Aseret Yemei Tshuva
Wow. I have quite a lot I want to talk about and each thing is so completely different mood-wise I don't know how I'm going to go about it. This might turn into a very long, very strange, very disconnected entry. You have been warned.
Rosh hashanna at home was lovely, even though it was a three day holidaythis year. I know I always say that after every two-or three- day holiday I always want to go up to my parents for making aliya so that I don't have to go through these kind of things every few months - only every few years. But this year, though I anticipated that I'dget sick of yom tov eventually, I never did. I was even sad when it was over. I just got this feeling of nachat; no need to rush anywhere, do anything, just enjoy yom tov. I even wanted to stay in shul longer after davening - I wanted more. And just ask anyone - I was really depressed when Rosh Hashanna itself was over because then you couldn't say 'Shana Tova' anymore with that knowledge that you are blessing people with a good whole new year. It didn't feel as special on Shabbat... But there were lots of good things too: I finally started a chavruta with Naomi! Yay! We were supposed to finish 'Al HaTshuva' together but she left early today so I guess we'll finish it each on our own.
My main focus this year in tfilot, for some weird reason, wasn't tshuva or din at all. All of the prayers, especially on the first day, completely enchanted me, but what caught my attention the most were the psukim and the prayers for the rebuilding of the Temple. It was the same all through the slichot we had here at midrasha, the song I connected to most was 'vahaviotim', also because we sing it to such a pretty tune... I had an absolutely beautiful Rosh Hashanna. I hope to have a Yom Kippur that it as beautiful.
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-Fast forward two days-
On Monday night I set out with Naomi from midrasha to a party. I know it is a party for me - for my Giyus. I know I wasn't origionally supposed to find out about it. I know it took a lot of orginizing. Other than this, I know nothing. Not where we're going, what's going to be done. Nada. So you can imagine my indignation (and maybe a little bit of excitement and glee) when after I get off the bus and have hugged Vivi, she then throws a blindfold over my eyes (her gym pants), some sort of crown on my head, and I start to be lead down a sidewalk that is suddenly full of cracks, steps and uncovered tree roots, that I can't see, that are just dying to get me. Not liking the jeers I hear from out on the darkness in the voices of Rose and Vivi, and the iccasional snicker from Dee, I choose whom I deem to be the trustiest guide - Abi. Not quite the best choice, as it turned out and it was a good thing Naomi decided to lend me her arm as well because Abi, being Abi, forgot atimes to warn me of the sudden steps, low tree branches and people in my way, all of which, I alas, could not see. After a few stomache clenching drops (really, a mere unexpected step off the sidewalk) and haphazard guesses as to which direction I was being led, I let go of all that and just imagined myself walking down an imaginary street in my mind. It was really quite liberating, having my eyes blindfolded; I could imagine whatever I wanted...
Eventually, they decided they'd had enough of the torture (or maybe we just got to Gan Saker, but I prefer the first reason) they whipped off the blindfold and presented me with a cupcake ...with a 'Happy Fortieth Birthday' candle stuck in it. And then we had a picnic of bagels (!) and salad accompanied by napkins that had the 'Happy Hannuka' crossed out and had 'Happy Giyus' emblazoned on them instead with magic marker. Oh, and the weird crown thing thet put on my head turnd out to say something alnog the lines of 'Hi my name is Ariela. Wish me a happy giyus.' I had been forced to walk down the street blindfolded with that on my head. I believe that it was the occurances of that night that made me start using the phrase 'I'm going to kill you' so much this week. But there were fun things too: we sang Avenue Q and Rent very loudly in a public park, much to the disturbance of Dee and the obliviousness of Naomi. I got a very nice, um, original, present (who knew that the Effeil Tower . We were forced to stand still for endless shots of the same picture. I stole Vivi's shoe... Life was good.
But seriously now, I was, still am, genuinly touched that all of them (all YOU guys) got together to do that for me. I know it was a tircha and it took time out of everyone's schedules, but I wanted to see everyone before I got drafted and you guys did that for me. Thank you. It meant, it means, a lot to me.
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-change of scenery, mood, topic, what have you-
Those of you who read my last post (those so few among you, who are few yourselves *whimsical Shakespearian look*) when I mentioned rikudei am might remember that I said that the teacher seemed to have taken quite a liking to me. Even then, not counting what I'm about to tell you, that was an understatement. He was always flattering me, once he sang to me, when he held my hand during the dancing (something I dodn't like in of itself, but that's a separate issue) sometimes he would sort of rub or caress it. Now, I thought I was being paranoid because my friend Roni had said that her friend had told her that sometimes he gets a little too close and clingy. But I tried to disregard that because after all he was that way, a jokster, with almost everybody. Well, I guess I gave him a little too much of my good faith. This past Tuesday was my last day at the chug because I won't be able to go anymore after I get drafted. Somehow, after class, he managed to get this out of me and then he goes and gives this kind of speech. Turns out, it's not so much that he had taken a liking to me, but that he was taken with me, if you get my meaning. Or at least it seemed that way. The way he put it - that he wanted to get to know me better, but then he tells me that he's 45 and has three babies - I really didn't know what to do with this. Thank god I had the presence of mind to refuse giving him my email and cellphone number (a mistake made in the past) and managed to get away with just his email being given me, and not by any will of my own, mind you. I'll tell you honestly, that was one of the singular most disturbing experiences I've ever had, bar none. I rid myself of that slip of paper as soon as I got back to my room, and though there was that little voice that said that he seemed like a nice guy and all he wanted was to get better acquainted - I quickly quashed that little voice. Sometimes you don't know if the little voice is the yetzer tov or yetzer ra, sometimes you do.
