, while you're trying to sleep or get the motivation to get up and out of the house. "Hello," it says to you in a mocking tone. "You didn't really think you broke me, did you?" So, here they are; Old Habits, Self-Doubt and Despair are sitting here with me right now as I write this, just hovering. How annoying.<br />
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During these last two weeks, I've exhausted myself looking for a job (I've submitted dozens of applications) and making a concrete plan for my return to Jerusalem. It's been all-consuming, and with each day that passes that I remain unemployed, my already overactive anxiety level amps itself to such a degree that my stomach gets tied up in knots, and I find myself perusing my mother's wine rack once again. Not too surprisingly, somewhere in the middle of this stressful mess, I've been slowly losing my grip on my Jewishness. You see, the plan for my Jewish survival this summer, was to daven twice a day, every day, always light Shabbat candles, always say kiddush and hamotzi over challah and to make sincere efforts to make it to shul at least once in a while, even if that means breaking some of my Shabbat observances, such as paying money for transportation (though there were more than a few times last year when I lived on French Hill when I had to choose between a Shabbat meal at someone's home, or not paying money for a cab and instead, sitting in my dorm, gazing gloomily at the flickering lights of my Shabbat candles, all alone. Needless to say, I always opted for the meal and paid for the cab, of course). The plan has been...well, discarded, for lack of a better term. Today was the first day that I davened mincha, realizing that I was giving up on the challenge of being a one-Jew army until I can be reunited with the tribe. I had no Shabbat dinner the night before, I hadn't lit candles, and no blessings were recited over anything. I am not proud of this, and it bothers me that I put forth such little effort in keeping my Judaism thriving even when out of its element, but I think the most shameful thing I did this Shabbat, was do something that I would consider work, and davening the weekday mincha...because I actually forgot it was Shabbat.<br />
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Now, I'm not entirely a halakhic Jew. Far from it. But I am observant in many ways that are meaningful for me, and not working on Shabbat is about as basic as it gets when it comes to Jewish observance. The "work" that I did this Shabbat, was for the sake of a precious job interview at the mall, buying people's unwanted jewelry for cash. At a lonely kiosk in the middle of the mall, I underwent a one and a half hour interview process, a large chunk of which required me to hand out fliers to passersby, awkwardly asking them in they wanted to sell me their jewelry. As I bugged people walking by the kiosk, getting tongue tied as I'm prone to do and having a hard time hiding my complete lack of enthusiasm for what I was supposed to be getting them enthusiastic for, I started to have unpleasant flashbacks of my past mall jobs, trying to sell people things they don't need, or possibly even want. I hate this kind of job, because if there is one thing I am not, it's a salesman. So when I found myself saying, in my too quiet voice, "Hi, how are you? Do you have any broken or unwanted jewelry that you'd like to sell to us for cash?" what I appeared to be saying, considering my overall demeanor, is this: "Hi, how are you? Yeah, I don't care. Look, we'll give you cash if you have unwanted jewelry to sell us, but then again, you can read the sign above our kiosk, and I'm probably annoying the hell out of you by being one of those people who get paid to pester other people until we find the rare person who is actually interested in what I'm pitching to them. In fact, I'm annoying myself right now. Just take the flyer, please? The guy who might hire me is watching and he says these fliers fulfill a quota. Yes, I know I'm awkward and I just told you that we'll take your cash for unwanted and broken jewelry and it's kind of funny, but I feel ridiculous. I'm no good at this, but I need a job. I didn't leave Jerusalem to come here and buy jewelry off of people from a mall kiosk...I want to go home." That's the general vibe I believe I gave off. I tried to fake my attitude, but I'm not a good actor, either. I have the unfortunate "blush intensely when you're nervous and uncomfortable" gene, along with a tendency to get tongue tied when I'm forced to speak to absolute strangers who I have no interest in speaking with, whatsoever. I'll find out on Monday if I get the pleasure of actually getting paid to recreate this awkward scene for hours at a time. Pray for me, will you?<br />
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After coming home and taking a nap and glaring at the walls of my bedroom, resenting them for not being the walls of my bedroom in Jerusalem, I distracted myself from my bad mood by reading a book with a cup of coffee outside in the waning sun. "I need to daven," a tiny voice suddenly said to me, and I realized it had been two weeks since I had. I got my siddur from my bookcase, went out into the back yard, faced East, and began praying. It felt good, and I took my time, lingering over the Hebrew words, enjoying the sound of my voice whispering the holy tongue, feeling nostalgic for Jerusalem. I thought of davening in the beit midrash at Pardes with an actual minyan, taking a pause from a long morning of studying chumash or mishna, just before lunch. I reminisced of the time I was on a tiyul to the Golan Heights, and our bus pulled over to the side of the road so we could daven in the parking lot of a closed cafe, the setting sun coloring the sky with such vibrant pinks and oranges, you felt like God was right there in that beautiful atmosphere, looking straight at you as you stood there with your siddur open, rocking gently back and forth in prayer. And then there was the time we had Kabbalat Shabbat services on the roof of a hostel during a tiyul to the Galilee against the backdrop of the sun setting over the sea, where I had just been happily wrestling with the forceful waves, letting them knock me over and buoy me back up again, without a care in the world. It was a good feeling, and I wondered why I had allowed myself to be so distracted with everything else to the point of forgetting this meaningful feeling. Taking a moment out of the day to just center yourself and reconnect with your spiritual side helps make life so much more bearable. I had been needing to do this.<br />
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...then I had this thought, right in the middle of the Shemonah Esrei: "Oh shit, it's Shabbat. I'm doing the weekday mincha! Oh, I just said "shit" in my head during the Shemonah Esrei! Sorry, God..." Nothing breaks your concentration and snaps you out of a moment quite like realizing that you're doing something of immense importance to you the wrong way, because in your laziness, <i>you actually forgot how to do it</i>.<br />
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So, I did what any person slipping away from their faith would do; hitbodedut. For those of you who are unfamiliar with this practice, it has its roots in Chasidism, and simply put, requires one to go off into nature (if possible) and talk directly to God. "We need to talk, don't we?" I said, as I closed my siddur on the wrong page. "Okay. Let's go to the park."<br />
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Hitbodedut may be a highly unstructured form prayer in a religion that has just about everything structured, but it never the less, I think, fills a void for those of us who have trouble leading a structured life. There's also something so biblical about it. This is how Abraham, Sara, Jacob, Moses and, well, everyone in the Tanakh prayed to God. There's something profound in its casualness, something comforting in its nonchalance. I am not going to lie: I could spend hours practicing hitbodedut when I'm feeling particularly troubled or confused. I always come out of it with a clearer head, and a feeling of being rebooted. It would be easy to be cynical and say, "well, you're just talking your problems out to yourself..." In a way, that's true. I have, in the past, talked to myself in a very earnest, serious manner, as if there were someone else in the room with me. One summer, when things were really bad and life was stuck in a horrid, never ending phase of confusing transition, I had some very insightful one-sided conversations with my cat. But there is something different about addressing God, and being removed from your usual environment. While the park down the street from my parent's house isn't exactly remote, it is nice and green and has a beautiful view of the mountains surrounding the valley that this town is situated in. In fact, I didn't even wait until I got to the park to start talking; I talked the whole way there, strolling through the 'anywhere in suburbia' streets. I might have looked a bit crazy, but hey, I used to talk to my cat. But so does the lovable Jon in the Garfield comics! Of course...my conversations looked more like ones with Realfield than the witty, lasagna loving Garfield...<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Come to think of it, maybe Jon just imagines Garfield to be witty, and he's a lonely, crazy weirdo with a typical cat...</td></tr>
