The Countdown

In the wee hours of December 16th, it occurs to me that my wedding is now less than two weeks away.  In 13 days, 12 hours, and 15 minutes (less by the time I finish writing this), I will be standing under the  chuppah with at least three rabbis and the man who will be my husband.

For as momentous an occasion as this is, the weeks leading up to it have their own events and related stress.  Today I performed in a Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra concert.  This week I have three nights of elementary school concerts, then we're flying back to the Midwest for a week with our families and some last minute wedding prep.  With everything else going on it's almost hard to remember how big of a deal this really is.

13 days, 12 hours, 9 minutes.

I've already told a handful of classes at school that when we return from our winter break in January they will be calling me by a new name.  The youngest ones are excitedly trying out the new name, seeing how it feels on their tongue and proving to themselves they can remember what I've told them.  The older students - girls in particular - understand what the name change means and have also started calling me by the name I won't officially use for another 13 days, 12 hours, and 30 minutes (or so). It makes me smile every time.

I can't really figure out why I'm writing this at...[checking clock]...1:06 in the morning.  Maybe it's just a way of telling myself that there's a reason I can't fall asleep.  Or maybe I'm just awake enough to be thinking of everything that has to get done but too tired to coherently do anything about it.  Whatever the case, the fact remains:

I'm getting married.

This is happening.

13 days, 12 hours.

The Optimism Challenge

A few weeks ago I found myself in the stressful and emotionally tumultuous trifecta that is school concert preparation, wedding planning, and not seeing enough of my fiance.  It seemed that everything had to be done right now! and if I couldn't get it done then surely entropy would ensue and the world would be over as we know it. Such stress was not uncommon for me, but this time it manifested itself in a single sentence, repeated mantra-like every time I stepped on the train, crossed unnoticed through bustling crowds, or dealt with indifferent and outright rude sales clerks:  I hate New York.

Most of my life has been regularly punctuated by these moments of severe stress nestled uncomfortably between moments of slightly less severe stress.  In fact, I distinctly remember a moment in elementary school (5th grade, to be precise) when I found myself stressed and unable to fall asleep well past midnight, trying to convince my parents that maybe I should call my classroom teacher so she could assuage my fears about whatever homework assignment or project was at hand.

I was a special child.

I was also never good at transitions.  The first year of junior high, freshman year of high school, and freshman year of college all featured extreme emotional instability that made it hard for me to cope with anything life had to offer.  I am forever indebted to the people who were closest to me during those years, and I suspect karma will make me pay for that some day.  Big time.

I always strove for success, though, and my need to be a scholastic perfectionist was only strengthened during my periods of self doubt.  I suppose I figured that if I could do well in school, it would be proof for everyone else that at least some of my stress was valid.  "See?" I could say to my parents, "I worked like crazy to get that A!  And if I hadn't worked that hard I definitely would've gotten an A-."

Like I said: special.

So with this insight into my neurotic need for perfection and my utter inability to manage major changes in my life, it is no surprise that from the moment I moved to New York I have been off-balance, and when I found myself surrounded by every obligation in the world a few weeks ago, I lost it.

And Tomm, the saint who for whatever reason will be publicly promising in less than four weeks to put up with this the rest of his life, finally called me out on it.

In no uncertain terms and with a good dose of tough love, he helped me realize that I needed to find a way to stop this vicious cycle of stress, anxiety, and discontent with everything around me.  I needed to pull it together and change something since New York was not going to change itself for me.  I was hurting - everyone could see it - and it simply wasn't healthy for me.

I thought a lot about what he said, and I instinctively knew he was right.  Just as in every other juncture in my life I had a choice about how to respond to it, and now was the moment of truth: How would I learn to love (or at the very least tolerate) a city I never imagined I'd call "home?"

I was reminded of when I was still in grade school and my mom introduced a new family bonding strategy at dinner.  Every night she would ask us "What is the best thing that happened to you today?"  My younger sister and I, being the sullen teenagers that we were, often rolled our eyes but we always found a response.  Sometimes it was "I did well on a test." Sometimes it was "I came home."  But whether we knew it or not, my mom's trick worked and slowly changed the tone of dinner; we began to look on the bright side a little more often.

The day after my stern talking-to from Tomm, I told him I'd like him to do me a favor.  "Every day, I'd like you to ask me: 'What was the best thing that happened to you in New York today?'  I want to start focusing on the good things about New York, and I need your help."

As the days went by, he was faithful to my request.  Most days my best part of New York was a kind stranger on the train, but even such a minor detail made a big difference in my outlook the moment I focused on it.  Suddenly, I noticed my attitude changing.  Instead of blindly muttering "I hate New York I hate New York I hate New York" in rhythmic unison with the train clattering over the tracks, I heard the toddler singing children's songs with his mom in a seat nearby. I saw the disgruntled teenager hold the door open for the old man.  I became more and more aware of the good people, the kindness that had previously been missing from my sights. 

There are still moments when some New York experience grates on my nerves, but it's a work in progress and that's okay.  In the meantime, I'm changing how I see this city, and it seems to be responding in kind.

Cold, Cold, Go Away

It has been over two weeks since I last wrote, and that's at least a week too long.  I have wanted to, though, numerous times, and I have a slew of barely-begun-but-ready-to-edit blog posts to prove it.  Lots of interesting things have happened, things that I want to discuss and share, but gosh darnit I'm just too tired.

Right after Halloween (specifically, after singing a rousing and vocally challenging Halloween song with six consecutive classes in one day), I began feeling that I was either losing my voice or getting a cold.  It turned out to be a cold. I thought it was on its way out until it came around to throw a few more punches, not unlike the character in a movie who walks away from the fight only to whip around and deck the other guy in a surprise attack.  It hasn't been all bad, though.  There have been a few positive outcomes of this unshakable indisposition:

1. My Contigo travel mug is the new love of my life, and one of very few products I will recommend with the zeal of a street preacher.  Thanks to this, my tea stays warm through a train ride, a walk to school, and about five periods of teaching.  If the tea lasts that long, that is.

2. I am incredibly thankful to my mom's friend who gave me the tea kettle for my wedding shower.  It's easily the single most-used utensil in the kitchen right now.

3. I have been so tired that I've gone to bed at or before 9:00 pm at least four times in the last week, and it's glorious.

4. Thanks to this cold, I have perfected my impression of a 67-year-old man with smoker's lung. It's spot on.  In fact, I think when I'm home for Thanksgiving I should stage a competition with our aging neighbor who thus far has gone unchallenged in the Hocking-Loogies-From-The-Balcony-While-Shirtless event.

It's really the fatigue that gets me, though.  I can live with the phlegm and the sore throat, so long as I have my Contigo to keep me company.  I can live with the sniffling nose and even the occasional mild headache.  But when I have so many things to do, - planning a wedding which is just over a month away, planning a school's winter show which is less than a month away, plus everything else that's part of my daily or weekly routines - feeling unable to do any ounce of work past 6:30 pm doesn't help my stress level.  Thankfully, most of the wedding planning is taken care of at this point.

The other byproduct of this fatigue is not being able to write.  For some reason, I can't sit down and write a creative, coherent, or remotely interesting blog post when I can feel the need for sleep creeping in behind my eyes.  It becomes impossible to concentrate or write freely, even when I have accomplished all my other tasks for the day and have a few hours free.

I hope that when things die down a little and when this cold finally frees me of its burden, I'll be able to write a little more.  Until then, tea and sleep will be my extracurriculars of choice.

The Triangle Place

There's a grocery store three blocks away from our apartment that Tomm and I refer to as "The Triangle Place."  It has a name - something about sanguine trees and a farm - but it sounds silly and doesn't make sense so we call it The Triangle Place.  It is situated on its own tiny, triangular island near a six-way intersection, and its entrance is obscured by the stairs leading to the train platform above.  Its lights are always on, illuminating the produce that lines two sides of the building.  Day and night, heaps of potatoes, mounds of onions, various types of peppers and tomatoes, and numerous other mislabeled vegetables glow in florescent pools of light.  There is fruit, too, usually well-priced if not the most fresh, but certainly a better deal than the next closest grocery store whose produce prices are three times as much.  If I'm going to end up throwing it out anyway, better to throw out the less expensive option.

Inside the isles are cramped, and the old linoleum floor bends unevenly and curls at the edges.  Despite its small size, I often forget where everything is because unlike the large, well-lit grocery stores of the Midwest, this store feels more like the basement office in a house.  You know, the one for which the bright eyed new owners had high hopes and envisioned as the perfect work space, but which instead turned into a storage space for holiday decorations, outgrown clothes, and unappreciated birthday gifts.  Still, the shelves are well-stocked, the products make the best use of the space allotted, and its not uncommon to leave with unexpected goodies instead of the few groceries you went looking for but never found.

