Author: Rabbi Sharon Forman

Categories
gender equality lifelong learning Rabbis

Spiritual Lessons from the Exercise Bicycle

We’re not big romantics in our house, and in a good year, Valentine’s Day may consist of a card featuring golden retriever puppies and a vase filled with pink flowers. But a few weeks ago in honor of this Hallmark-generated holiday, my husband decided to help keep our middle-aged hearts healthy by investing in a home exercise bicycle. Unlike me, my husband is extremely disciplined in his diet and his commitment to physical fitness. I, however, was raised by a mom who believed that Jewish people should exercise their brains and leave cultivation of physical brawn to lesser minds. It’s hard to shake that kind of bias, even as an adult who understands the importance of maintaining a sound body. Of course I want to be in good working order, to be healthy and strong. I’m just not all that coordinated, and I have never been able to find a compelling exercise regimen. In honor of this pagan love festival, though, and for the sake of my heart, I relented and tried one of the streaming exercise classes that was an integral part of this biking experience.
Grudgingly, I approached the spinning bicycle. At first, I couldn’t even put the shoes on properly. Yes, I could handle the Velcro straps at the top of the shoes, but the bottom strap was a bit more complicated and required simultaneous tugging and pressing down on a lever. Clipping my fancy shoes into the pedals was tougher than tap dancing, but one of my sons managed to guide my feet into the correct spots until we heard the reassuring click.  Finally, I selected a class from a menu of incredibly fit instructors. Touted as a beginner’s class, the half hour would have resulted in a brain hemorrhage if I had not modified my input. Daunted, but not defeated, I promised myself that I would try again.
The next day, armed with a larger water bottle and a better attitude, I selected a different instructor. This class went much better, although I still needed to adjust my workout so that I didn’t feel light-headed. I found a computer generated “leader board” ranking my progress against 15,000 other riders to be a demoralizing nuisance, so I slid it off of the screen. This instructor spent time talking about how the bicycle worked, how to hold my back in a more comfortable posture, how to breathe. She told us to listen to our own breathing, push enough, but not hurt ourselves. I was tired and shaky after this ride, too, but I was willing to try again the next day.
As a newbie to the exercise bike, testing out the various instructors has been eye opening. Of course, being an instructor for Peloton, Soul Cycle, or Fly Wheel is not the same as being a rabbi. Yet, there are some fascinating lessons that I’ve learned in my brief foray into biking classes that relate to both leading an exercise class and religious services.
  1. Don’t judge an instructor by her outfit, and try not to judge a rabbi by the way she looks.  Initially, I wanted to reject every perky, Barbie doll looking instructor with the “I Dream of Jeannie” ponytails (okay, they all have those high, endlessly shiny hairdos). I just felt frumpy watching them and expected them to be ditzy. Some fulfilled my expectations and were, in fact, annoying. They posed for the camera, smiled like they were on a Disney kids’ show waiting for a canned laugh, and giggled through some of the class. Not my cup of tea. Yet, other instructors who looked equally beautiful had intelligent comments about breathing, stretching, and fitness in general.  As a female rabbi, I know that many of us, especially, are judged by our appearance. We’re told that our hair is too long or too short, too natural or too processed. We desperately need to wear some lipstick or wear way too much makeup. Our suits look boring, or our dresses are too distracting. Take a breath, and try not to let the appearance get in the way of what a rabbi (or an exercise instructor) is supposed to do.
  2. A rabbi cannot be all things to all people. Peloton would never hire just one instructor to teach all of its classes. One teacher is a biking expert, another has a background as a professional dancer. Some instructors tell you to sing along to the music, and other teachers tell you that if all you want to do is sing to take another class. One instructor shared a cute story about how her daughter helped pick the playlist for the class, and other instructors don’t seem particularly kid friendly. Rabbis are like this, as well. Some rabbis are more intellectual, others love to sing, and others are all about forming a community. We expect our rabbis to somehow fulfill the needs of every congregant simultaneously. There’s just no way this is a reasonable expectation.
  3. The exercise bike experience also taught me something important about leading services for congregants. As the person directing the pace of the prayers, we need to understand that some of the worshippers may be first-timers. They may not even know metaphorically how to clip in their shoes, and we expect them to keep up a ridiculously high speed when they are on the verge of passing out spiritually. Everyone comes to synagogue for her or his own reason. We can’t expect our congregants to engage fully if we are not engaging in the class right along with them. How can a biking instructor or a rabbi know if the resistance is too difficult if he or she is simply looking ahead to announce the next element of the class or service?
  4. So far, every instructor I’ve tuned in to has encouraged riders to “open your heart.” In exercise and in religion, this advice is pretty much on target. And the only leader board you need to worry about is the one in your own mind. I’ll keep up the beginner rides when my kids go back to school next week, but maybe someone out there could please help me get those shoes out of the pedals.

