It’s the head of the year, which is what Rosh Ha-Shanah literally means. A time for dipping apples in honey, new year’s resolutions, self-reflection and commitment to change and new beginnings. Let me rewrite that: it’s the head of the year in the year of the pandemic. So how is that different?
Many of us won’t be sharing delicious food with our families on these Jewish High Holidays, instead raising a glass and dipping our apples virtually via Zoom. Some of us will attend virtual services too; my synagogue is offering pre-assigned socially-distanced seating inside the synagogue, a tent for those who prefer to gather outdoors and online streamed services for those who don’t want to gather in person. We’ll be in the last category. It will be weird not to give everyone a hug or at least a hearty Hag Sameach (happy holidays).
But we’ll still do an outdoors Tashlich, where we symbolically cast away our sins onto the water, always an eyebrow-raising sight for the non-Jews who watch us toss our breadcrumbs into the Harbour. Maybe some of us will share this experience virtually with family around the world – Facetime atonement anyone?
Our thoughts and prayers might feel different too this year. Who will live, who will die, who by water, who by COVID? Prayers circling the earth for a speedy discovery of a safe and effective vaccine, for numbers to go down and not up, and for our loved ones to stay healthy and strong. A year ago as we wrapped ourselves in our familiar prayer shawls, could any of us have imagined such prayers?
It’s almost the end of my year of turning 60. Next month it will be twelve months since I decided to go back to school, start a blog, write a book, travel to Israel and Lithuania, chant again my Haftorah, and hire a wonderful woman to translate 80+ pages from Yiddish to English, my 60th project. The documents are newsy letters from home, written to a brother and sister who made Aliyah, moving to Palestine in the 1930’s. In this year of so much uncertainty we were amazed to meet the letter writers’ descendants in Israel, relatives of Shimon and his mother. My translator’s coming to the end of these letters that I found online, and I can’t wait to read the final batch. But I will have to wait to retrace the family’s steps in Vilna, using the letters and my mother-in-law’s stories to find addresses in the maze of the Ghetto’s cobblestone streets.
A letter dated 11 September 1931 contained New Year greetings from mother (Beyla) to her son Hananiah in Palestine: “May dear G-d grant you everything you desire for the New Year so that you’re able to sort yourself out and don’t have to work so hard….Business isn’t great, but compared to others we’re doing well. We’re fed and live in warmth and cleanness and have no debts. This year I haven’t saved any money…Have a good and happy year and have a good time. When we’re invited to people for holidays, we always drink to your health and remember you.” New Year’s greetings haven’t changed much; Beyla’s words remind me of blessings for our family that I’ve mailed in my own cards.
Then there’s this PS wish from almost 90 years ago to big brother from his 6th grade little sister: “I’m sending you a Rosh Hashanah card for the New Year. Keep well. From your sister Etele Gurvitz. Greet everyone who’s left for Eretz Israel. Be strong!” (Could she have imagined our masked kids heading off to school, struggling under their heavy backpacks)?
Like us, Etele and Beyla didn’t know what was about to come crashing into their world, for just a year later, the beloved son in Palestine would die saving someone in a terrible accident. And only ten years later, the letter writers would be lost to the killing pits of Lithuania, having endured years of war, imprisonment in the Ghetto, separation, forced labour camps and loss of their home and businesses.
Their words remain. And I’m excited that soon, many others besides me will be able to read these poignant letters, should Yad Vashem make the English translations available on their website.
They wrote about normal everyday life, family times, and the anticipation of holidays; all things to remember to be thankful for as I mentally make a pandemic blessings list:
· It could be worse – Nova Scotia has relatively few cases and so far, thank G-d, our family here and elsewhere is all healthy.
· We have had work; like Beyla, we haven’t managed to save any money either, but, we’re getting by (thanks, clients!).
· There’s plenty to eat, drink and wear and we’re warm too, lucky to have a roof over our heads and we are learning to recycle, re-use and be even more thankful for all we have.
· Having a loving husband (who is an ace BBQer) to go through the pandemic with (30 years!).
· We’re eating better (sorry, restaurant friends!), and thinking more about how we spend money, time and energy.
· Another summer with my Mum, including waterfront strolls, fish and chips and telling family stories while looking at old photos.
· Our trip to Israel with family and celebrating my mother-in-law’s 91st birthday – there and back three weeks before their first diagnosed cases of COVID.
· Technology has allowed us to pray each week with fellow Jews, have virtual medical appointments, teach, connect more with family and friends (yay for Zoom Shabbat dinners!), and take me to school and online learning.
· Good friends have helped us make a plan to renovate my grandparents’ house.
· New MFA writer colleague friends who rock!
· Six months of live performances before the lock down.
· Having a backyard to eat in, relax in, grow flowers in.
· Slow days on the beach, staring at the waves & watching the hermit crab
.
So, lots to celebrate in this unusual year, including more writing and many good books and teachers.
L’shanah tovah to you and yours – may we all be signed and sealed for a sweet new year in the Book of Life, remembering to live in all its blessed moments.
Comments