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In any case, I got to the park, lay down in the middle of an unoccupied soccer field, stared at the sky and gazed at the mountains, and talked to God. When I walked away, I felt more centered, more grounded, more inspired to keep my Judaism ever-present in my life, no matter where in the world I might find myself...even in the town that fills my mind to the brim with memories of my angst-ridden youth, without even one synagogue, and a Jewish community that is so small and quiet, I don't even think they exist. No, it's not like living in Israel, let alone Jerusalem, but what in the world is?<br />
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On the bright side of this conundrum, I do have a mother that goes out of her way to make sure there's something I can eat at dinner with the family that isn't treyf, who found me a chanukiah so I'd have something Jewish to decorate my room with, and there is a store here that sells challah. The guy at the kiosk in the mall told me that if he were to hire me it would be no problem to work me into a schedule where I'd never work on Shabbat, and I have a Skype date with my former Hebrew professor who has graciously offered to converse with me through the summer to keep my Hebrew from slipping into oblivion. And I finally got around to chastising myself for feeling like I live under impossible circumstances to practice Judaism, when Jewish history is full of Jews defying much more tragic circumstances than I can even fathom to keep their Jewish identity intact, and Jewish tradition alive. If the starving can find matzah for Pesach in the hell of a ghetto, and if the dying can say their prayers all the way up their last moment of life in a death camp...well, then I suppose it's about time I got some perspective. Besides, if absence makes the heart grow fonder, then that will only make the homecoming all the more sweeter, whenever I find myself back home, in my beloved Jerusalem.<br />
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Now, if you'll excuse me, I must go show Old Habits, Self Doubt and Despair to the door. They were never good friends, anyway.<br />
<br />Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-86862596760935356942012-06-07T22:28:00.003-07:002012-06-07T22:28:46.111-07:00This Isn't Goodbye, Jerusalem! This is See You Later.Well, I'm no longer lost in Jerusalem, the most interesting, intense and unique place to have the pleasure of being lost in. I'm now lost just somewhere in the vast world. Two full days of travel without sleep, three airplanes, and one jetlagged day later, I have found myself sitting in my robe at my parent's place, by myself, surfing Craigslist for a job, and drinking cup after cup of coffee. Talk about feeling lost.<br />
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Looking out the window at a grey, rainy Oregon sky is like looking out at a different planet. Where is the clear, blue summer sky? The tree-lined Rechaviya streets? The white stone buildings? Where is my beloved Jerusalem? Did I really say goodbye to all that I've grown to love over this past year just a few short days ago? Wasn't I just praying at the Kotel, tears streaming down my face, feeling that I was saying goodbye to God Himself, unplugging from the vibrant Jewish life that I've been so blessed to live?<br />
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Perhaps I am coming off as overly dramatic, but as anyone who has left Israel will tell you, it's impossible to leave and feel that you haven't left a significant piece of yourself behind. As my plane lifted off the ground, I began sobbing, my face buried in my hands, hiding behind a curtain of my disheveled hair. "Not yet!" my mind screamed. "I don't want to go! Israel...you're breaking my heart."<br />
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Saying goodbye and simply letting go when it is time to doesn't come easily to most people, even when you know that you'll be back one day. With me, there's that tiny, but insistent voice in my head saying, "but what if something happens? What if nothing goes according to plan? Remember last year? Remember how your plan didn't work out at all?" It's a manipulative little voice because on the one hand, it's telling the truth; last year didn't go according to plan at all. However on the other hand, the plan was nowhere near as good as what took its place, so why should I fret over having a few curve balls pitched at me, and encountering unexpected twists and turns along the way? Somehow, things always end up working out in the end, and that's exactly what happened over my year in Israel. It's like God dumped a jigsaw puzzle into my life, and told me to just start assembling it: "Here, Megan. None of this makes sense right now, but just keep working on it. It will come together in the end, no matter how frustrated and defeated you feel. Just keep putting the pieces together." So I did. I like the bigger picture that I ended up with.<br />
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For someone who has said many permanent goodbyes, a fair share of them not on good terms, I'm sorry to say, you would think that I'd be used to it by now. Some things, I think, you never get used to. The best you can do is cope, until time takes some of the pain away. While I have a plan to return to Israel in the fall, plenty of obstacles remain in my way, most of them financial, so it's difficult to believe myself when I say, "yihyeh besder." I like to think that some of that Israeli nonchalance has rubbed off on me. Instead, the Israeli impatience seems to have stuck the most, which isn't surprising, given my own natural tendency to be incapable of just relaxing and taking things as they come.<br />
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So how do we do it? How do we say goodbye before we're ready, deal with transition and uncertainty, let go when we don't want to and somehow remember to be present and to enjoy the things that we've got going for us right now? It's a challenge. Right now I'm just having trouble resisting the urge to say "todah" instead of "thank you," "shalom" instead of "hello," and "slicha," instead of "excuse me." But never the less, I propose the following to other sad souls such as myself who are also mourning the end of their time in Israel and all the things that are suddenly missing from day to day life, whatever our future plans might be. Hopefully it helps, and hopefully, I can take my own advice.<br />
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<b>1. On Goodbyes:</b><br />
Everybody hates them. They're one of the most difficult and sad facts of life. Perhaps there's someone very near and dear to you, someone who has made your life better in some way by being in it, someone who you've gotten used to not being too far away from, their physical presence comforting. After the goodbye, you feel a piece of you tear away, and the sudden lack of their presence is glaringly noticeable. It's easy to think that there's a void in your life now where that person used to be, but really, you're just missing them. It's normal. There isn't really a gaping hole right in the middle of your soul. People can't (or shouldn't) fill voids for you, because for one, that's an awful lot of unfair pressure to put on someone just so they can meet your needs, and two, people always go away. It's inevitable--you are a completely separate entity with your own life to live. They've got their path, you've got yours. Some goodbyes aren't permanent, but rather, more of a "see you later," really. You usually know when those goodbyes happen. Those people make the effort to walk back into your life again someday, if even for a visit. And the goodbyes that are forever? You learn to live without people, because human beings are adaptable creatures. We can suffer a tremendous amount of loss, and still live life, even happily.<br />