The establishment is like the United Nations of grocery stores.  Located on the edge of a Jewish shtetl, it is designed to cater to a Hispanic population, if its tortillas, fajita shells, and the aisle devoted to Goya canned goods are any indication.  Still, nestled between the cans of refried beans and corn, and just below the tortilla wraps, are Jewish foods with Hebrew on the labels, and bottles of Kedem grape juice stand alongside Jarritos.  Meanwhile, behind the counter is usually a young Russian woman in her 20s.  One Friday afternoon when the sun, already hidden behind the apartment buildings, edged toward the horizon, I overheard this cashier wish an undeniably Jewish patron a gut Shabbos.  And tonight, a young Jewish girl payed for her Mexican groceries with a Muslim cashier while Arabic music played from behind the counter.

The Triangle Place is a miniature embodiment of Brooklyn - cramped, dingy, but always available, the things you need usually in stock, and bustling with every nationality represented.  There is nothing glamorous about it, but it has its treasures if you look hard enough.

Sally the Singing Guitar

It’s been a while since I last wrote, which is perhaps to be expected in the first weeks of a new work schedule.  Additionally, the community orchestra I’m performing with had its opening concert of the season on Sunday.  It was the first concert I performed as a member of a symphony orchestra since I was in college.  It’s been three years.  I know that probably doesn’t seem like much to most people, but after having performed with string orchestras regularly since I was 10, a three-year hiatus is notable.  It feels nice to be back on the stage playing that particular flavor of music – the kind that only 60 string players, a full wind section, and percussion can pull off simultaneously.

Meanwhile, I spend my days pushing my music cart around three floors of an elementary school with my guitar on my back.  Sixteen classrooms – in and out, in and out, setting up, tearing down, every 50 minutes.  Initially I was put off by the thought of not having my own room.  The classrooms in this school are great, but there's not nearly enough room in which to dance, move, explore, get into groups, play instruments, and do all the things I intended to do with my perfectly planned, immaculately designed lesson plans. You know, in that dream world of mine. Still, despite my discontentment at not having a space to call my own I’m discovering there are a number of benefits to using the students’ own classrooms for music.  First of all, they know the room.  With knowing the room comes knowing the room's rules, which makes my job easier.  Then there's the fact that their teacher is still in the room.  Her presence alone is helpful, but it's especially beneficial if there is a student who needs just a little more one-on-one help with paying attention, in which case the teacher or her aid can step in without me having to turn my attention away from the class.  So even though pushing a cart around isn't remotely ideal, it's not quite as bad as I had imagined.

The students know me best by the guitar, whom I have affectionately named “Sally” for the sake of the kids.  Their reactions upon seeing me in the hallway are adorable, as expected.  “Hi Sally!”  “It’s Sally!”  “Saaaaallllyyyy!!!!”  and the occasional “It’s the music teacher!”  Many do remember my name, but I’m apparently not nearly as cool as my guitar.  Either that, or they think my name is Sally, which is fine so long as they’re saying it with such excitement. 

I feel like I’ve stumbled upon a nugget of teaching wisdom in personifying my guitar.  Last year I made the rookie mistake of assuming that the students would have some sort of innate, evolutionary predisposition to respecting instruments and personal property.  Oh, how wrong I was!  The youngest students were always reaching out to touch the shiny, blond wood, or brush their fingers over the strings like they saw me do every day in class.  It was especially tempting for them when they lined up and there stood the guitar in its stand by the wall, so close!  All it took was a single finger, a quick flick of the wrist, and out came the ringing tones that didn’t quite make a diatonic chord but sounded like music nonetheless.  At least, that’s what I figure it sounded like to them.  The same sound, to me, had quite the opposite effect.  My head whipped around, eyes searching wildly for the child attached to the fingers which had so brazenly touched my guitar.  My guitar!  Really, I guess I wasn’t so different from the children.  I just didn’t want to share.

What I had failed to do was introduce them to the guitar as a thing to be respected.  Yes, it is mine.  Yes, it is [relatively] fragile.  No, students shouldn’t get to play it whenever they please because, well, chaos.  But I never explained that to them or helped them understand the difference between mine and yours, about asking permission, about respecting instruments just like we respect people.  I forgot that children will be children, and it is my job as an educator to help them grow up, little by little, into the kinds of human beings we need in the world.

So this year I changed things up a bit.  It wasn’t a well-planned conscious decision; like many things that happen in the classroom, it just kind of happened.  “This is my guitar, and her name is Sally.”  Sally?  Don’t know where the name came from, but it seemed appropriate for my small, well-loved guitar.  “Sally loves to play music, and she loves singing with friends, but she’s very shy.  She doesn’t like when people she doesn’t know try to touch her or play her, and if she gets scared she might go back home (to her case, of course).  So let’s promise to respect Sally so she stays with us to make music!”

Wow.  Why didn’t I think of this before?

The immediate response among the children was powerful.  By giving the guitar a name she transformed from an inanimate thing into a someone, and someones can be spoken to, cared for, and respected.  Sure, sometimes a student’s curiosity still gets the best of them, but even then my response is measurably improved because the lesson I teach in reprimanding them is far more powerful than “It’s mine, don’t touch it!”  I can speak to the child and say “Oh no! Did you touch Sally?  Remember, Sally doesn’t like being touched by new people.  What should we say to her?”  Respect, apologies, and just a dash of guilt, all thrown into one!

Little by little, I think I’m figuring out how to be a good teacher.  Between the ideas that pop into my head without a moment’s notice and those that I steal shamelessly from other teachers, I’m slowly collecting the tricks for that bag my music ed professors always talked about. 

Great, one more thing to carry around!  Maybe I should name it, too.

The psychology of teaching

I just finished my third week of teaching at my after school job and my first day at my day job.  Both are at elementary schools teaching roughly the same age group - Kindergarten through 2nd/3rd grade, ages 5-8.  The differences between the two schools - and their students - are immense.  The after-school position is located in an area with a very high percentage of students living in transitional housing, to give you an idea of the socio-economic condition of these families.  Meanwhile, the elementary school where I teach during the day boasts strong parent involvement in the school.  That's just one primary difference between the two.

Whether it's a result or simply a correlated factor, the students at my day job are markedly more well-behaved than those in the after school program.  Home life, parent involvement, health, neighborhood, school atmosphere, teachers' efficacy, and time of day -- I believe these all play a role in how a student performs in school.  Though it's impossible to pinpoint the causes, as a whole the students whose lives are more challenged are more likely to act out and be disruptive than those who regularly get the attention, support, and love they need and deserve.

As a teacher, one of the biggest threats to our students' learning is often their own behavior.  The term "Classroom Management" is thrown about regularly among teachers from before they even get their licenses.  I remember being a student in college and regarding classroom management as my greatest weakness (even though I hadn't even had a chance to try it yet).  I was terrified that no matter how good I might be at teaching a child how to play an instrument or sing a tune, I would fail miserably the moment the class acted up.  I may have even had nightmares about hiding in a corner while my students took complete control of my room and broke every rule I had ever imposed or implied, like a mutinous ship about to throw its captain overboard.  I might still have those nightmares.

I've not been teaching long, and though I've learned a great deal I still have a lot to learn about managing behavior in my classroom, as evidenced by my classes this week.  Oh boy.  Students were talkative and it seemed impossible to get their attention for more than a minute at a time.  They were reluctant to participate and when they got excited, they couldn't control it.  Some students in each class would start crying and throwing hissy fits if they weren't called on to propose an idea and get a turn.  When I would finally get the class focused and attentive, two students would start acting up and the whole class was distracted yet again.

At the beginning of my final class today, I quietly approached one boy who has had some trouble in class the last few weeks.  I encouraged him to have a "good day," to try really hard to have the best music class he could.  I smiled, and we pinky-swore that he would do better.  Five minutes in and he was disruptive.  Now, this kid knows when he's doing something wrong, but fixing it seems to be very challenging.  Typically, one of my ways of pointing out behavior that needs to be fixed is to move away from the circle: if a student is acting inappropriately (talking, ignoring directions, acting out, being non-participatory in a purposefully defiant way), I motion for them to scootch out of the circle, and once they show me they're ready to return I invite them back in.  It works for some, not so much for others.  Well, for this student, it did not work.  He ended up sitting out the entire class period.  By the end of the day, he was so distraught that he wasn't allowed to participate (ignoring much of what he would have to do to make that happen), that he was bawling.  "Let him bawl," I thought.  "Maybe this will deter him from behaving similarly next time."

As the class was leaving, the teacher whose room I use approached me.  She's not much older than me, but she has a Masters degree in Special Education so I definitely appreciate any advice she can offer.  "Have you tried rewards with him instead of punishment?  The kid obviously doesn't respond well to punishment, so maybe try giving him something special to do instead, or offer him a prize for good behavior."  Bribes.  Bribes always work.