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Rabbi Sharon Forman serves Westchester Reform Temple and was a contributor to CCAR Press’s The Sacred Encounter: Jewish Perspectives on Sexuality.

Categories
parenting

Blessing Up: A Chanukah Lesson

At a Shabbat service led by two b’nei mitzvah students in my congregation, I was lulled into a meditative frame of mind. As if following a rigid script, the young people chanted from the Torah, led the set prayers in English and Hebrew, and presented divrei Torah to the community according to a formulaic outline. Then, after one of the students wound down his presentation describing his mitzvah project and expressing words of thanks to parents, siblings, guests, teachers, and clergy, he appeared to finish his speech. I waited for the requisite, “Shabbat Shalom,” and thumbed through the prayerbook to locate the concluding prayers of the service. Pausing, the bar mitzvah boy looked up from his typed words and radiated an impish smile. He gazed at the congregation, pointed both index fingers toward the heavens, and finished his speech with a loud exhortation, “Bless up!”

I had never heard of that particular expression before that moment. It reminded me of something a professional athlete might intone in preparation for a big game. Since that day, I’ve thought about the phrase more than a few times. Did the bar mitzvah boy mean we should bless God, who dwells up on high? Perhaps the expression means that it’s time to make a blessing and be grateful for the gifts we have that we are taking out of God’s realm and drawing into our own spheres. Maybe he thought he was being cool and funny by calling the congregation to prayer with slang in the midst of a formal service?

With the imminent arrival of Chanukah, this young man’s expression has re-entered my consciousness. Reviewing one of the famous disagreements between the schools of Rabbi Hillel and Rabbi Shammai (Talmud, Shabbat 21b:5-6), we recall that on Chanukah, we add an additional light for each night of the festival, as instructed by Hillel. While the modest sage’s rival, Shammai, favored kindling a brilliant array of lights on the first night and then deducting a candle or light as each night passed, Hillel would kindle lights corresponding to the outgoing days. By crowning Hillel as the victor in this conflict of opinions, the Talmud has ruled that when we light a chanukiyah, we, too, are supposed to “bless up.”

Just two weeks ago, I shared a very slow-moving elevator with a 96-year-old man and his 94-year-old wife. I asked them how they were getting along, and the gentleman looked at me, shook his head with caution, and instructed, “Take my advice, don’t get old.” The couple shuffled off of the elevator and made their way together, as I processed the jarring conversation. This man who was almost a century old probably did not feel good, may have suffered profound personal losses of friends and family members who predeceased him, and could have been suffering from a number of ailments and worries. He looked ahead at his days and may have wondered if positive, joyful experiences awaited him. Like the darkening chanukiya of Shammai, this nonagenarian’s opinion about life and joy corresponded to the incoming days, and the lights dwindled for him.

Downcast, I reminisced about my grandmother, who passed away at almost 102 years old. She enthusiastically complained about her failing eyesight, mourned the parents, siblings, husband, and friends she had lost, and lamented the insults of aging. Yet, she retained her gratitude and her sense of humor, joking that the Malach Ha-Mavet had lost track of her because she had moved to an assisted living facility in Mason, Ohio. For the time being, she was tricking death by living in a town that sounded eerily similar to the Ashkenazic pronunciation of Meitim — dead ones, and so the Angel of Death had assumed he had already visited her. I learned from this grandmother and my other grandparents, as well, to ascribe to the school of Hillel, and focus on the light of the outgoing days.

The Talmud instructs us to elevate to a higher level and never to downgrade in matters of sanctity. May we internalize the lesson of Hillel and find increasing light and joy in the progression of time. May we find strength in our days, and may we all grow very old with vigor and goodness in a world of peace.

Oh, yeah, and to quote a very wise bar mitzvah student, remember this Chanukah to always “bless up!”

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Rabbi Sharon Forman serves Westchester Reform Temple and was a contributor to CCAR Press’s The Sacred Encounter: Jewish Perspectives on Sexuality.

Categories
Death Rabbis

Do it Yourself Goodbyes

“Daddy can fix anything,” my children brag, whenever I fail to manipulate a stubborn valve on my twelve-year-old’s clarinet or silence a menacing hiss from the pump in our fish tank. Of course they are correct. My husband and his family are proud do-it-yourself types: shoveling their own snow; filing complicated tax returns without assistance; and even lubricating the beast-like sewage ejector pumps that dwell in our basement. In a textbook case of opposites attracting, I had been raised in a family that excused ignorance in the basics of lawn mower or doorbell repair by claiming genetic links to centuries of preoccupied Talmud scholars.