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Saying goodbye to a place can be just as hard, especially to a place like Israel, and even more so, a place like Jerusalem. The significance of it in many people's lives, certainly in mine, is massive. It's like saying goodbye to a person, a loved one, or a cherished lover that you don't want to let go of. But you're not Israel's only lover, and she's collected many lovestruck Jews who have found home in her embrace. A goodbye to Israel definitely does not have to be for good. She'll be there, waiting for you, for however long it takes to be reunited.<br />
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<b>2. On Transition and Uncertainty:</b><br />
Welcome to life, where nothing is guaranteed except that it will eventually end. Sure, many people do settle down and live stable lives, but life is still full of transition and it cycles through different stages. And most things are uncertain. How dull would it be if they weren't? Wouldn't you rather feel anticipation than be bored to tears with predictability? I know I complain and agonize far too much about living in constant flux and uncertainty of how it will all turn out. But what I wouldn't want, what I wouldn't enjoy at all, would be knowing what happens before it happens. You know how people get pissed off when someone gives away the ending of a book or movie? That's because you want to experience it for yourself. Yes, there's the journey along the way, but we want to experience the whole story. And as we all know, the best stories are filled with action, drama, character development, and a good plot. You can't make a story without the tension of transition and uncertainty...not a good one, anyway.<br />
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<b>3. On Letting Go:</b><br />
This one...this one is the worst for me. When I find something that makes me happy or content, I don't want to let go of it for fear that I'll never get it back. When you're attached to things and people without an existential infrastructure in your life, letting go can be a huge blow to your happiness and well-being. This goes hand in hand with the goodbye, but it's deeper than that. It requires you to not be consumed with missing that which you had to say goodbye to. It requires you to be able to be okay with the goodbye. This is difficult, because there's also a catch: you have to train yourself to let go. Sometimes, you cling and hang on as a reflex. You can even recognize that you<i> need</i> to let go, and you <i>want</i> to, but you simply do not know how. It's tricky, but it can be done. Which brings me to the next issue.<br />
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<b>4. On Being Present:</b><br />
Dwelling in the past and yearning for the way things were before the tearful goodbyes and dreaming of a hopeful future where you are reunited with all the things that you're missing is an easy trap to fall into. It's not the same as fondly reminiscing, or indulging in a healthy dose of fantasy. Rather, it's miserable, and very counterproductive, trapping you in an endless loop of torturing yourself over the way things aren't at the current moment. To escape this hell, keeping yourself busy and occupied is worthwhile. Yep, that's right; distract yourself. Eventually, you'll realize that your life isn't so bad, and you can live it anywhere you find yourself, and with lots of people who show up in it. If you're successful, letting go should come next, because dwelling is a massive part of what makes it so hard to let go. Believe me, I know; I struggle with this constantly.<br />
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I want to lose myself in Jerusalem again, and only several days have passed since my departure. The goodbyes still sting, the uncertainty and transitions are consuming my every thought, I'm still attempting to loosen my grip on all the things I don't want to let go of, and I'm anywhere but present. It's a good thing that so few things in life are permanent and unchangeable, otherwise, I'd be really depressed right now. Instead, I'll just keep saying, "yihyeh beseder" each day, and before I know it, it will be. In fact, it already is. I just need to allow my heart to catch up to my head so I can feel it and think it at the same time.Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-79902035481356730562012-05-27T16:26:00.002-07:002012-05-28T15:36:40.654-07:00Shavuot: An Inspiration For Converts<br />
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<span style="line-height: 24px;">Now that Shavuot has come to an end (well, for those of us in Israel, anyway), the complete cycle of my first year as a Jew has also drawn to a close. I have been fortunate enough to have my first experiences as a Jew with every one of our holidays in the Holy Land, which is really something special. Not every new Jew gets to jump on an El Al flight just weeks after conversion to live in Jerusalem. I guess there's no better way to make sure that you've joined the correct tribe than to live among the natives.</span></div>
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Shavuot holds a special place in my heart. It may not be as fun as Purim is, what with all its booze, encouraged public drunkenness, costumes and acting a fool in shul by blotting out Hamon's name as we recount the story of Esther. It may not be as profound as Yom Kippur, when we fast the day away, admit to our flaws and sins, and seek forgiveness from everyone we've wronged and from the King of Kings Himself, wiping the slate clean for another year. It may not be as significant and grandiose as Pesach, as we recount the story of overcoming slavery with the guidance of the hand of the divine over our chametz-free seder tables. And it's certainly not as odd and quirky as Succot, as we dwell in Sukkahs out in our yards or on our patios, shaking the four species in all cardinal directions (during my conversion, as I was discussing the difficulty of explaining Jewish practices to the people in my life who were wondering just what kind of people I've joined, an Orthodox rabbi friend of mine told me, "Just wait until you get to Succot. Invite them over for dinner in the little hut that you've built out in your driveway while you shake a bundle of branches and a citron around, and they'll think you've joined some bizarre cult)." But Shavuot has all of the aspects I look for in a chag: all night text study on a caffeine buzz with my fellow Jews, lots of dairy foods, including the heavenly taste of cheesecake, and the recounting of the story of Ruth. As a convert, I identity with and look up to the Moabite lady-turned Jewish. They said it couldn't (shouldn't?) be done, but Ruth defied the status quo, transcended ethnic and religious boundaries, and provided part of the lineage of the glorious Kind David. And of course, Shavuot commemorates the giving of the Torah--God's gift to the Jews.</div>
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With all of this text study and deep consideration of Torah, Shavuot certainly does inspire a multitude of philosophical questions and analytical discussion on all things Jewish. And since the wheels in my head are constantly turning with the momentum of a gushing stream of thoughts and questions about the nature of Judaism and where the Megan-shaped piece of the puzzle fits in to it, Shavuot just feeds my need to understand, to analyze, to question, to discover, to ponder--all done over copious amounts of coffee; all in all, it's a chag that pats me on the back for being neurotic and obsessive. The validation is comforting.</div>
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Just a few short months ago, I found myself agonizing over the realization of just how complex simply being Jewish is in the modern world, especially in terms of conversion. Nightmares, insomnia, anxiety and tears all plagued me as I considered the possibility of going through another conversion and what that would mean about the way I feel about my Jewishness currently. It's not as though I wasn't aware that a Conservative conversion just isn't going to cut it for some, but when I started to consider where I'd ultimately like to make my home in the world, and where I'd like to rest my bones once this crazy ride called life is over, I started to feel anxious about status as a Jew. Could I make aliyah one day? Can I have a Jewish wedding that will be universally recognized as legitimate? What if I have kids? What about when I die? And furthermore, what do you mean I'm not Jewish?! You might as well say that I'm not Megan.</div>