It made me think about my approach to behavior management.  Yes, I realized, she was right.  Not just this boy, but many students respond best to getting opportunities instead of having them taken away.  At the end of that lesson, I built a drum circle by inviting a couple students at a time - those who showed they were prepared to join us - instead of starting with everyone and moving out the ones who didn't do well.  In the end, every student in the circle was doing what they were supposed to do.

Then tonight I read something interesting.  A friend on Facebook shared an article from Business Insider entitled "8 Mistakes Our Brains Make Every Day and How to Prevent Them." The third mistake discusses "sunk cost," whose origins are described by psychologist Daniel Kahneman:

Organisms that placed more urgency on avoiding threats than they did on maximizing opportunities were more likely to pass on their genes. So, over time, the prospect of losses has become a more powerful motivator on your behavior than the promise of gains.

The article briefly describes how people "emphasize loss over gain."  Now, I am certainly no psychologist and having not done any additional research on sunk cost, I can't be sure I'm understanding this accurately.  But in considering my teaching, the idea that losses are a "powerful motivator" struck me.  If my experiences today alone are any indication, then while loss is indeed focused on, it doesn't actually motivate young students to avoid it.  It seems that many of these students can't get past what they are losing, but the threat does not encourage them to do better.

In fact, I don't know that that threat works on me, either.  I remember a professor in college who told me that if I couldn't master the performance of a particular piece of solo repertoire, then perhaps I should consider another profession entirely.  It didn't make me work harder on the piece, but it did leave me crying in the cello locker room (which was, thankfully, immediately across the hall from my professor's studio).

But maybe that's precisely what this concept is all about.  It's not that we are encouraged to do better by avoiding negativity, but that we dwell on negativity in such a way that it impedes our ability to seek positive experiences. Is this what my students are doing, dwelling on negativity?  And does that mean that the punishment I'm offering is actually much more severe than I previously thought?

I need to find a way to correct the wrong behaviors.  I do believe that children need to learn how to behave even when they're not getting any discernible prize for doing so.  But by the same token, if students cannot fix their behavior after being punished then perhaps I need to change the process entirely and avoid the negative behavior in the first place.

Maybe, to borrow from Mr. Kahneman, I need to avoid the threats in order for my students to maximize their opportunities.

Sun spots

Every so often, I happen upon Clara sitting in the kitchen in a pool of sunlight that has sneaked through the clouds, between the tall buildings, and into our window.  My first thought is always "Why is she sitting in the middle of the kitchen?" but I quickly notice the brightly lit rectangle in which she has placed herself and I dismiss my initially absurd question.

At home, my dog used to do the same thing around the house.  You could often find her curled up in splashes of warm afternoon sun, oblivious to the world.  I know that a lot of animals do this, and it makes sense.  If the sun is shining, go sit in it!  But sometimes I'm envious of the way Clara can just wander around until she finds the warmest part of the floor, hunker down, and enjoy it for as long as it lasts.  Wouldn't it be nice if we could all do that just as easily?

Well, after much searching and waiting, I think I have finally found my sun spot.

My last job as a music teacher ended in June and until last week I was unemployed.  Originally I had thought surely I would have a job by the beginning of the school year in September.  Throughout the spring and summer I applied for a multitude of teaching positions, hoping desperately that I might be able to use my music education degree to its full extent here in New York.  But the pickings were slim and, more frustrating than that, agonizingly slow to materialize.  At the very end of August I was finally offered a part time after school position.  Minimal hours, decent pay, challenging school environment, but teaching music nonetheless.  I knew I still needed something in addition to the 8.15 hours I would be paid there, but I was at least happy to have something.

A few days later, I got a call for a general music position that I had been pursuing for months.  I was ecstatic to finally have clinched that one, but I'd still have to wait nearly a month to do a demonstration lesson for the principal and the program directors.  In the meantime, I calculated that I would have less than 17 hours a week of classroom teaching, and I knew I'd need a little bit more.  Not even because of the money, but just to keep myself occupied.

So I sat around and twiddled my thumbs for a few weeks, waiting for one program to start and for the date of the demo lesson to arrive.  I was happy I'd have some work, but I was frustrated by both the lack of positions in my field (especially since I really wanted to teach in a string program) and the astonishingly slow pace with which everything was moving forward.  While I was sitting around, students had already started school and I wondered "Why aren't these music programs starting, too?"  Apparently this is one of those New York things.

Then, a week before my demonstration lesson, I got a call about a school that needed a string teacher twice a week for 10 hours total.  Oh my goodness, yes! I thought.  This is what I want!  And I could probably do this in addition to the other two programs, so long as we could organize the schedule correctly.  I immediately called for an interview, we set one up for the following Monday, and it went very well.  It looked like I was well on my way to having three jobs at three different schools, but doing what I love.  Hard work, to be sure, but I was excited nonetheless.

Two days later was the demonstration lesson.  It went swimmingly.  Afterward I was shooed away so the principal and the program coordinators could talk behind my back, and later that day I got an email from one of the coordinators.

"The principal wants you to teach 16 classes."

Twice what we had first discussed.

Crap.

Somehow in the span of a week, I went from worrying that I wouldn't have enough hours to being offered an overabundance of classes to teach.  I may have been pushing it thinking I could teach at three schools every week - an after school program for around 9 hours, 8 classes at one school during the day twice a week, and 10 classes at another twice a week - but add another 8 classes to that and I knew it was past my limit.  Thankfully, I had a few days of Jewish Holidays to think about it before any decisions had to be made.

Throughout the holidays on Thursday and Friday, plus Shabbat, I didn't know what to do.  And what's more, I felt frustrated.  Why was I told something at the last minute that would force me to decline something else that I so desperately wanted to do?  Why was this all happening at the same time?  Why wasn't it easier?!

But when I told people about my situation, many of them noted the overwhelmingly positive aspect of my circumstances.  Unlike a month prior, I had plenty to choose from!  I had options, and the people offering them to me really wanted me to work for them!  So shouldn't I be happy?

Well, today I talked with one of the program coordinators for the school that wanted 16 classes a week.  We spoke at length about the situation and he sympathized with my circumstances.  He knew what I wanted, he knows where my educational passions lie, and we figured it out.  By the time I made the decision to decline the string teaching position, I was confident I was making the right choice.

Once I made the decision, I immediately felt better.  I felt as if I had chosen the best option, not only for me but for the adults and students involved.  I'm confident that in the next few years I'll get other opportunities to teach strings, and I'm incredibly happy to be working for this particular organization for my first year in New York.  It took a while, but I think things finally settled in the way it's supposed to be.  I found my own little sunspot, and I'm going to enjoy it as long as I can.

Shul Shopping, Part III

The Holiday Season is in full swing and along with it come plenty of opportunities to go to the synagogue.  We began with Rosh Hashanah two weeks ago, then last Saturday many of us spent a good portion of 25 hours in the synagogue and not eating.  Just four days later we commenced the celebration of Sukkot, that bizarre Jewish holiday in which Jews suddenly become carpenters and build strange huts in their yards topped with bamboo sticks, tree branches, or corn stalks.  Oh, and we also say a blessing while holding onto the trimmed branches of three different trees (date palm, willow, and myrtle) plus an Israeli citrus fruit called an etrog and shake them all around.  It's all very symbolic.  Take my word for it.  

Here are some pictures if you have no idea what I'm talking about:

A traditional sukkah
Source: The Mendel Sukkah, sukkot.com

The Lulav and Etrog
Source: Blueenayim, dreamstime.com

With all these opportunities to go to the synagogue, it can be a bit of a challenge to get in the holiday spirit if you aren't enjoying the congregation with which you're spending so much time.  I spent all of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur at Shul #3 which, although it was the best of the three I tried out, still lacked much of what I was looking for.  By the powerful concluding service of the holiest day of the year, culminating with one long blast of the shofar (ram's horn), I knew I needed to start looking for another shul to call home.  I've already written at length about my dissatisfaction in my own neighborhood so it shouldn't surprise you that I needed to look a little further.

A quick search on Google Maps for "Modern Orthodox Synagogue Brooklyn" provided a couple other options.  I'm sure there are more synagogues than appeared in the search results, but any synagogue that has an Internet presence is probably closer to what I'm looking for anyway.  To my dismay, the next closest synagogue was three miles away, which wouldn't be so bad if I weren't planning on walking to shul every Shabbat.  But I'll get to that later.

I walked to the synagogue on Thursday morning and entered to find that although I was fifteen minutes late for the service, they hadn't yet begun.  I actually took this as a good sign.  There's this thing known as "Jewish Standard Time" in which everything starts later than expected, and I'm very used to that way of doing things in a synagogue.  The building was a bit smaller than the other three I had been to, but the sanctuary was bright, open, and featured a single curtained mechitza down the center of the room.  This barrier was designed as sectioned frames on wheels so they can be moved and manipulated as necessary, and even removed entirely for an event in which they'll allow a mixed crowd.  There were no pews; instead, there were rows of chairs set up, again making for a very convertible space.  The ceiling featured a domed skylight, and the morning sun poured freely into the space.

