For the past 5 or so years, September has been a particularly busy month for me. School starting, multiple weekend festival gigs with Clan Du, and the High Holidays. Now college is over and Clan Du is on hiatus, but I still attend Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur services in some form, somewhere. This year was one of the very few spent away from home (I think I only went to services at Brandeis my first year, and didn’t so much care for them) and to try and sum it all up, while I did miss some aspects of my home temple “scene,” the change was very welcome. A new town and community, a new “service buddy,” my Uncle Sam, a new rabbi and cantor with new things to say. I even got to be glilah yesterday afternoon at services and dressed the Torah. I don’t remember the last time I did that, or if I’ve even done it –ever-, but I had help. It was nice to be even a small part of the services at this temple I had been going to these past 10 days.
Rewind to Friday night… some excellent Indian food at Natraz with Rob. The dance room at Bruxelle’s was –scarily- dead later on when we went out, but at least Rob, Dylan and I got some choice renditions of the Doors’ “Alabama Song” in, wandering around Nyack from bar to bar (as we had been planning… you think I’m joking…).
Saturday we hit an Octoberfest at Bear Mountain Park. The weather wasn’t great, but we made the most of it. It started out as Rob, Mat, Kevin, myself, and Rob and Kevin’s friends Dan and Casey. But then Adam and Yael drove up and joined us, followed by Caroline, her daughter Emma, and Renia. We had a nice time, drinking good beer, eating knockwurst, potato salad and some rather profound WAFFLES, and hucking around the (real) frisbee, thanks to Dan. What else… I must’ve heard the “chicken dance” 5 times throughout the day… Dan got screwed on this contest he entered where you got to jam along with the band on some horn instrument that looked like a long hose with a… well, horn, attached on the end… Rob was the superstar of the afternoon, successfully playing frisbee with us as well as outfielding for a nearby family baseball game… yup. Goodness. We left when it started raining, but the good times kept rolling for me… that night Ines, Mike, Roberta and I hit the Cheesecake Factory for diiiiins. “Really, the only word for it is… mmmmgaaaaahhh.”
Kevin, Dan, Casey, Rob.
Mateus chugs!And Sunday night to Monday was Yom Kippur. Services and fasting from dinner to dinner. Uncle Sam and I caught the tail end of Kol Nidrei being played by a cellist and violinist prior to Sunday night services, which was nice, especially since this is a tradition at my temple, although the violinist had some slight intonation issues. Monday morning we decided to walk to the temple since it was so damn nice out. The rabbi continued his sermon theme from Rosh Hashanah and this time spoke about the importance of loving the stranger “within.”
Two friends are in a bar, drinking, having a good time. One turns to the other and says, “I love you.” The other looks slightly puzzled and responds “No you don’t. How can you say such a thing when I have not bared my soul to you?"
I’m not going to delve into this any further here, but suffice it to say, this really strikes a chord with me.
And finally… I beat my cousin Josh at ping-pong (albeit “General Grievous”-style… don’t even ask) which means I am now RANKED! Whoo! Number 8 baby!
This entry is a bit like an episode of Scrubs, huh? The abrupt juxtaposition of the fun and the serious? It even throws –me- off a bit… but that’s how it came out of my head.
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