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So I suppose it's appropriate that we ask, for whom was the Torah intended? If Torah is God's gift to the Jewish people, and we are currently living in an unprecedented historical era where the question of who is a Jew has become more complicated than ever before, where does that leave our beloved Torah? If I can claim the the Torah belongs to me just as much as it belongs to any Jew by birth, even when there are plenty among those who I consider to be my fellow Jews who would not consider me legitimately one of them, then isn't that a good thing? We may be a non-proselytizing people, and we know that righteous gentiles are included in the World to Come (which is why I believe Judaism to be inclusive on a human scale, not exclusive for our distinction of being chosen), but surely there is something to those of us who want and believe that we are intended to play a role in this world as Jews. After all, Ruth had this realization about herself, and that seemed to work out rather well, right?</div>
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Perhaps there is something inherently weird and ultimately paradoxical about the concept of "choosing to be chosen," but I personally think it's a matter of perspective. My understanding of my own Jewish destiny is that I started down a path at a particular point in my life, and after many twists and turns, I found myself in Judaism. I didn't so much become a Jew by choice, as I chose to embrace who I'd become, which ultimately meant being Jewish and living my life as such. Also, I don't believe that God chose the Jewish people over any other people on the earth other than to play a particular role in this existence. If I'm going to meet up with my gentile family in the World to Come because they get a piece of God's glory in the end too, and if I understand that as a Jew, I'm obligated in my humility to not mistreat others, including the gentiles, the converts, the widowed, the orphaned, the poor, and my fellow Jews as well, then that says something to me about the nature of choice. Choosing an action over another one includes more than just the action; it includes accepting the subsequent consequences that action as well, whatever they may be. And since we are beings of free will, both blessed and cursed with the ability to choose, then I chose to embrace this life as a Jew, knowing that it can be a very complicated existence. It's up to God whether He chose me or not, but He chose me for something, just as He chooses every soul for something, otherwise we wouldn't be here. What we do with the divine gift of our lives, is up to us.</div>
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As I walked home this morning from the Old City after Shacharit at the Kotel, my exhausted mind reflected on my all night study marathon, and my stream of consciousness looked something like this (mind you, it was about 6:30 in the morning): "I'm so hungry; I have to get home; Wow, that was so cool, all of us at the Kotel at sunrise; I'm so happy with life right now; I want more cheesecake; Angels, humans and God--divinity and flaw, divinity within flaw...hmmm...; I can't wait until I can write down what that rabbi said at his shiur; I'm so happy that I became Jewish...hey. I'm in Jerusalem still. Wow." This is the state of mind of someone who is happy with the choices she has made.</div>
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Yes, I choose Shavuot as my favorite of all our chagim. Not because it's better or more important than the others; it's just special to me in the specific role that it plays for me in my life.</div>Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-18867199045286884762012-05-18T14:08:00.001-07:002012-07-25T19:55:30.553-07:00Tattoos and JewsFor most of the year that I've been in Israel, I've been careful to cover up a particularly shameful part of my body that doesn't lend itself to snius: my right upper arm.<br />
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Yes, you read that right. When my right upper arm is exposed for all the world to see, naked as the day it was when I was born, I feel embarrassed, disgraceful, indecent. "Don't look at me!" I want to yell, as though I've been caught masturbating. "This isn't for your eyes!"<br />
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This overly dramatic reaction is all thanks to my tattoo, and my stupid 18 year old self who consciously decided to permanently deface my body in a fit of youthful defiance. My upper arm is adorned with a Chinese dragon and the word "trust" in Chinese. Yep. White girl with a Chinese tattoo. And no, I don't speak or read Chinese. I've been to China...for what it's worth (which is exactly nothing, in this case).<br />
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It's not unusual for people of my generation to have tattoos. Even my mother has a tattoo, which still blows my mind to this day, because she's about the last person in the world that you'd expect to have one. Seriously, everyone and their mom has a tattoo, it seems. They are about as common and mundane these days as having more than one piercing in your ears. We are all so rebellious in our conformity.<br />
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In the Jewish world however, tattoos are another story. Based on Leviticus 19:28 which states, "Do not cut your bodies for the dead, or tattoo yourself. I am the Lord," Jews are clearly prohibited from tattooing themselves. This is likely a law that was intended to prohibit Jews from behaving as pagans did (cutting yourself for the dead, perhaps indicates a pagan mourning ritual), and distinguishing ourselves from the heathens, so to speak. In general, the Bible looks down upon self-mutilation. God is not fond of emo teenagers.<br />
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Tasteless cutting jokes aside, Jews and tattoos don't really mix. Sure, there are plenty of Jews who see this passage as outdated and archaic; it's not like we have to concern ourselves with the influence of pagans these days (I mean, usually. Who knows, some of us might decide to become Wiccan or something). In a modern context, tattoos are a part of mainstream culture. Assimilation issues aside, an argument can be made for non-halakhic (or loosely halakhic) Jews who see no problem in getting one.<br />
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That's not my issue, though. I got this tattoo well before I joined the tribe, when I was young, rebellious, and brimming with stupidity. I've never forgiven myself for it. If I could travel back in time and change anything in my life, it would be not getting the damn thing. I would love to go back and punch myself in the face. Hard. This is a scenario that I've often fantasized about, and every time I think of the impact of my fist hitting my younger self's shocked, anguished face, a gentle, placid smile comes to my lips.<br />
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Tattoos are not for everyone, and I mean no disrespect towards people whom they are for. I've seen plenty of people with impressive art adorning their body, which was clearly well thought out long before the needle went anywhere near their skin. I am one of those people who is not cut out for tattoos, which is something that I should have thought about for a few years before I ran off to the tattoo parlor. I also pierced my nose that year, and the year before that, at age 17, I convinced my body-piercer-in-training friend to pierce my navel (much to my parents dismay, when my mother caught a glimpse of it, months later). Apart from my ears, piercings also turned out to not be for me, but that's different. I can take the jewelry out. I can't cover or easily remove the dark black ink embedded in my skin.<br />
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I've disliked my tattoo for years, and decided that I would wear sleeves that would be at least long enough to cover it while here in Israel, partly because I'd like to blend into my Jewish existence a bit more, and partly because I don't want to talk about it. Ever. You see, here's the thing with tattoos; once you get one, when people see it, they are going to want to know the story behind it. What does it mean? What does it symbolize? Then you have to get into a discussion about it, and as you listen to yourself describe the like, so totally deep metaphor on your arm, you realize that you sound like bloody idiot. I don't want to tell you what my tattoo means. Today it serves as a ghastly reminder that one should think a bit before making a decision that will make something permanent in her life. But you can't really sidestep the conversation by just saying, "I don't like it anymore and I want to get it removed one day" without getting into an obnoxious conversation with someone who doesn't realize that it's rather unfortunate to have this thing on your body, and it makes you self conscious and embarrassed. A typical conversation can go something like this:<br />
