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Congregation will rededicate Torah
KINGSTON - Congregation Ahavath Israel, 100 Lucas Ave., will be conducting Shmini Artzeret and Simhat Torah services on Thursday and Friday.
Shmini Artzeret services will start Thursday at 9:30 a.m. and Yiskor will be recited. Shimat [sic] Torah services will start later that day at 7:30 p.m.
Simhat Torah services will be Friday at 9:30 a.m. The congregation will rededicate its newly repaired Torah by starting to read it from the very first word, "B'resheet."
There is no cost or tickets needed to attend any of the services or programs. All are welcome.
For more information, call (845) 338-4409, send an e-mail to ahavath_israel_sec1@juno.com or visit the congregation's Facebook page.
"Congregation Ahavath Israel-"
"My old synagogue."
"Yes, they're celebrating Simhat Torah tomorrow morning. I-"
"Simkhes Torah. It's when you read from the beginning of the Old Testament."
"I want to go, but I wouldn't be comfortable going by myself. Would you go with me? I'll still go if you say no, but I would prefer it."
"Uh, yes." He looks so happy. "Of course."
"It's 9:30 in the morning. I saved the notice from the paper. I'll tape it to the cabinet." I pat the cabinet door. He forgets often. "Thank you."
That Friday was one of the last days of green deciduous trees. They were wet and blue with rain.
I directed my attention to the standing bin of yarmulkes and fine lace squares and lingered there. It didn't tell me a thing.
"Will I need to wear…?"
"No, you should be fine."
Another richly dark lobby. We arrived before the rabbi. My grandparents appear on brass nameplates under various headings on the walls. I clicked across the stone floor in search of as many family members as I could find. Dad tapped names of people I haven't seen since an aunt's funeral many years ago.
There was exactly a minyan. My father grinned openly and squeezed my shoulder. "You picked a good day to go, kiddo. You couldn't've picked a better day. We're doing them a favor."
The cantor crouched in the aisle and whispered.
"If it's alright with you, we'd like to invite you to receive aliyah."
Read from the Torah? I don't know Hebrew. I was going to learn, when I went to Hebrew school with Jonathan sometimes.
"You're going to need shawls."
The young rabbi's very pregnant wife had to pee more than once. She removed and folded her tallis and laid it on her seat gracefully. She even waddled to the bathroom gracefully.
She knows the songs by heart. Her book rested closed on her round belly.
I walked up the aisle to the Torah. Why didn't I bother to learn Hebrew? Contrary to my ignorance, I felt dignified.
After the person who followed me read her passage, I was dismissed. I descended the stairs and walked to the end of the aisle. My father gave me daps and let me by to my seat.
My father brings home artifacts. A book, Bialystock: Photo Album of a Renowned City and Its Jews the World Over. I've known where my family was from, but this is the first I'm seeing of it. He unpacks and waves at me a dual Jewish/Gregorian calendar, which he hangs next to Mom's Christianity-themed one in the hallway. A paper from my grandfather's funeral service bears his Anglicized name and a chart of twenty anniversaries: one-year increments after date of death and their Gregorian equivalents. My father empties his pocket of a transliterated copy of the kaddish and moves to drop it in the trash can.
"No-"
He's surprised. "You want it?"
"If it's OK."
"Absolutely." Bewildered. "I was going to throw it out."
It isn't until Friday morning that it registers. I had chided myself for not crying for Poppy the way I had cried for Gram-just as I had chided myself for not mourning Gram the way I had mourned Great Aunt Ginny-and I had explained to myself that it was the distance. That was why. I went to see my grandmother's body the morning she died. Poppy lived in Florida. Now I have a family history of strokes, that's what I took away.
Zichrono livracha.