At eighty-five years old, my mother-in-law refused to accept any help caring for her home or her ninety-four year old husband. Married almost fifty-two years, they tended to each like binary stars caught in each other’s gravitational pull. Each evening after dinner, they would clean their dishes, take out the garbage, and set the table once more in preparation for breakfast. In the first week of March, my father-in-law collapsed before he could sit down at the tidily set table for his morning coffee. The doctors told my mother-in-law to prepare to say goodbye. After being given this devastating news, my mother-in-law called me.

“In the event that he dies, he wanted you to give the eulogy,” my mother-in-law informed me in a strong, clear voice.

“What about the service? Have you called your rabbi?” I inquired, as my nose started to run, and my throat closed a bit.

“Our rabbi has that South American accent. Henry could never understand a word he said. You can read a few prayers, can’t you? Please.” She was asking me to lead the funeral.

Although for more than two decades my professional work has focused on Jewish education, I am an ordained reform rabbi. It’s not such a leap to think that I could officiate at my own father-in-law’s funeral. But I’ve always been rather shy, more comfortable leading a discussion in the classroom than standing in front of a congregation chanting prayers or giving a sermon.  I’ve officiated at funerals before, but most of the life-cycle events in which I participate are joyful ones. Weddings, Bar and Bat Mitzvah celebrations, and baby-naming ceremonies can be scheduled months in advance to coordinate with little league baseball playoffs or All County band. Graveside prayers often interfere with school pick-up and Hebrew school carpool. And they make me cry, even when I have not met the deceased.

“Are we really going to have a do-it-yourself funeral for Henry?” I asked my mother-in-law.

“He was a quiet man. He wouldn’t want a long service. No more than ten minutes,” she instructed me.

When one of the fish dies in that tank of ours, it takes me at least five minutes to provide a proper send off. “This purple and yellow fairy fish lived here for two years darting around the rocks and corals with the blue damsel. May she return to the large sea, and may her memory help us treasure the beauty of this world.”  Then, one of the kids flushes the toilet, and we make sure no one else is missing an eyeball due to white spot disease or “ick.”

I didn’t want to give my father-in-law any less of a tribute than I would do for a fish. Almost a generation older than my own dad, Henry was more like a grandpa. With his shock of white hair and his thick accent that made you believe that somehow you had magically learned to understand German, even though he was speaking in English, he would pat me on my head in the same way he did to our children, and say, “you’re a good girl.” Good sounded like “goot.” He had fled from Nazi Germany as a teenager and built a life here in America. A natural athlete and artist, he loved to eat, especially my mother-in-law’s plum cake, which he called Pflaumenkuchen.

I called my dad for advice. “I don’t want to cry and ruin everything,” I told him on the phone. “I know it’s not a tragic loss, but we’re so very sad.”

“It’s okay if you cry,” my dad calmed me.

“Wouldn’t you rather have someone who loved you say goodbye than a stranger?” My dad continued.

I came up with all sorts of excuses. In the end, I couldn’t disappoint my mother-in-law. I knew that she would hate for that Portuguese-speaking rabbi to drive all the way out to the frigid cemetery in New Jersey to make a few blessings for a man he barely knew.

The hardest part of the funeral happened the night before when I needed to herd my husband, his brother, and their mother to my kitchen table so I could organize the service. In any other circumstance, I would be the respected clergy person, and everyone would sit down docilely. But on this day, no one wanted to plan the details. That would mean my father-in-law was really gone, and not just slowly winding down to the end of a long life like an old Bavarian clock.

Late into the night, I typed out the eulogy. The next morning, we held the brief service, which lasted for more than ten minutes. The grandchildren read excerpts from Ecclesiastes and helped shovel clods of wet dirt onto their grandfather’s coffin. Our feet were covered in mud.

I was glad not to have subcontracted out this task. Honored to recite the prayers for my almost grandpa, my father-in-law, I said farewell to him and retold his story.  I did not carry his casket like a strong pall bearer, but I did utter the words to “El Malei Rachamim,” invoking a God we hope to be merciful who will watch over Henry’s soul, as it returns to its source and becomes one with the earth again and everything that ever lived on land or water and in our hearts.

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Rabbi Sharon Forman was ordained as a rabbi in 1994 from the New York Campus of HUC-JIR and has tutored Bar and Bat Mitzvah students at Westchester Reform Temple for the past decade. She contributed a chapter on the connection between breastfeeding and Jewish tradition in The Sacred Encounter: Jewish Perspectives on Sexuality. She lives in Westchester County, New York with her husband, three children, and their new puppy, Sammi.  This blog was originally published on Mothers Always Write.

