A Blog Post

I never know what to write, where, if... And yet I come back here, still, after 13 years.

It's close to Shabbos.  I am getting older.  We all are.

I am grateful:

I went to a Yeshiva poetry slam this week. I think it's probably around my 30th one.  That's a lot of poems.  It's an amazing thing - good for the kids who go on it I think/hope.

I form connections with students.  This was manifest this week in several ways: The kids at the explanatory minyan that I run, the kids at the explanatory minyan I used to run, the kids I helped with poems, the kids I learned with privately, the kids who asked for help with assignments in other classes, the kids who say thank you as they leave class at the end.

I recently officiated at my first funeral.  I want it to be mostly a G-d thing, and not share too much about it. I will share that a particular funeral home involved was very unsettling to deal with, so if you ever have options in New Jersey in this sad area and want to know where not to go, let me know.  On the other hand, the helpers came out - an amazing organization that helps with anything in this realm, a kind head of a chevra kadisha, and more.

I miss dad (and mom, but dad's leaving is rawer).  I miss being with him for Shabbos (not the place where he was for the very last years so much, but him). I miss his simple love and support (even if it didn't always feel simple to me, it was).

I yearn for connection.  I usually steer clear of this topic, but we humans need connection.  I pray for all the never marrieds, all the widowed and divorced, all the unhappily married, all the people of this world.

I am grateful for poetry in my life, for the passion I have for it.  People at the slams I've neen taking kids to for I think 6 years assume I teach English.  When I told a colleageue from another school on Thursday that I don't teach English but rather Jewish Studies, her response was, "Get out!" Im particular I'm grateful for Rav Froman's poems, which I miss.

It's almost Shabbos, I don't know who will see this, whoever you are I hope you had a beautiful and meaningful Shabbos and I wish you all the best.