The service featured a great deal of singing, much of which was accomplished by the untrained voices of the congregation, a small but delightfully boisterous bunch.  Unlike the other synagogues in which most people seemed to sit back and let the leaders do their job, I felt that the members of this congregation were more personally involved with the service and with one another.  I especially smiled when one paragraph was read out loud in English by an old man in the back - the same paragraph that my Dad has had the honor of reading in our synagogue for years.  We use a different translation, but the message was the same: we want you to pray with us, and we want you to understand it.  Let's face it.  It can get really easy to forget what's actually being said when you're praying in another language.

By the end of the service, there were maybe 30 people in attendance (a high estimate, perhaps), and most of us went to the sukkah for the kiddush reception.  By the way, it was a single kiddush, with a single table.  Finally!  A kiddush for the men and women together!  At the kiddush, I could tell that people were friendly, but nobody really approached me to say hello.  I was a little dismayed until I decided to leave and the rabbi stopped me at the door.

"Hello.  You're new here.  Where are you from?"
"I just moved to Borough Park."
"Oh?  And what are you doing all the way over here?"
"Well, I didn't like any of the shuls in my neighborhood, so I came here."

We spoke a bit longer, he invited me to lunch, and I politely declined because I told him I had to get back to have lunch with my fiance.  So he invited both of us for the following day.  Before leaving, I told him:

"Y'know, of all the shuls I've been to around here, you're the only rabbi who has spoken to me.  Thank you.  I really appreciate that."

He seemed stunned.

The  next day I convinced Tomm to come with me, and after services we were approached and welcomed by the president of the congregation, the Rabbi (who wished us mazel tov on our engagement and confirmed our acceptance for his lunch invitation), and the old man who read the paragraph in English.  Additionally, I was invited to lunch by the rabbi's wife who I didn't realize was the rabbi's wife, so I declined only to find that it was her food I was eating an hour later.  At kiddush, someone helped us when he realized we hadn't managed to get a bit of the wine after the blessing was made, and when kiddush seemed to be ending and we had lost track of the rabbi, the old man from before said "Oh we'll get you to that lunch!  Don't worry, I'll take care of you."

Music to my ears.

The lunch table was graced by many of the congregants and the rabbi's 20 children (okay, maybe there were only 12), and I managed to get into pleasant conversations with a few other people.  After a fabulous meal replete with salads, fish, chicken schnitzel (Tomm's favorite), potatoes, vegetables, and a scrumptious dessert, we had to take our leave early because of Tomm's work schedule.  The best part for him?  Not a single person raised an eyebrow or protested about the fact that he was working on Shabbat.  Instead, everyone treated him with the respect owed to a hardworking doctor, recognizing that there is no greater mitzvah (commandment or good deed) than to save a life, even if it means working on Shabbat.

Speaking of working on Shabbat:  Many of us - regardless of our faith background - are familiar with the precept to "do no work" on the Sabbath.  It is, after all, the reason many Christian establishments are closed on Sundays.  Throughout the Jewish community this commandment is observed to varying degrees depending on the individual's  level of religiosity (wow, that's actually a word?).  However on the Orthodox side of the spectrum there is a very little room for debate; the 39 categories of labor that define "work" are clearly delineated and avoided on Shabbat.  They go beyond the commonly understood definition of "performing a service in exchange for money" and extend into such activities as building, baking, and lighting a fire.  These categories provide the framework for the myriad of rules that observant Jews follow in order to create and experience a holy, joyous holiday every single week.

While I do my best to observe the Sabbath, I do so in a way that is comfortable for me, a way is constantly in flux.  I haven't reached the point where I strictly follow all the laws of Shabbat and I am still trying to figure out what works for me to make the day holy.  There are a few things I do my best to avoid, such as spending money, working (I refuse to work at a job for which I am paid on the Sabbath), and driving.  I have my own excuses for certain things, like using the phone in order to stay connected to my family on Shabbat and thereby make my experience more enjoyable, and while that may change with time it suits me for now.  As for driving, that is something I definitely try to avoid, especially driving to the synagogue.  But when the synagogue is three miles and a full hour each way by foot - potentially through pouring rain, snow, extreme temperatures, and other cumbersome natural phenomena - driving or riding on the bus becomes a much more appealing option.  For example, today, when I was just plain tired and didn't want to get up early enough to make the trek.  Had I resigned myself to taking the bus I could've cut the commute in half and felt much more willing to go.  But I was lazy, so I didn't attend services today.

I want to walk, I really do.  But I may have to consider what's really important in terms of my Jewish practice and experience.  If avoiding transportation means not going to shul and missing out on the positive experiences of participation in a community, then am I really making Shabbat holy?  I realize that for the more observant Jews out there, this is a non-issue.  This isn't even a discussion.  But the spirit of the law means just as much to me, if not more than, the letter of the law, and I may need to seriously consider what is important to me at this point in my life.

As for the shul, this one might not be the end of my search.  I still want to see what else Brooklyn has to offer, to make sure I find the place and the people that make me the happiest.  In the meantime, I'm just glad I've found a place that makes me smile and is willing to invite me for a meal.

A sassy way to save your day!

Despite having just recently fasted for Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, I really don't have anything inspirational, eye-opening, or remotely monumental to share with you.  What can I say?  Sometimes, even the holiest of days doesn't provide fodder for a blog.

However, today something struck me as being worthy of a post.  Mind you, this does not follow suit with my usual content, but I think everyone can benefit from this one.  If you haven't already heard of this diet, then I encourage you to read on.  If you know about this diet and have used it, then I implore you to comment below about your experiences so I know if it's still worth touting.

I now present to you, the BRATT Diet!

For some unidentifiable but thoroughly aggravating reason, I was struck this afternoon with a rather poignant stomach ache.  I knew it was nothing serious and was fairly certain it was the result of something I ate, but it put me in the fetal position and made me considerably whiny.  As Tomm fixed himself a sandwich for dinner, I realized that I probably should try to eat something, and turned my sights directly to the BRATT diet:

Bananas, Rice, Applesauce, Tea, Toast.

The diet consists of low-fiber, low-fat foods that are very gentle on the system.  While they do not provide the nutritional substance required on a daily basis, they are perfect options for a day or two while suffering from an upset stomach or diarrhea.

I first learned of this from my cousin when I was in college, and I was a little skeptical at first.  I had told her about how for a few days it seemed that everything I ate was disagreeing with me.  It was mostly just annoying and uncomfortable, but I wanted so badly to digest something, fully and completely, in a normal fashion.  Imagine my relief, then, when I made myself some plain ol' toast  accompanied with tea (unsweetened, no milk) and found that over the course of the next couple hours I was completely fine!  No pain, no grumbling, angry stomach, no intestines yelling at me - such bliss!  After a day or two of nothing but BRATT food, I was feeling significantly better and was able to resume my normal eating habits.

When I was in Israel, there was a period of a couple weeks where I regularly had intestinal upset.  (I determined later it was probably because of an aversion to the regional tap water, and once I switched to bottled water I was pretty much fine.)  I ended up eating a lot of toast and drinking a lot of tea in that time just to keep myself hydrated and somewhat sated.  It was during this particular bout - specifically during a 12 km hike - that I discovered something interesting about the diet, or at least about myself:  If I think I'm feeling better and want to "test" it with "real food," DON'T.  No matter how benign the food might seem, no matter how convinced I am of its laudable dietary qualifications, multiple degrees, honors, or awards, it's not worth it.  It only ends in misery, forcing me to crawl back to my rice and applesauce only to hear them chide "I told you so."

Thankfully I don't regularly suffer from stomach problems, but in the last few years I've been satisfied with the results whenever I've had the unpleasant opportunity to resort to the BRATT diet.  I don't know that I can say with any amount of certainty that this diet actually helps get rid of a bug, but I usually feel a bit better after nibbling on toast or sipping some tea.  I often find that having something in the stomach is better than nothing at all, even when your stomach is as cantankerous and petulant as a hormonal teenaged girl with PMS and a pimple on picture day in 8th grade.  At the very least, it feels like progress to be able to swallow something and not regret it 15 minutes later.

I should reiterate that this diet is not recommended for long-term use, at least not on its own.  One resource recommends it for a maximum of three days (don't worry, it's safe to open the PDF in that link), but more than that and you will deny your body the vital proteins, fats, fiber, and nutrients it needs. 

So what do you think?  Have you tried this?  If you're like me and even the most simple tummyache is mildly debilitating, I highly recommend this course of action.  I'd be happy to hear your thoughts in the Comments section, if only so I can confirm my suspicions that I am the only one in the world so madly in love with this sick-people diet.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have some applesauce to eat. 

Play on!