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<b>Acquaintance:</b> Hey, nice tattoo! What does it mean.<br />
<b>Me, resisting the urge to run away:</b> Um, trust.<br />
<b>Acquaintance:</b> Oh...what does that mean?<br />
<b>Me, cheeks heating up:</b> Well, it's um, complicated. Look, I don't even like the damn thing.<br />
<b>Acquaintance, apparently amused:</b> Aw, you regret it, huh?<br />
<b>Me, getting really annoyed:</b> Yep.<br />
<b>Acquaintance, not picking up on my discomfort:</b> Then why did you get it?<br />
<b>Me, trying to resist urge to kick this person in the shins:</b> Well, I was 18 when I got it. I was a very different person back then.<br />
<b>Acquaintance, thinking that insulting me is fine in this case:</b> It's Chinese. That's so typical.<br />
<b>Me, beginning to hate Acquaintance:</b> Gee, thanks.<br />
<b>Acquaintance, thinking that I'm an idiot:</b> That's why you should think before you ink.<br />
<b>Me, suddenly feeling like a deformed freak:</b> I'm aware of that.<br />
<b>Acquaintance, mistaking insensitivity for cheekiness:</b> Are you sure you know what it says? How do you know what it says if you can't read Chinese?<br />
<b>Me, holding back tears:</b> You look it up...just like we look up Hebrew every day in the beit midrash.<br />
<b>Acquaintance, now way out of line:</b> What if it means "Butt humper" or "I'm a dumb white person with a Chinese tattoo?"<br />
<b>Me, feeling fiery rage burn within me:</b> Yeah, I'll bet it says "Butt humper."<br />
<b>Acquaintance, not getting the hint:</b> Ha ha! Well, I bet you learned your lesson.<br />
<b>Me, feeling small and inadequate in my existence:</b> Will you please leave me alone about it? I'm feeling self conscious enough about it as it is <b>(puts on sweater to hide the shame, despite it being 90 degrees).</b><br />
<b>Acquaintance, certain that I'm retarded:</b> You know that Jews aren't supposed to get tattoos, right?<br />
<b>Me, about to explode:</b> Seriously, I don't want to talk about it...<br />
<b>Acquaintance, now thoroughly hateful: </b>I'd never get a tattoo. They're so stupid.<br />
<b>Me, turning into the Hulk:</b> WILL YOU FUCK OFF ALREADY?!<br />
<b>Acquaintance, chuckling condescendingly: </b>Okay, okay. I'm just messing with you. It's not that bad. No, really.<br />
<b>Me, sobbing:</b> ...<br />
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Okay, so that was a dramatization, but you get the idea. Most people don't mean any harm. They're just curious, which is totally natural. And some people think that they are just harmlessly teasing you like friends are prone to do, and I admittedly go along with it to avoid looking like a baby. It is a bit of a touchy issue, though. That's why I hate wearing tank tops and swim suits. I've been forcing myself to get over that at this point. Once everyone has had some form of the above conversation with me about it, they generally lose interest and don't bring it up again. So, the sleeves have come off. I'm tired of t-shirt tans. They really aren't so flattering. Also, it gets hot here, it being the Middle East, and all. How the Haredim put up with it in their usual attire, I don't understand. I'd be willing to bet that crowded Meah Shearim apartments don't always have air conditioning, too.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Haredim in the Middle East: Apparently superhuman, and immune to the heat of the sun.</td></tr>
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Well, I should stop being sensitive about it and just deal with it, like it's just an unsightly scar that you eventually grow accustomed to. People aren't going to treat it as such and just pretend like they don't notice it, of course, because the whole point behind tattoos is for them to be noticed. Perhaps if I make up elaborate stories about it, each one different every time someone brings it up, I could make into a fun game of self amusement.<br />
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<b>Acquaintance:</b> Hey! You have a tattoo!<br />
<b>Me:</b> Hmm? Oh, that! Yes. I got it in prison ages ago. Sometimes I forget it's even there, haha! I once shanked another inmate for asking too many questions about it. <b>(chuckling with fond nostalgia)</b> Man, those were some crazy times, you know what I mean?<br />
<b>Acquaintance, slowly backing away:</b> Right...<br />
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Or, how about this one:<br />
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<b>Acquaintance</b>: I didn't know you had a tattoo!<br />
<b>Me: </b>Well, everyone in the biker gang had to get one, whether we wanted it or not. It was either get the tattoo, or be dragged behind Wild Hog Jimmy's bike into the next county. Isn't that messed up?<br />
<b>Acquaintance:</b> Oh...that's...unfortunate. Listen, I've gotta go...<br />
<br />
Oh, or this:<br />
<br />
<b>Acquaintance:</b> Is that a tattoo?<br />
<b>Me:</b> That's exactly what I said when I first saw it! Man, you pass out in a Tijuana bar one night, and wake up the next morning with a tattoo and a marriage certificate to some guy named Enrique. I'm <i>still </i>not sure if the marriage has been annulled or not. Poor Enrique. I never meant to break his heart, but with his English and my Spanish...it just wouldn't have worked out.<br />
<b>Acquaintance:</b> What the hell is wrong with you?<br />
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Or, I could just act bewildered when someone brings it up, as though I have no idea how it got there. Or I could claim that it's a birth mark, and I was just born with it. I do love telling stories.<br />
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In the end, I suppose it doesn't really matter. This is the way my body looks, so...I should really just embrace it...even my upper right arm. I think the nicest reaction I've gotten to it (outside of sincere compliments that always blindside me--you mean you think it looks <i>nice?) </i>was when it was revealed for the first time to a certain special someone:<br />
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<b>Me, feeling nervous, shrinking away: </b>Ummm...I have a stupid tattoo, and I got it when I was 18, and I hate it, so let's not talk about it, because I hate talking about it, and, and...<br />
<b>Charming Fellow:</b> Can I see?<br />
<b>Me, shying away:</b> Ummm...<br />
<b>Charming Fellow:</b> I won't ask you about it, I just want to see it.<br />
<b>Me, slowly turning to my right:</b> ...<br />
<b>Charming Fellow:</b> A dragon?<br />
<b>Me, bracing myself for an unpleasant conversation:</b> Yes...<br />
<b>Charming Fellow:</b> Huh.<br />
<br />
...and it was never brought up again! And he's still my certain special someone to this day. How could I not be wooed by such a conversation? I practically melted.<br />
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So, having a tattoo when you don't want it anymore isn't the end of the world, but it takes some time to fully accept that you're forever branded by your youthful indiscretion (unless you have a few thousand extra dollars lying around to get it removed). A rabbi that I know once told me a story about a convert who became ultra-Orthodox, and even a rabbi eventually, and he had a very striking tattoo from before he became Jewish, which was of Jesus on a crucifix, that ran from the top of his chest, down to his waist. Imagine the stories that guy has to tell at the mikveh. And just think of the conversation he must have had with his bride on their wedding night! Sure, it might be a cautionary tale made up by rabbis and Jewish mothers to scare Jewish youngsters into not getting a tattoo. The moral of the story in any case, is that it could always be worse.<br />
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<br /></div>Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-21493534561842939752012-05-17T15:28:00.001-07:002012-07-25T19:52:08.148-07:00I became Jewish because I'm really good at complicating my life.In the not too distant past, as I was struggling with my conversion demons and the nearly unanswerable question concerning what this thing I joined called Judaism actually is, I made some shallow, or at least unfair assumptions in this very blog concerning certain Jewish practices that don't jive well with my sensibilities. This bothered me, so I tweaked some of those past posts, in some sincere attempt to not come off as a complete asshole (maybe just an asshole with a little 'a'). But perhaps rewriting large chunks of text looks more like saving face than just having the humility to admit that I was not being particularly thoughtful. I must say though, since I managed to insult both Reform Judaism and Orthodox Judaism, I have a certain degree of pride in my obtuse condemnations of them; you can't pinpoint my prejudices. My prejudices run along the entire spectrum! My condescension is all inclusive, folks.<br />