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-and now something a little more on-topic-
I'm really happy. I didn't expect to be really happy now. I expected to be depressed during my last chavruta of this, my last class of that. Because this is an end of an era, of a sort. But I'm happy. My last classes of Ein Aya and HaRav Kook last night (my favorite classes by far) made me really happy. We talked about pratim (roughly translated as details) and clalim (roughly translated as generalities, ideas) and how no matter how little and simple all the details look they are all part of and connected to some general, exalted, godly, idea. We also mentioned that we need the details because otherwise we wouldn't be able to live on this earth - no one here can live on exalted ideas. Very Kook-like. And then I finished 'Kol Dodi Dofek' with Sara - the part that talks about all of Israel being connected and responsible for one another in our mutual journey toward God. It made me think of what I've been doing here for the past thirteen months - all the spiritual baggage, no, wrong word; all the spiritual matter I've been provisioning myself with before going out into the world and working together with other people in order to better ourselves in the eyes of God. And yes, forgive the mocking tone, but being drafted is a sort of 'going out into the world'. I'm going to start using and doing the things I've only been learning about for more than a year. It's time. And I'm excited. Did you hear that? I'm excited! I got what I wanted, what I asked from Him almost every night after I said Shma - excitement, happines, pure will. I'm going to serve my country. And He knows, we need it.
I no longer feel like Yom Kippur is my last day in a world that is all holiness before I step into a world that is all 'earthiness' as HaRav Kook would say it, but I do feel that this is the first time I'm truly ready and excited about Yom Kippur. And it's not because I feel like I've worked everything out and that tomorrow night I'll be able to stand pure and holy in front of Him, far from it. I'm very much opposed to those here who say that we who have been here a year don't really have what to say vidu'i for because we where here all last year - how miuch could we have sinned? Or if we did, how badly? I disagree, I think there are plenty of ways I could have done wrong, and I know I did, within these walls. No matter how much a person can work on themselves, they'll never be perfect. Though it is their job to reach for perfection.
Anyway, apart from that side note, I feel very much prepared for this Yom Kippur. Maybe it was our beautiful slichot that we started before Rosh Hashanna. Maybe it was the praying on Rosh Hashanna itself. Maybe it was something I learned in a chavruta with Ma'ayan, or Naomi, or Sara, or Michal, or maybe one of the classes I attended, or something I learned on my own, or something God Himself slipped into my sleep. Or maybe it's partly all of that and the simple, or not so simple fact that I've come a long way in one year. I'm not the same person I was last year. Well, I am mostly the same but I am fundamentaly different. I have different ideas, ideals, interests. A different outlook on life and my connection to HaKadosh Baruch Hu. I kind of vountary self-brainwashing, if you will. I like this new me. I hope I can preserve it, but cultivate and improve it at the same time.
So I feel different this year. I don't feel any less of a 'defendant' in this trial before my Lord, but this time I feel like a much worthier defendant. Not because I'm less wanting in goodness, but because I feel that my person, my self, is worthier.
Thinking back on this past month and last year, on my 'shana alef' and 'mini-shana bet' , and knowing I'll soon be moving onto other things (saying 'it'll soon be over' sounds wrong and isn't what I mean) doesn't make me sad, it makes me happy. Not sad that it is no more, but happy that it was. The first time someone told me to look at things like that I stared at her as if she was crazy. How can you look back on something and not be sad that it is over?! Even if you really do appreciate what you did, how can you not feel even the slightest touch of melancholy? You know that it is the best way of looking at things, but how do you get there? Well, I don't know. I suppose it's kind of like reading a paragraph of HaRav Kook and understanding some element of it, then someone comes and tells you that there is this element as well. You understand what they (he = HaRav Kook) mean intellectually but you just can't grasp the idea all the way; like someone who's never seen an elephant trying to understand what one is from someone's discription: "it's as big as a house", "it's grey", "it's got a trunk". All these discriptions are true but they don't really give you the whole picture. Until you have the moment of epiphany. You suddenly get it, in it's completeness. You put everything together. What you understood previously only with your brain, you now feel with your soul, your inner sense of intuitive right-ness, and it becomes part of you. A 'prat' becomes a 'clal'.
So no, I'm not heartbroken that I'm leaving. I'm happy that I was here. It's time to move on to other things. But isn't it wpnderful that God worked things so that my period of improving my nation (in one way or another) comes after a day, a year, of self-cultivation? Ma rabu ma'ashecha Hashem.
I wish you all a Shanna Tova, with all the meanings that only HaRav Kook could attribute to the word 'tov'.
Ariela