Last Monday I had the most wonderful, life-affirming, uplifting experience I have had since arriving in New York.  I attended the first rehearsal of the Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra, a local community orchestra now celebrating its 40th anniversary.  It is filled to the edges of the stage with humble musicians, some of whom use music to pay the rent and many more who don't.  They aren't payed to be there; in fact, there is a membership fee to play in the orchestra.  It just goes to show precisely how dedicated they are.

When I arrived, people were immediately friendly.  Hi!  How are you?  Are you new?  Welcome!  People welcomed me, pulled me into their conversations, allowed me to sit in the middle instead of on the outskirts, noticed me and wanted me there.

And then the music started.  Oh, what rapture!  We sight-read a Brahms symphony (replete, of course, with the kinds of melodies that only a cello section can pull off with affective grace and depth of feeling), the first major symphony I had performed in two years.  Through our instruments we sang, we hummed, we soared, we crawled, we lifted ourselves in rising, swelling melodies, forced ourselves through the cramped and jagged spaces of dissonance, then resolved with harmonious consonance upon the conductor's subtle cue.

Sometimes I forget I'm a musician.

In the world of music education, I have always considered myself as a teacher of music rather than a musician who teaches.  It is not that I doubt or downplay my musical talents, but rather that I put more emphasis on my talents as an educator who happens to use music to teach children.  Among the music education majors in college, though we started out with nearly identical musical course loads as those of the performance majors, by our senior years we had distanced ourselves from our musical peers.  Once we had completed the requirement for performance with the orchestra or band, many of us devoted our energies to learning pedagogy, methodology, conducting, and the basics of other instruments.  By our final semester we were rarely on campus, spending all our time instead in schools where we taught as student teachers.  There were plenty of education majors who continued to perform, but once I was out of the orchestra the only performances I cared about were those of my students.

I've never wanted to be a soloist.  I might have had fleeting dreams of such a life when I was younger, imagining myself sitting at a Steinway 9-foot grand on some stage, but I abandoned such flights of fancy once I realized how badly I wanted to be a teacher.  It wasn't an either-or situation, mind you.  It was simply a realization that a classroom is a far more exciting venue than a stage.  Besides, I never would have cut it as a professional performer.  When I was a young musician in a small town, I was pretty decent at my variety of instruments and didn't think much of it.  But once I started comparing myself to other musicians at statewide summer music camps and at college, I realized I just couldn't quite compete.  Conveniently, I had no interest in doing such a thing.

However, despite my aversion to performing a solo in the cello Master Class (the unsavory memories of which linger in the back of my mind like the smell of cigarettes in an old hotel room), I loved performing with the orchestra.  Loathed the audition process, despised the sectionals where, try as I might, I would inevitably be heard, but I loved the feeling of playing with so many other musicians.  I didn't care if I was last chair.  I just liked the experience of making music with a group of like-minded individuals.  It was like a group project that actually worked, and we all know the success rate of those in school.

The last time I played with the university's symphony orchestra, we played Tchaikovsky and I remember thinking as we neared the end of the piece I don't want this to end, because this may be my last opportunity to play such wonderful music with such talented musicians. I figured that any community orchestra wouldn't quite measure up to the caliber of music we performed regularly, because the only community orchestras I knew were good but still very amateur.  That performance, in December of 2010, was the last time I performed a concert with an orchestra.

There aren't many things I can say I absolutely love about New York, but one of the things I've discovered is that not only is there a community orchestra, but there are many.  And not only are they plentiful, but they're good!  

But the greatest part for me? That it is somewhere I am invited to belong.  Maybe it was just this particular ensemble, but I truly felt they were happy I was there.  People checked their personal bubbles at the door in favor of the more inclusive embrace of the orchestra, a refreshing change of pace from what I have experienced thus far.

I can't wait to go back.

Getting lost at the Da Capo

Rosh Hashanah (lit. "Head of the Year") has become one of my favorite holidays in the Jewish calendar.  It even beats out Hanukkah which, although fun, doesn't have quite the spiritual breadth and depth of Rosh Hashanah.  The Jewish New Year is celebrated as a two-day holiday which manages to encompass a wide variety of Jewish values: family, community, joy, prayer, and thanksgiving, as well as introspection, repentance, forgiveness, and humility.  And food.  Lots of food.  What kind of Jewish holiday would it be without food?

I've always enjoyed the spirit of the holiday and the symbols that are so ingrained in its celebration.  We eat apples dipped in honey to remind us that we should have a sweet new year, and we pour honey on our challah instead of dipping it in salt, for now is not a time for sadness.  The challah itself is shaped differently: Instead of being braided into a loaf, we make it into a round braid or spiral to emphasize the idea of continuity from one year to the next.  Traditionally we eat a new fruit on the holiday, and many people choose the pomegranate for this custom as it is rumored to have 613 seeds - equal to the number of commandments in the Torah.

And those are just the symbols at the dinner table!

Every year, I have celebrated Rosh Hashanah at home with my parents, my siblings, and whomever my mom invited to join us for either of the two festive meals.  Even as a college student, I always went home for the New Year.  There were some years where I debated, thinking maybe I would stay on campus instead of schlepping home, but ultimately I could never resist the comfort of spending this particular holiday with my family.  No matter where my roots were spreading, I always felt an unconscious desire, a need, to start the year at the beginning -- my beginning.

This year everything has turned topsy-turvy and my new home is some 800+ miles away, so I was faced with the opportunity to start a completely new beginning.  Yet another Da Capo moment!  But I realized about five hours too late that I wasn't prepared to "make Rosh Hashanah;" to account for the food, the timing, the traditional elements that always seemed to appear before me - like magic! - at home.  (Thanks, Mom!)  Realistically, I don't think there is any way I could have recreated any of my life's intimate experiences with this particular holiday even if I had tried.  For starters, Tomm is working a month of nights without any time off for the holidays, so big, festive meals in the evening were out of the question.  We did, however, do our best to make Wednesday night's dinner something worthy of the New Year, even if the holiday wasn't beginning until three hours later.  Pasta Primavera may not exactly be standard fare for such a meal, and unfortunately I completely forgot about the traditional pomegranate, but we blessed the grape juice, the round-ish challah, and the apples with honey, so it still counts, right?

After he left for work I went to shul for Maariv, the evening service.  I don't believe I have ever before attended the evening service before Rosh Hashanah.  Usually I was at home helping my mom prepare for guests.  I'm glad I went, though, because the small choir that supported the chazzan lent a great deal to my experience.  (For an orthodox synagogue to have anything resembling a choir is virtually unheard of to my knowledge.)  Yet despite the music - so grand and beautiful to behold and in stark contrast to my typical shul experience - it could not make up for what was lacking.  I didn't dwell on it, but in the back of my mind a thought, not fully-formed and more closely resembling a feeling, nagged at me.

The next two days I spent a great deal of time at the synagogue.  The services were about three hours longer than I would've anticipated, and the choir only sang for part of it.  But I was there, I recited the prayers, I heard the sounds of the shofar, and I sang along where I could.  Did I commune with G-d?  Not so sure.  Even less uncertain is the answer to the vexing question: Did I commune with the community?

Since moving here I've been feeling like I'm missing something in regards to the Jewish community.  I feel like more of an outsider than I really should be, and I can't help but contrast my largely uninspiring experiences here with the overwhelmingly positive experiences I grew up with.  With that in mind, I'd like to share an experience Tomm and I had on Friday night:

We had just arrived to the synagogue for the afternoon and evening prayers, quick services that would mark the end of Rosh Hashanah and the beginning of Shabbat.  It didn't seem the services had commenced so we dawdled outside the doors of the sanctuary for a minute.  An older gentleman with a long, straggly beard appeared and made some comment about the talk that was going on before the services.  Perhaps they were going longer than expected?  I asked him if they'd started the afternoon service yet and he said no, then - detecting either our accent or our uniquely Midwestern sense of kindness and civility - he asked us where we were from.  We told him about our respective hometowns and the city where we met.  "Oh! That's Twerskiville!" he announced, referencing the large Hasidic community on the West side of the city.  I attended shul there a couple times and I'm familiar with the rabbi, though I certainly wouldn't identify myself with him.  At any rate, this man had at least some idea of where I was from.

"Y'know," he said, "for people from out of town, meaning of course anywhere outside New York or Lakewood [NJ], it's different.  Jewish communities are more open, more welcoming out of town.  But in town, it's like there are too many people.  People don't notice you as much, it's not as much of a community.  When a place gets so big, it's easy for people to get--" and he reached over to point to a notice on the bulletin board.  LOST.

"But come, let's daven (pray)."  And with that he led us into the sanctuary.

Lost.  Precisely.  As this man spoke I looked at him and wondered how he had managed to so perfectly encapsulate my experiences up to this point.  He was an absolute stranger, but it was as if I was meant to cross his path so that he could give credence to the very feeling I had been trying to ignore.