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Of course, I'm being somewhat facetious, but it's better to admit to making a mistake than to continue to defend your mistake as though that's not exactly what it is. Then I would look as though I protest too much, and I'd revert back into an asshole with a capital "A."<br />
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Just this week, I've learned some things about Judaism that are worthy of my consideration before I just jump into the ring and start throwing punches in all directions. Let's start with something concerning our liberal friends in the Reform movement. But before I start groveling, let me preface the discussion by saying that I still truly have problems with Reform Judaism. I still think that there is too much of a tendency within the movement to disregard Jewish tradition and ritual, and while I admire and support their attempts to be more inclusive of women, I think they take it too far by trying to force egalitarianism even where it's not natural. What I mean by unnatural is not "perversion" or "morally wrong." I just mean, I don't want complete egalitarianism just for the sake of waving the banner of egalitarianism like it's some great achievement in and of itself without considering the individual. Now, understand, please, that I too want to be equally considered, equally valued and equally heard and respected. But people are different, men and women are different in nature (it's true, shut up) and I'd like that to be taken into consideration before all gender roles get thrown out the window after being labeled evil inventions of patriarchal societies.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">-Honey, it just makes sense for me to mother the child, because I have a womb and my breasts produce milk.<br />
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-Tch. Typical patriarchal argument. You're such a dick. </div>
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Now that I've insulted feminists, let me get back to the heart of my issue with Reform Judaism, which is that they seem to have no problem with playing fast and loose with conversions. When I discussed a particular Reform convert that I met last Succot, I mentioned my alarm with her ignorance of the very religion she converted to--not knowing about after meal blessings, not seeing the point of eating meals in a sukkah, not knowing that many Orthodox Jews don't touch the opposite sex, and are typically (at least ideally, if they are following their practices) super-virgins until the get married, in that they have before never engaged in intimate contact of any kind. I stand by my alarm at her ignorance. Converts obviously don't know everything before they head to the mikveh (though some Reform Jews don't see the need to immerse in a mikveh as a part of their conversion process...I hope they do know what a mikveh is), but at least knowing of and having some familiarity with really, rather basic Jewish practices, even if you have no interest in taking them on yourself should be a taught and learned.<br />
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But, I also criticized her version of reciting HaMotzi, with the challah chain. I believe I referred to it as "perhaps the most incorrect way to say HaMotzi." Well, honestly, that's not quite true, in a certain sense. While there are laws or rules to follow when performing certain actions in the Jewish world, there are also plenty of variations. Jewish customs are not the same in every area of the world, community, or even household. I "learned" how to recite HaMotzi from the three year old living in the household that I was living in during my conversion, which consisted of laying a hand on the challah and repeating the blessing after his mother said it, and then tearing large chunks from the loaf and tossing a piece to each person around the table. Apparently, the Rabbis who codified our laws once upon a time, would do it a bit differently.<br />
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The truth is, a lot of these practices became customs, passed down over generations. We don't do them all the same way. We might recite the same blessings, but how we hold the challah for instance, or if we cut the bread into pieces with a knife or tear chunks off with our hands, is moot. I still don't like the challah chain. It feels like a hippie invention, and I've never liked linking hands with my neighbor. It's awkward. The only time I'd do it, is at a Reform Shabbat meal.<br />
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In my evisceration of Reform converts, I also referred to some Orthodox practices that I find silly at best, and odious at worst. But then again, I also have had some new light shed upon those practices from those who actually practice them. I'm referring, of course, to the "no touching" rules of both shomer negiah and niddah. This is still troubling to me, so bear with me.<br />
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I made the brazen claim that shomer negiah was about avoiding temptation to have intimate contact before marriage as well as to avoid inadvertently coming into contact with a woman who is menstruating. As far as I can tell, these are the "practical" considerations of being shomer negiah. Okay, fine. If that is important to someone, I understand. Judaism sees the marital union between husband and wife to be something holy, and their sexual relationship a blessing, that has the ability to produce life. I'm not going to get into my own personal beliefs concerning sexual behavior between people prior to marriage, except to say that I see the value in connecting with someone on an intimate level before deciding to spend your life with them, exploring and understanding that side of yourself as a sexual being, and that homosexual relationships should also be valid and valued and recognized just as equally as heterosexual relationships (perhaps now some of you will forgive my issues with egalitarianism from before, eh?) All of this is how I view sexual behavior, relationships and marriage, and yes, Judaism and I disagree here, but I can rip my hair out over it in frustration another time. The issue that I truly have the biggest problem with in this sense, is the practice of niddah.<br />
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For those of you who don't know, a woman is in niddah from the beginning or her period, to seven days after she has stopped bleeding. During this time, she is 'off limits' so to speak, to her husband. She is not to have any physical contact with him. She may have physical contact with children, other women, and family. When her period has ended, and the seven days afterwards have elapsed, she immerses herself in a mikveh, and is then permitted to engage in marital relations with her husband again.<br />
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Niddah often gets translated as 'impure' or 'unclean' and it is no mystery why people would read it that way. Being untouchable in some sense, and then have to ritualistically immerse yourself in water before you can be touched by your husband again certainly carries the connotation of being unclean because of something totally normal and healthy that your body does.<br />
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Let me share too much information for a moment. When I first began to menstruate, I was only ten years old. My pituitary gland decided to play a cruel joke on my young body by acting up before anyone else in my class. As a result I was intentionally wearing baggy clothes, and almost always two shirts to hide my changing body. Puberty was around the time that I started dressing like a boy, hanging out with boys, skateboarding, playing basketball, and generally wishing that I was a boy.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-nE9YO4BLvkc/T6rbqzvchOI/AAAAAAAABPk/JsQGfRO5vJA/s1600/ryan+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="492" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-nE9YO4BLvkc/T6rbqzvchOI/AAAAAAAABPk/JsQGfRO5vJA/s640/ryan+2.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Clearly, the other girl in the front was having the same issue with her body as I was with mine. </td></tr>
