Checking In

It has been a long time since I have posted anything, and that mostly has to do with dealing with a pretty deep depression (which I wrote about here over at JBC.org). Life has been a bit of a roller coaster ride for me since September and I'm only just now feeling like things are leveling out a little bit, so hopefully I'll have some stuff to write about soon. I've felt quite disconnected from a number of things and I'm slowly trying to make those connections active again. I feel quite lucky that I have had an incredible support system during this time, from my best friend who is hundreds of miles away, to a wonderful friend and her family, to my rabbi and temple community, to my friends in California and Atlanta. Together they have provided me love, friendship, and help as I tried (and still try) to make the choices that are good for me. I'm not out of the darkness yet, but the light is easier to see and appears more often.

Life has not stopped in the past couple of months, however. The High Holy Days have come and gone, Hebrew school marches on, I've visited my dear friends in California, and work has been as busy as ever. Each day was a struggle for awhile; it is hard to go about your day to day business and relate to people when you feel so far out of your own skin, but the world around you doesn't stand still just because you want to crawl under the covers.

So, hopefully, this will signal my return to blogging.

Shabbat Post, Recent JBC.org activity, etc.

I've got a post in the works about this past Shabbat and leading Torah Study/Services at my temple, but as I am running on about 50% capacity, it will have to wait until another day. As my post will be related to my most recent post at JewsByChoice.Org, I thought I'd post links to all of my June and July posts there. If you are not a JBC.org reader I would encourage you to check out the blog. There are a lot of great posts and ensuing discussion in the comments that are relevant not only to converts, but to all Jews.


The Art of Leading Services

My First Camp Shabbat

Shlach L'cha: Punishment and Reminders

Truth and Respect

Random Thoughts on the Future

I realize that I haven't posted in a couple of weeks, but that isn't because I haven't had anything on my mind. On the contrary, I think I've had TOO much on my mind and haven't been able to organize my thoughts past "ugh, I'm tired" on a daily basis. I did post over at JBC.org on last week's Torah portion, however. Go read it if you are interested.

What has been mainly on my mind is the future, namely my future, and what my plans are for it. I'm in an odd point in my life where I am happy and content in many areas, but in others I want change, need change in fact. I'm happy at my temple and with my involvement there. In a couple of weeks I'll join the Board of Trustees; next school year I will continue to teach 4th grade Hebrew and will likely be the permanent substitute teacher for a couple of the HUC students; and I will hopefully get more chances to lead Torah study when my rabbi and our intern are both out of town (or even when they are in town). I'm less happy with my job; at the moment it feels like a means to an end, but I just don't know what that end is. Suffice to say I have a lot of planning and decisions to make over the next few months if I'm going to make the changes I want. That was all very vague, but there are some things that are not ready for public consumption at the moment.

The weeks are winding down until my good friend is ordained and he and his wife move across the country to southern California. I'm very happy for them both as both will be beginning new jobs and hopefully settling into a more permanent home. At the same time I'm sad; they have become my family over the past couple of years and I'm going to miss them dearly. They are good people and have been a huge influence on my life and on my Judaism.

Upcoming posts...

Posts that I am formulating in my head:

• A response to my Job class (the 2nd one is tonight).

• Thoughts on gay marriage and how it fits in with Reform Judaism.

• Pesach!

• Plus some random Torah and study related stuff.

But, at the moment I seem to have little time to actually sit down and write anything out. Perhaps this weekend.

One day it's there...

Earlier this week I was on a business trip that required me to be on the floor of a manufacturing plant for periods of time throughout a two day period. During this time I didn't wear my tallit katan as a safety issue (and I personally see the point of wearing it to see the tzitzit, so I didn't just tuck them in). I gotta say that I felt weird without it on. After only a few weeks I've really grown attached to the presence and significance of the tzitzit. I found myself reaching down for them on more than one occasion and feeling saddened when they weren't there.

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I'm going to have limited internet access over the next week and a half, so there will be no new posts from me. But, Tuesday I promise to have a new post for both this blog and a new contribution to jewsbychoice.org.