The fact is, my presence in the synagogues around here has been largely ignored.  The mumbled "shana tova" (Happy New Year) or "gut shabbos" (a wish for a good Sabbath) exchanged with others are mere pleasantries said as quietly and unenthusiastically as we can.  I am not a part of this community and I am no closer to them than the black-hatted and bearded Hassids who breeze past me on the sidewalk with bristling indifference.

At both the congregations I've called home throughout my life, I went to shul to feel connected -- connected to others and by extension to G-d.  I went to shul to be counted, acknowledged, appreciated.  I went to feel part of something larger, holier than myself.  Singing out loud and saying the words that are so many hundreds of years old with my families - real or surrogate - surrounding me and singing with me was what made it a holy experience.

In music, especially when playing through a piece with an ensemble for the first time, reaching the words da capo at the end of the piece can be disabling.  Faced with the sudden change in direction, we may have to quickly turn a page or five only to reveal that the music's tempo, time signature, key signature, dynamics, and style have completely changed since the beginning.  Eventually we manage to get back on track, maybe even skipping a few measures of music between the da capo and the opening bars just to get our bearings.  But inevitably we catch our breath, return our focus to the music we make, and move forward.

This year, the da capo is certainly throwing me for a loop.  I seem to have lost the melody, and I'm looking at the conductor thinking Where the hell are you? but it's not too late to make something beautiful.  I just have to take a breath, pause for a moment, and find where I belong in the music.

L'Shana Tova u'metukah.  May you have a happy and sweet New Year.

Gainful Employment

After months of searching, resume submissions, cover letters, emails, and the occasional interview, I have finally landed a job!  Before you start getting too excited and congratulatory, I'd like to temper it by saying that this is a part time, after school job which will amount to fewer than 10 hours a week.  Still, it's a job in my field which will allow me to use my specific skill set with almost complete curricular freedom.

I'll be working in a public school in Manhattan which works with an outside organization to provide "extended day" school (a well-attended after-school program which extends the standard school day until 6:00 PM).  I was originally interviewed for the position of Community Educator, an entry-level position which would have placed me and a colleague with a specific classroom to work with them every day after school from 3:00 to 6:00.  After the final round of interviews I received a call from the organizer offering me a choice between the Community Educator position and that of an Activities Specialist: fewer hours a week, but greater pay per hour and would allow me to specifically teach music to students in grades K-2.  After some deliberation I decided that although I would not make as much per week as a specialist it was a far better career opportunity, so I took it.

I'm excited for this position for a variety of reasons.  One wonderful feature of the job is that I can pretty much teach whatever I'd like.  There is no curriculum set out, no specific objectives that the students must achieve, no expectations about concerts or other performances.  This freedom is exhilarating because it means that I can finally focus on musical concepts that I have, up until now, found very challenging to teach within the context of a standard school music program.  Namely composition and improvisation.  Without having a concert to prepare for (at least not one that's already scheduled), I can use this as a learning opportunity for me in addition to an exciting and fun class for the students.  Besides, the students already have a music teacher during the school day, so I want to be sure I'm not stepping on the other teacher's toes and focusing on exactly the same things she is.

The other reasons I'm excited for this position have much more to do with me than with the kids.  Call me selfish, but I'm excited to be getting out of the apartment, using my degree and experience in a productive way, making a little money, and hopefully making some friends.  Apparently there is research to support this kind of need for personal fulfillment, for when I looked up "gainfully employed" to make sure I was, in fact, spelling it correctly, I found a Wikipedia article all about it:

Gainful employment is a positive psychology concept that explores the benefits of work and employment. Second only to personal relationships, work is the most important determinant of quality of life.^[1][2] Over 7,855 articles were published on job satisfaction between the years of 1976-2000.

Turns out I'm not being selfish after all.  Upon reading this article, I learned that gainful employment is not just about making money; it's about job satisfaction, fulfillment, and all the other personal needs that a good occupation addresses.  While being employed might just mean "getting paid to do a job," gainful employment is about the kind of work that makes you want to go to work, the kind of job that makes you happy, and the kind of environment in which you enjoy growth, responsibility, empowerment, and positive relationships.

Thinking about my employment history it's easy for me to separate the jobs from the gainful employment.  Working at a grocery store part time?  A job.  I went, I worked, I got paid.  But every single time I had the opportunity to teach - whether I was making money or not - I felt that I was doing something worthwhile for my students, my colleagues, my superiors, and myself.

The Wikipedia article lists nine components of this particular brand of employment, and they are as follows:

1. Variety in duties performed
2. Safe working environment
3. Income for family and oneself
4. A purpose derived from providing a product or service
5. Happiness and satisfaction
6. Positive engagement and involvement
7. A sense of performing well and meeting goals
8. Friendships at work
9. An environment that respects and appreciates diversity

 I was surprised to read some of the items on this list.  For instance, the fact that the first component listed is "Variety in duties performed" seems odd to me from the perspective of an employee, especially one who has worked a number of jobs that had very few duties to perform.  Yet thinking about my best jobs, especially those in teaching, I realize that all of them included a wide variety of duties to perform, and instead of constantly feeling burdened or overwhelmed by the things I had to do, I was generally happy that going to work meant something a little different every day.  Or what about "Friendships at work"?  No wonder I've hated the summer jobs where I didn't get along well with my coworkers, even if my superiors and the customers were pleasant and enjoyable to work with.

Reading this list makes me consider not just my own employment history and career, but work in general.  In movies, television, media, and sitting at the bar on a Saturday night, people are often quick to complain about their jobs.  In college, my classmates working part-time jobs to pay for rent and tuition regularly groaned about their horrible bosses, the agonizingly mundane tasks they had to perform, the crappy hours, and all the other issues inherent in being at the bottom of the work ladder.  "But at least I have a job," they'd say, and it was true because without the money they made from that job, they couldn't have been studying to get the education necessary to ultimately make them gainfully employed.  Still, I have to wonder: is it worth it?

Is it worth it to work your tail off doing something you dislike as a means to an end?  Is it worth it to spend a third of your waking hours just waiting to leave?  Is it worth it to downright hate what you're doing and allow yourself to be unhappy and frustrated, even if the money made from that minimum wage job is an absolute necessity?

The fact of the matter is, sometimes we can't avoid working a job we don't like, which is rather sad when you consider how much of our lives are spent at our jobs and how desperately many of us need something, anything to pay for the other necessities in life.  So maybe the onus is on the higher ups, the bosses and supervisors and CEOs, to make sure their employees are, in fact, gainfully employed.  I don't know. I certainly can't provide a solution to the quagmire.  All I can do is ask questions.  So I ask...

Are you gainfully employed? 

A Stranger in a Strange Land

Growing up in a small town in Wisconsin which boasted a century-old Jewish community, Shabbat morning services were kind of a big deal.  My relationship with the community was built upon Torah readings, poorly but passionately sung Hebrew melodies, and the smell of herring at kiddush.  The weekly d'var torah (sermon) was our communal learning, and together we thrived in our small but dedicated congregation.  I never thought it odd that my sister and I were the only two kids in shul every week, and my sense of normal was very much shaped by the members who were at least two generations older.  As far as I knew, it was normal to go to shul every week and pray for a minyan (the required quorum of 10 to proceed with the service), normal to make changes to the service in order to suit the needs of our membership (like counting women for the minyan), normal to feel obligated to attend because my absence would be felt by every other congregant.  Spurred by my parents, my education, and my community, I was dedicated to my shul and loved it wholeheartedly.

Outside of the synagogue or my home, normal was being the only Jew around.  Unlike some young Jews in similar situations, I wore my religion like a badge of honor.  I gladly answered my classmates' and teachers' questions about my practices, dutifully did the extra work to make up for missed days of school around the High Holy Days, and enjoyed the respect that accompanied my uniqueness.  In a city overwhelmingly full of Catholics and Protestants, I loved being different.  To me, that was normal.

In college I enjoyed a slightly larger Jewish community, but even then I was still different.  I was nearly the only observant Jew in the music school, and the only consistent college-aged congregant at the shul a block away from campus.  Again I was surrounded by non-Jews in school and an older community at the synagogue (albeit younger on average than at home), and I knew I was right where I belonged.  It didn't bother me that I didn't have a close-knit group of Jewish friends with whom to share a Shabbos dinner or go out on Saturday nights.  In fact, I was markedly more comfortable in non-Jewish circles and preferred the feeling of adding to the diversity of a given group.

When I first moved to campus I was excited to participate in the Hillel (an organization for Jewish students on college campuses).  Surrounding myself once a week with other members of the Tribe was comforting.  Inside jokes passed freely among us, the kinds of jokes that our non-Jewish friends could never really understand.  We played Apples to Apples: Jewish Edition and laughed openly as we juxtaposed gefilte fish, Albert Einstein, and Jewish mothers and debated which one fit better with the adjective "misunderstood."  Yet while I was comfortable there, it was a decidedly atypical part of my sense of Jewish community.