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So when I found bloodstains in my underwear, I did what any logical ten year old would do; I threw them away. I hid the evidence. Maybe it was a fluke, I hoped. Maybe that wasn't blood. Or maybe I had cut myself somehow and didn't realize it. Just throw the panties away, get a fresh pair, and pretend like that didn't happen. Of course, it did happen, and when I showed my mother, I knew just from her expression that it was no small thing. When she gave me an overview of what was going on (she eventually checked out a library book for me that would go into graphic detail about the wonders of the female anatomy. Life was never the same after that), I reacted as though I had just been given a lifelong prison sentence. I couldn't understand how I was supposed to live with this. It was going to last 4-7 days a month?! I had to wear this bulky pad like a crotch diaper?! I couldn't swim while wearing the crotch diaper (tampons came later. When you're ten...yeah, tampons are just out of the question)?! How was I supposed to change the crotch diaper at school? What if I bled through the crotch diaper? And I'll be doubled over with cramps this whole time as well?! How could people live this? In the words of Dorothy Parker, what fresh hell is this?<br />
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More than any of that though, I was absolutely sure, more than certain, that I was the only girl in the fourth grade who was going through this. I had the distinct sense that as soon as I would show up to school the next day, everyone would know somehow, that I had gotten my period. I was terrified of being found out, and of nobody understanding what it was like, because nobody else was going through this. Most of them would have another two or three blissful years of innocence left before they would be put through this hell called puberty.<br />
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Not long after being thrust into womanhood at a too-early age, I learned that apparently, "being on the rag" was a bad thing, just as I had expected. If you were in a bad mood, or upset with someone, no matter how understandable your emotional reaction was, it was not outside of the realm of reason to assume that you were on your period. All of my emotional responses to the outside world could be boiled down to one simple fact: I menstruate. There are few words to describe how frustrated and humiliated I felt (and still feel) whenever my feelings were dismissed as the hormone crazed rantings of a woman on the rag. Of course, getting more angry about this only makes you look more like a hormonal bitch in the eyes of the one waving away your feelings. I grew up being bombarded with the idea that getting your period was a bad thing, nobody takes a woman as seriously as a man because we have periods, and by the way, it's gross! Bleeding from your vagina for days at a time? If I could punch someone every time I've heard "never trust something that bleeds for a week and doesn't die," I'd be moderately wealthy, and so satisfied with my swollen, punching fist.<br />
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I know that I can't speak for every woman and her particular experience of coming of age with this physically pivotal moment in her life. I'm speaking for myself: I have a hard time accepting shomer nagiah and niddah practices, because I automatically assume them to be negative reactions to the female body, its functions, and the honestly difficult reality of existing in this body. Don't get me wrong; I love being a woman, and am perfectly comfortable in my feminine skin these days. That took a lot of time and a lot of work to get to, though. And it's not just menstruating that makes female bodily experiences a touchy subject. In the secular world, we struggle with being more than what we're constantly being fed--too fat, too thin, boobs too small, boobs too big, hips too narrow, cellulite is gross, I like big butts, and I cannot lie, you're not enough of this, you're too much of that...it's maddening. It's not difficult to look at a religious observance regarding a woman's body and its natural function in the same light. You bleed, you're untouchable. You have to go purify yourself before you're fit for affection and intimacy again. You're dirty.<br />
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Of course, this isn't how women who practice niddah (and their husbands) view it. As a teacher of mine put it, it has nothing to do with purity and impurity, rather, niddah should be considered a time of separation where husband and wife can evaluate and contemplate their relationship beyond it's physical aspects, as well as be autonomous from one another. While I'm tempted to make a joke here that married couples stop having sex at some point, and that conjugal relations should be encouraged whenever possible, there is something to be said for creating a sense of longing and yearning for your partner when you are off limits to each other physically for about two weeks out of the month. Not being around each other and in each other's personal space constantly, perhaps, can keep the flame of desire between a married coupled kindled, and the need to rediscover the spark when love becomes routine is less of an issue. I recently have read some studies regarding what keeps a happy marriage happy, and it's not all that far off from Jewish marital values. For instance, spending time apart and pursuing your own interests every so often is a positive thing. Spending time with each other during every waking moment of your lives apparently becomes tedious--and annoying. Even sleeping in separate beds once in a while apparently has its benefits (though that seems to have more to do with the fact that sleeping with another person every night can do a number on how much restful sleep you actually get, because it's easy to wake each other up with moving around, snoring, hogging the blankets or the bed...all that fun stuff they don't tell you about before you start sleeping with someone).<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">How can I make it look like an accident if I just kill him in his sleep?</td></tr>
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I have never been married, but I have been in a long term relationship--a seven and a half year long relationship, to be precise. Five of those years, we lived in sin with each other, and encountered these same issues, which really ruined our relationship (among other things, but that's a whole other soap opera). We spent almost all of our time together, and as a result, we annoyed the living hell out of each other. Even the tiniest, most mundane things that your partner does can turn you into an irrationally furious and resentful person. Those little things fly under the radar when you're not in each other's faces all the time. We argued over everything at the point where the relationship became practically unbearable. And because he had restless leg syndrome, and I have a tendency to toss and turn restlessly until I finally find a position that my body finds suitable to sleep in, we kept each other up, woke each other up, and generally wanted to strangle each other with the sheets in exhausted frustration.<br />
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My point is, I get the potential advantages of what niddah forces a couple to do by separating themselves from each other on a regular basis. I still think that not touching at all is a bit extreme. Niddah also pertains to a period of time after giving birth, which I find even more extreme. After having a baby together and starting a family, you would think that the most natural impulse for a couple would be to embrace each other and to express affection with their new lives together. And since you're clearly not going to be having sex with each other until the new mother has recuperated, it seems arbitrary to remove yourself from each other, physically. Here however, I was given the argument that the time following a birth, it is crucial that a mother and child spend that time together to bond. Why this means excluding the husband from some part of that physical process is beyond me, and where the argument becomes weaker, I believe.<br />
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I still can't get behind the practice of niddah, personally, probably due to my affectionate nature in romantic encounters. I'm not the type of person that thinks to hug friends hello or goodbye, unless we are really close, I'm avoiding the awkward situation of rejecting your hug, or I'm attracted to you and I want to touch you (what?! Oh, like I'm the only one who does that...). If I'm involved with someone, affection is crucial, perhaps to make up for my general stiff awkwardness when it comes to platonic affection. A lot can be said in a hug, and sometimes, they are really needed.<br />