Categories
Rabbis

Naming our Puppy: A Biblical Task

In Breishit, God parades all of the animals in front of the first human, Adam, who names them effortlessly according to the way they look and behave. The rabbis imagined a fascinating prequel to this scene. In Breishit Rabbah 17:4, God first approaches the ethereal angels with this very important task of assigning names to all of the hairy, feathered, and slithery creatures. The Midrash teaches that those perfect heavenly hosts, however, were unable to complete the mission of naming the animals. Only Adam, with his first-hand knowledge of life on earth, was up to this challenge.

This week, our family will be adopting a puppy. Along with purchasing food and squeaky toys, we have had to figure out a name for this furry creature. Of all of my many concerns over bringing an animal into our home, I never thought that giving it a name would be so difficult. The dog’s chewing on shoes, homework, and furniture; soiling carpets and floors, whimpering at night; contracting single-celled intestinal parasites from ingesting bird droppings- these were my worries. Finding a name for a cute dog didn’t seem so arduous. I’ve bestowed Hebrew names on dozens of babies, whose parents were grateful for my suggestions. Over the past decade and a half, my husband and I sailed through the challenge of assigning what we consider lovely first and middle names to our children. Evoking images of Biblical queens, military leaders, strength, and virtue, these names sounded modern, yet nodded respectfully to a treasured past. The initials of our daughter’s name even managed to pay tribute to no fewer than four of her deceased great-grandparents and one beloved great-aunt. How hard could it be to name a dog?

By making the naming of the puppy a democratic process, we opened ourselves up to a multitude of dissenting opinions. My husband, who is still in shock over the imminent approach of a pet, abstained from all pertinent naming discussions, making me the single adult voice in the conversation. I prefer names with some literary or cultural resonance that acknowledges the past, a great work of literature, or a charming reference to a work of popular importance. Scout, Guinevere, Groucho, or even Adrian topped my list of potential monikers. Can you imagine calling to the dog outside, “Yo, Adrian!” It would never get old. I even held back my list of exotic Biblical names: Muppim, Chuppim, and most notably Shlomo-Zion Ha-malka.

My children, however, had different notions of the perfect pet name. Staunchly rejecting all cute labels that referred to foods or desserts, they preferred names with a vocal punch. My daughter was wedded to names with strong consonants in the middle, like Parker, Charlie, Jessie, and Maggie. My sons loved the names, Danielle and Teddy.  “Who are these people?” I asked them. “What qualities are we bestowing on the puppy when we name her? Don’t you want to give her a beautiful name with some history? Don’t you want to name her something that evokes an image of a ballerina or a warrior or a musician? Don’t you want to name her something clever?”

I’m no angel, and I am not cut out for the task of naming animals. After an ulcer-inducing breakfast at which no one could agree on any suggestions, it seemed that we would be calling our new housemate, “Dog.” My fifteen year-old daughter hatched a compromise. She handed out four index cards to each person in the family except for my husband who was at a meeting and pledged to abide by the results. “Write down four names that you would happily give to the dog,” she instructed. Then she arranged the index cards onto the floor like an old-fashioned concentration card game. “Everyone takes a turn and flips over a card with a name he or she can’t stand for the puppy. Whichever card is the last one standing will be the dog’s name.” It seemed simple enough. “Giselle” immediately was overturned. I nixed “Parker.” The Marx Brothers’ names bit the dust, as well. Finally, the only name that remained was “Danielle.” When my husband came home from work, he asked how the naming process went. “Danielle?” he said quizzically. “What kind of name is that for a dog?” We were back at square one and needed help of Biblical proportions. Out of nowhere, my ten year-old suggested, “Sammi.” My husband and I had actually considered naming both of our sons Samuel, but neither of those bald seven pounders quite looked like a Sam at birth. Miraculously, everyone agreed to Sammi for this newest family member.

On Friday morning, we plan to pick up our newest family member, Sammi. When I made an appointment for her at the veterinarian, the receptionist asked if her name was Samantha or just Sammi. “I don’t really know,” I confessed. We’ll have to meet her first to figure it out. Sometimes in life, after all, we have to name ourselves.

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Rabbi Sharon Forman was ordained as a rabbi in 1994 from the New York Campus of HUC-JIR and has tutored Bar and Bat Mitzvah students at Westchester Reform Temple for the past decade. She contributed a chapter on the connection between breastfeeding and Jewish tradition in The Sacred Encounter: Jewish Perspectives on Sexuality. She lives in Westchester County, New York with her husband, three children, and their new puppy, Sammi.