There was, however, one unifying feature of all my Jewish interactions in Wisconsin: we knew we were all part of a much smaller community within the general public and as such, we made a point to include one another.  For what it was worth, many of us stuck together despite the unspoken feuds between various sects or followers of particular traditions.  Together we were part of the larger, global Jewish Community, and many of us honored that, at least among the Jews I knew.

In this neighborhood in Brooklyn, things are different...vastly different.  In fact, in New York City in general it seems easy to take our religion and practices for granted.  I'm still getting used to seeing Jews regularly in the subway, on the street, and in Ikea.  As I get used to this new reality, I also have to come to terms with the fact that being Jewish doesn't automatically grant you access into the Jewish community.  Apparently, when being Jewish is not unique and your existence doesn't threaten and isn't threatened by anyone else in the general public, there is no strong need to stick together just because you had a Bar or Bat Mitzvah in middle school.

Even in my search for a modern Orthodox synagogue in the neighborhood - where modern Orthodoxy has been pushed aside by the much larger and more conspicuous Charedi (ultra Orthodox) population - it's easy for my presence to be overlooked or ignored.  I'm just another Jew; nothing special about that, right?  Besides, the synagogue isn't the only place around here where you spend time with your Jewish neighbors, so even the importance of participation in the service is diminished.

I have to keep reminding myself that what I am witnessing and experiencing is more-than-likely specific to my neighborhood.  In fact, I spoke with a man (modern Orthodox) who works in the neighborhood but lives in a different one altogether, and he described this area as being uniquely unfriendly at times.  People have their own lives, their own personal bubbles, and according to him it's not unusual for them to be standoffish even to those they see daily as they run their errands and go about their lives.  Additionally, I may find that in synagogues with younger membership I will be more immediately accepted.  Who knows?  My experience is exceptionally limited for the time being and I can't let my current opinions define my entire outlook.

The hard part is that in order to find those synagogues where I will feel more comfortable, I might have to travel into the the neighboring areas or even into Manhattan.  This brings up a whole slew of issues to take into consideration, a discussion which I will reserve for another blog post altogether.  In the meantime, I'll use the upcoming Jewish New Year and the Days of Awe to think more deeply about what my Judaism means to me in my new environment, and perhaps to redefine my concept of "normal."

Introducing Clara

As promised, I would like to share with you the finale of our Mouse Saga.  After the long, arduous, and less-than-fruitful chase over the course of nearly a month, the story has indeed come to its end.  With its end comes a new beginning, which can be summed up nicely in the following statements:

Our new cat is home.

The mouse is gone.

The two statements are unrelated.

Before regaling you with the story of our newest addition, I'll start with the mouse's exit.  We came home with Clara and followed her around as she began sniffing and exploring her new environment.  As we wandered into the kitchen, Tomm heard a noise and wondered if it had come from Clara.  Noticing her silence, he looked instead to the shelving unit which has been the central focus of our mouse hunt and there, in the selfsame basket as the one which started the whole debacle, was the mouse stuck pitifully on a glue pad!

After Monday morning's near-catch, I put one of the month-old glue pads into the basket figuring at least it wouldn't be any less successful there.  The mouse had done a good job of avoiding them for the last month but hey, what the hell.  That morning just before leaving for the shelter, the exterminator came by and threw a few poison packets behind the refrigerator and stove and gave me a handful of large sticky pads.  I wasn't terribly keen on the idea of poison, but something had to be done.

So imagine our surprise when we returned early in the afternoon to find the mouse trapped of its own accord on a little plastic dish of goo that had been sitting in our kitchen for weeks!  This is quite possibly the most anti-climactic ending I could have envisioned for the story. 

It's probably a good thing the mouse found it's way out just as Clara found hers in, because with all the attention she's claiming for herself there'd be none left to bother with the mouse!  She is a four-year-old Russian Blue who has been in at least two shelters over the last couple months.  I don't know much of her story before that, but she is very comfortable with people and is making herself at home quite nicely.  I should also mention that neither Tomm nor I have ever had a cat before, so this is a brand new experience for both of us.  I just hope we do it right!

The shelter had named her Gracey for no particular reason, so we spent the train ride home trying to think of our own name for her.  I started by thinking categorically and considered composers' names.  There aren't a whole lot of well-known classical female composers, but the first to pop into my mind was Clara Schumann, the wife of Robert Schumann.  While I enjoy Clara's strikingly beautiful music, I've never listed her among my favorites (like Tchaikovsky, Shostakovitch, or Brahms) because I've never performed her works or studied it in great detail.  I held the name in the back of my mind as we explored other options, some cute and reasonable, others funny and downright embarrassing for a cat.  At one point on the train, I said "Tush!  We could name her Tush!" Tomm smiled and at that moment a young religious Jewish man sitting across from us said "You do know what that means, don't you?"  "Yes, we do," I laughed.  I tried to convince him I knew my way around Jewish vocabulary, but I don't think he was convinced either of us were members of the Tribe.  Oh well.  

By the time we arrived at home the name Clara had been repeated numerous times, bobbing up to the surface like a ball in a pool between every new ball we threw in.  Ultimately, we decided that the little terrified cat inside the box Tomm carried was, in fact, Clara.  The composer, however, was merely the inspiration and not the true eponym.

After cautiously crawling out of the box, she spent a lot of time sniffing and exploring in between hiding under the bed.  I don't blame her, really.  Later that afternoon Tomm had to leave for a night shift at work (the first night of a full month with that schedule), and a few hours later I left to audition for a community orchestra in Manhattan.  I was a little concerned about leaving Clara alone, but when I returned the apartment was just as I had left it, complete with Clara meowing loudly in the hallway.  I imagined her saying "Why did you leave me?!" over and over again, so I spent the next number of hours curled up with her on the bed while I finished a book.  She enjoyed pawing and kneading the crocheted afghan on the bed and even held it securely by her teeth as she worked her paws, stretching and extending the claws then curling up the paw, right then left then left.  I hope that blanket can survive the gentle but consistent abuse.

When I finally went to sleep, I hoped that Clara might stay with me throughout the night, but I seem to have forgotten that cats are very much nocturnal animals.  With Clara, that means jumping off the bed once every hour and meowing loudly for my attention.  As a new parent I woke up every time, sometimes following her into the living room before returning to the bed where she joined me, if only momentarily.  At some point I'm sure I'll learn to tune out her chitter chatter, but as I strive to understand what she's trying to tell me I'm afraid to miss a single word.

It's only been a day and already I'm in love with this cute and quirky cat of ours, and I wouldn't be surprised if she became a regular feature of this blog.  I hope you won't mind!

The Mouse That Lived

It all started about one month ago when I reached for a granola bar from the basket I'd put them in only to find that one had been nibbled on, wrapper and all.  A Nature Valley Chocolate Peanut Butter crunchy bar with a corner conspicuously missing.  I tossed it in the garbage and decided not to fuss.  Maybe it was a one-time thing, I reasoned.  Besides, Tomm had had a few consecutive rough days at work and I saw no need to bring up yet another issue.

The next morning I checked the basket and again I found the unmistakable marks of a small rodent with an appetite for chocolate peanut butter granola bars.  Alright, I decided, now it's worth fussing over.  I put the unchewed bars in a Ziploc bag and left the evidence for Tomm to see.

(A few days later, I also noticed a small hole chewed through the Ziploc housing a few half-emptied bags of chocolate chips I'd saved for baking.  Sure enough, the mouse had gotten all the way to the chocolate and had torn through those bags as well.)

Action had to be taken, but having never had a mouse in my kitchen before I didn't quite know what to do.   I hemmed and hawed for a day until one night when Tomm was on call.  I walked into the kitchen, flipped on the light, and saw a small, gray blur scurry along the floor to the safety of the stove.  Now, I will tell you with complete honesty and not a hint of hubris that a mouse - even the idea of a mouse - does not frighten me in the least.  It doesn't creep me out, unnerve me, or scare. It doesn't even repulse me.  But when something moves very quickly in a place where you expect silence and stillness, it can make a person jump.  Once my brain calmed my rapidly beating heart, I decided to investigate.  With a flashlight in hand I scanned the spaces around the oven - behind it, on the side by the wall, and underneath.  Nothing (except a significant deposit of crud from goodness knows how many tenants before us).  I looked at the door under the oven housing the broiler pan and, girding myself with resolve, I got down on the floor.  Preparing the flashlight, I opened it slowly.  There, caught in the beam, was a pair of tiny black eyes sunk into a fuzzy face.  We stared at one another for a few seconds.  I made the mistake of breaking contact first to look for something to catch it, and when I looked back a second later it had vanished swiftly into the night.  Or, more likely, into the wall.

I sat on the floor of the kitchen determined to catch it that night.  I had taken a long nap that day and as far as I was concerned nothing could deter me from keeping a night-long vigil.  I heard scratching sounds from the wall and thought certainly the mouse would try to come back and there I would be, ready and waiting for it to appear.  Of course, I also realized that a trap might work better than my own reflexes, so I looked up some ideas online and found a rather simple but ingenious (and humane) trap suggestion.  I set it up with some granola bar bits as bait and, confident it would work, went to sleep somewhere around 3:00 am.