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Still, it's good for me to recognize that my assumptions regarding a particular lifestyle are not always, you know...correct. You should see me try to explain kashrut to my family. It's totally impractical, and no, I don't know why we Jews eat the way we eat. I know why I do it and why it's meaningful for me, though. It makes me more mindful of my eating habits and what I put into my body. Having dietary restrictions makes my palette more sensitive, and I become more appreciative of my meals. I started doing it, because I lived with a Jewish family who kept a kosher kitchen, and then I converted and felt compelled to keep kosher because, well, that's what Jews do, right? I also can't tell you why I prefer to daven with a mechitza separating men and women. All I know is that it gives me a different sense of prayer space, and I can concentrate on my attempts to have an I-thou relationship with God this way. I'm not ogling the men if it's a mixed minyan, or anything like that. There's just something about it that means something to me, and really does make my shul experience different.<br />
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So, maybe observing niddah provides that important something for some other people. I don't think it's a mystery as to why it gets a bad rap, because hey, it's a touchy subject. We're talking about our periods and sexual boundaries. We live in a world where women's sexual freedom has been fought hard for, and the stigma behind setting our own boundaries on our own terms (guess what? We like sex too!) still trips us up in the bedroom, in relationships, in concepts of self image, and understanding of our own femininity. Observing a practice that sets limits based on what your body does naturally can seem, at first glimpse, like a giant step backwards. I've gotten so used to hearing apologists explain away certain Jewish practices that sideline women, that it's hard not be cynical about what has come to be known as "women's issues." But behind all these practices after all, are real people with their own reasons for their observances. It's condescending to assume that they're looking at their own lives through my eyes and judging themselves based on my criteria. Women who observe niddah have their own minds and their own opinions and their own feelings. They don't need to be told what to think and feel. I get furious when supposed feminists go on and on about the freedom of women to use their own brains to live their own lives, only to condemn women who don't conform to their version of what the modern day Wonder Woman should look like: "You want to be a mother? You want to get married? You want to cook for your husband? You want a man who will take charge? You like giving blow jobs? You shave your legs? You wear make-up? Well, you're just a slave to a patriarchal system that has poisoned your mind! Shame on you, woman!" But you know what really is liberating to us? What really sets us free? Being trusted know what we want and what's best for us, and make our own decisions over how we choose to live our lives by using the brains that God gave us. How about not fighting one form of oppression just to replace it with a different one?<br />
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Anyway, I still have a lot to learn before I open my mouth and make sweeping declarations about the nature of Judaism and Jewish practices, having been Jewish for less than a year, myself. Of course, having an opinion and forcefully expressing it with passion would be very Israeli of me...You know, sometimes I think I may have joined the most complicated people to ever populate God's green earth. I feel so at home.<br />
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<br />Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7907313579299978109.post-29443549480716037702012-04-14T07:50:00.004-07:002012-04-14T08:26:02.527-07:00So, I'm writing again...When I pick up a pen and scratch it across the page, I ask myself, "and what lies shall I tell today?" Often, I don't mean to tell the lie. It just happens by mistake, like I tripped over a word and landed on another one. Somehow, that mistaken word looks better on the page, tastes better when it rolls off the tongue, feels good when I get back up and stand on it as though it were the sturdy, solid, undeniably real truth. Pretty soon, I'm weaving one hell of a tale, tripping over little white truths and landing on something much softer and dreamier, like clouds. And then that's what I'm standing on: clouds. Just thin, substanceless wisps of air, and I'm running through them, making it all up as I go. The scene has changed, and it's not on the boring ground anymore, but actually floating around up in the sky! Imagine, a whole world made up of beautiful fluffs of clouds, and a falling idiot of a woman, plunging through each one.<br />
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People say, "Doesn't she know she's falling? Doesn't she know she's going to hit the ground and shatter into a million pieces? What a mess it's going to be! Who does she expect to clean it up?"<br />
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And when I plummet the last inches of space between where I was and where I was running off to, when I hit the sturdy ground that never went anywhere while I was losing myself in the clouds, I blackout, and then wake up confused. "Oh, that's right!" I say. "I fell from the sky."<br />
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Now, <i>that's</i> a story to tell. So I go on telling such an interesting lie, that I forget that I tripped like a foolish klutz and ended up where I was never supposed to be in the first place.<br />
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But sometimes I'm a bit more grounded. I scribble for a bit until I say, "I don't like this one." I'm tempted to rip it from the notebook, crumple it up, and play basketball with the waste bin. Never wrote it. Never thought those things. I stake no claim to those words.<br />
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Now, don't go digging through my trash just to call me a liar. Even I don't want to see what I've been throwing away in there. Some people's trash is dirtier than others. Mine is garbage--a filthy sounding word if there ever was one: garbage. "Fuck" sounds positively flowery and sweet by comparison.<br />
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A bad poem or story tossed away is a sad thing, I know. It's like hating one of your children. You can't even try to fix it, to undo the damage you've carelessly inflicted upon it before it turned into this obscene mess. Where did it even start to go wrong? What was the first mistake? It's not that way in the beginning, after all. At least, it didn't look like it was going to turn out this way. Each fetus of a poem or creative story looks just like the next; a clumsy bundle of words thrown together into something resembling coherent thought, strung loosely together with the next, which is supposed to express some frustrated emotion, begging to be expressed, or some intense, burning moment that you've experienced that you want to paint into a perfect portrait, which will capture it with authenticity. But it comes out all wrong. Now it's just some trite love poem for someone you're longing for, that only manages to look like a desperate call for his affection once again; "Look, I wrote a poem about us! Can I come over again tonight? Please?" It looks obsessive, when you meant it to be passionate. It looks pathetic, when you wanted it to look bold and striking. It mocks you, and embarrasses your attempts to express that still frustrated emotion, begging for release.<br />
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If I could just tell at the beginning how it's going to come out, when it's an unidentifiable blob, perhaps it wouldn't seem so cruel when I throw it away and absolutely deny that it ever happened. Because, what kind of mother throws her babies into the garbage?<br />
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It's just that, sometimes, the things I create, the fruits of my labors, just don't come out like a baby is supposed to. Sometimes it's a hideous beast, and I hate looking at it, wondering how such a thing managed to inherit every piece of me that I don't want to show--a chimera of my deepest, darkest flaws.<br />
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Sometimes a mother just can't look her own child in the eye. It's better this way, tossed aside, like I don't care about it at all. It's alright. I'll start over. I'll make another one into a portrait that I can bring myself to look at.Ma'ayan Dyerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13447085986258268415noreply@blogger.com0