As I'm sure you've guessed, the trap was worthless.  We tried it on a couple of other nights, and it was equally worthless every time.  So the next day we went to buy some "real" mouse traps.  Standing in the isle at the 99 cent store, we were faced with two main choices: spring-loaded killing machines, or sticky pads of punishment.  We decided to try out the sticky pads first, and we strategically placed four of them around the kitchen.  After a couple days, we hadn't caught a mouse but we also didn't see any signs of the mouse's presence.  Even if we weren't getting rid of the problem, we figured that the problem was rid of us and so we were placated.

Of course, this was only temporary.

Signs of the  mouse reappeared a week later in the form of bread and bagels gnawed on through their plastic bags.  We moved the sticky pads around, baited them a little, tried the trash can trap again, all to no avail.  One day I caught the mouse scurrying again.  The last straw, though, was when we set the table for dinner last week and noticed a few small and rather unsavory brown bits on the otherwise clean plates.  This mouse had to go.

I bought the spring loaded death machines the next day and set them with peanut butter around the kitchen.  Nothing.  I tried arranging it in the basket (which no longer held granola bars) with a slice of bread.  The mouse just ate half of the bread. And then last Friday as I was baking a cake for Shabbat dinner, I needed to get some ingredients from the shelf of the linen closet that we had reserved as a pantry space. I opened the door just in time to see the mouse sitting on the middle of the shelf amid bags of pasta, beans, flour, and sugar before it ran to the back and disappeared.  Oh goodness, the damage it had done.  It had found its way into all the pasta and, to my dismay, both of the bags of chocolate chips I had bought to replace the ones I had to throw out before.  It left behind partially-chewed remnants of packaging as well as its own little "gifts," all of which I cleaned out.  There was no sign of the mouse anywhere else in that closet, but I moved one of the death traps to that shelf (after putting all the food in a Rubbermaid container) and added a chocolate chip to the peanut butter that was still on the release from days earlier.  In fact, I sprinkled chocolate chips on and around the other two traps as well, thinking surely I would catch it this time.

The rest of that afternoon, the mouse started getting ballsy.  I would sit at the computer and see a slow movement out of the corner of my eye.  Was that a dust bunny that just blew in the corner?  Nope, that was the mouse's tail disappearing behind a box in the living room.  Moved the couch, and the mouse sprinted from it to the other wall.  Go to where it had gone and suddenly there was no sign of it.  Back to the computer.  A little later, I saw the mouse go into the kitchen.  Followed it.  Nothing.  All afternoon that mouse crept around the apartment, running mousy circles around me, taunting me with every pass from the pantry to the living room to the kitchen.  It was Hide and Go Seek, and the mouse was winning.  At one point I saw it sitting in the hallway in front of the entrance to the kitchen, looking at me.  I swear I caught it sneering at me before vanishing into the kitchen for the third time that afternoon.

I began to feel like the little, neurotic chef from Ratatouille, convinced I was seeing a rodent who was doing its very best to trick me into believing exactly the opposite.

The next evening we checked the traps.  Nearly all the chocolate chips were gone, but the trap was otherwise untouched.  I blamed myself for not really sticking the chips into the peanut butter, so it must have been pretty easy for the mouse to grab without setting off the trap.  I reset them, this time truly embedding the chocolate chip, certain that now if the mouse wanted the chocolate, the act of wresting it out of the thick peanut butter would lead to its demise.

When we checked the traps again on Sunday night, we had decidedly reached the final final straw (all those other final straws were merely precursors).  Not only did the chocolate chip disappear from each trap, BUT THE PEANUT BUTTER WAS COMPLETELY GONE AS WELL!  The mouse had strategically gnawed, chewed, and licked the traps clean of all food, all without tripping the trigger on a single one.  Oh ho ho, little mousy.  Well done.  I'll give you that.

At this point Tomm and I decided we should invite the exterminator to take care of the problem professionally, but we don't have the direct number for our building's exterminator who comes twice a month, and the super wasn't around all day Sunday.  He didn't return my call on Monday, either.  But around 1:30 on Monday morning I was awoken from my slumber with sounds of a disturbance in the kitchen.  I thought I heard a SNAP, but then I heard a few more similar sounds and realized we simply didn't have that many traps set out.  I heard a little more rustling and went to investigate.

I turned the light on in the kitchen and nothing moved.  I checked all the spots I would normally see the mouse before it ran, and it wasn't anywhere.  I looked in the pantry and found nothing.  Back in the kitchen, I heard a rustling again and looked down to find the mouse desperately trying to hide behind the leg of a metal shelving unit with one of the old sticky traps on its back.  FINALLY!  I went toward it and held it down by the black plastic of the pad while it continued to try frantically to escape.  How would I actually get it, I wondered?  I couldn't pick it up with my bare hands, and I simply could not bring myself to squish it.  This mouse had caused trouble and eaten my food, sure, but it was still a living, breathing, terrified little creature and I didn't have the resolve to just kill it on my own.

I was shaken out of my existential crisis by the mouse who managed to pull away from me toward the back of the refrigerator.  The trap on its back kept it from moving away entirely, but it pulled and dislodged itself partially from the sticky pad, attached now only by its tail.  Oh no!  I had to find something to catch it with, hold it in, and when I went back to the mouse and tried pulling it toward me with the sticky pad, it pulled free completely and was gone.

I had practically held the mouse in the palm of my hand and it got away!  It left patches of fur on the sticky pad but it was alive and presumably still planning on returning.  I waited around in the kitchen for a while longer with a flashlight and a large bowl, hoping to trap it should I see it again, but my impatience and fatigue got the better of me and, defeated, I humbly sulked back to bed.

I'm still hoping to hear back from the super, but in the meantime we're getting a cat.  We're very excited about getting a pet and we're certainly not looking specifically for a mouser, but if this cat happens to gift me a lifeless rodent, I won't be disappointed.

Besides, I hear mousy heaven has plenty of chocolate chips.

Around the Shabbos [buffet] Table

I've mentioned before that I don't have any close friends or family who live here in New York, but Tomm does have a few and this week one of those friends invited us over for Shabbat dinner at his place on the Upper West Side.  It would be a bit of a schlep for us, and Tomm warned me that this friend of his (a former roommate from college) could sometimes take a little getting used to, but I was excited to do something outside the apartment and, what's more, with people my age.  That and it meant I would get a week off from cooking Shabbos dinner.  Don't get me wrong, I really enjoy cooking and I especially love preparing such an important meal, but sometimes it's nice to let someone else do it.  Of course, I couldn't go empty-handed so I baked a lemon olive oil Bundt cake for dessert, which turned out to be quite a crowd pleaser!

The journey would have taken about an hour by train had we planned it perfectly, but in reality it was closer to an hour and a half.  We didn't mind, and our host was utterly nonplussed at our tardiness, especially since we weren't nearly the last ones there.  All in all, there were around a dozen of us, all somehow friends with the host but many of us strangers to one another.  I felt good knowing that I wasn't the only one meeting new people, and what's more, I was in the company of very like-minded 20-somethings among whom the conversation flowed effortlessly and endlessly.

I quickly got into a conversation with an exceptionally kind woman who works as a linguist.  As it turns out, one of her primary second languages is French, in which I have a minor!  Though we didn't immediately switch to speaking in a language nobody else in the room would have understood, we did swap suggestions for French films and talk about how we absolutely must get together for home-cooked French food.  Her husband meandered over to Tomm at one point and commented on our sudden friendship, to which they both agreed "Now we just sit here quietly and let them talk."  Such understanding men we have!

The group as a whole was rather interested to hear about where I came from, and humorously impressed when I jokingly slipped into a thick Wisconsin accent.  I laughed when someone spoke of "the country" as a place where "there is dew on the grass," as opposed to my definition which involves cow excrement and bales of hay.  Yet even greater than our differences were our similarities, and I lost myself in the stories we told, forgetting that I was hearing them in a studio apartment just west of Central Park.  Still, I was thrilled by the opportunity to play the role of the small-town-girl-in-the-Big-City and to feel empowered by my experiences rather than dismissed for my naivete (the latter being a sentiment which I'm sure is internally, rather than externally motivated).  

It was one of those evenings, and one of those groups, where there were at least five conversations going on independently at any given moment.  If there was a lull in your own it wasn't hard to jump into another and be welcomed immediately, so long as you had a good story to share.  The good food, good drink, and good company kept us there much later than either of us had intended, but it was all worth it and made for an excellent night's sleep.  

Though I'd never want to live on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, it's good to know there are plenty of people there with wide smiles, good stories, and a couple extra seats around the Shabbos table.  Someday soon I hope to return the favor.