Writing Towards Freedom

It's time for this year's Tread on Trafficking campaign. I'm naming mine Writing Towards Freedom this year for two reasons. One, the personal goal I have taken on in conjunction with the fundraising this year is to write at least 10 minutes per day, 6 days per week. (A lot of a little goes a long long way... just like donations!)

Two, Writing Towards Freedom stands for WTF, which is exactly my response to the idea that people find it acceptable to prey on other humans, children in particular, through sex trafficking.

One friend wrote me an email asking why this is such an important issue for me. My response:

Why is it personal to me? I'm not sure. Maybe because the thought of it makes me so sick that I almost CAN'T think about it much. When my friend first blogged about the organization I went to their website and then actually started crying as I

Meat Quota Reached

I wrote in June about this year's meat-eating experiment. In a nutshell, I wanted to see if I could eat meat 25 times or less within a year, starting with the beginning of the season for my CSA. Well, I hit number 25 during Pesach. I guess I really should have started with Pesach because I ate meat 7 or 8 times (depending on how you count.... I had soup with a tiny bit of meat in it on the last two times because it was delicious soup, but skipped the chicken those days). Pesach is an interesting time. We're so limited on what we can eat, we're providing for family, we're sometimes guests, it's a chag and therefore worth if not actually commanded to eat meat in order to show the importance of the day. I also was glad to have almost all the meat I consumed at that time purchased from Grow and Behold and therefore, organic, free range and all that other good stuff.

In any case, over the year I have found that I am losing my taste in meat more and more. I have several times eaten it and felt it wasn't good enough to be worth it, it sometimes made me feel a little ill afterwards, and sometimes I was just very aware of the loss of life necessary to create it. I have also become very sensitive to how often others consume meat, how much of it, and how little aware. Prime examples are Tuesdays and Thursdays when I have lunch duty at school and which happen to be fleishig days at school. Mass amounts of meat are prepared for these kids, and a depressing portion go straight into the garbage without the children even consuming it. They grab what's given to them, eat a few bites and then would rather chat with their friends, or just don't like what they've been given.

Finally, I've been reading little bits of a book I stumbled upon last year at Powell's called Judaism and Animal Rights. It's a collection of varied and excellent essays discussing every angle I can possibly think of regarding meat consumption and other issues around animals as we face them both today and in Jewish history. I am really coming to believe that drastically reducing our consumption of meat is a Torah value more consistent than any demonstration of food consumption we do today in the name of Judaism. Thanks to this book I also see why that's a controversial idea, but there any many great thinkers and rabbis who believe this to be true. This is true for health reasons, ethics reasons from many different angles, and even in sheer awareness and appreciation of the gifts G-d heaps upon us.

So I'm trying again this year, starting again at the resumption of the CSA distribution, but I will see if this time I can eat meat just 18 times before next Pesach. That way I can begin again the following Pesach with as much as I need, but still be able to count my meals for the rest of the year without worry.

Megillah 2013

Just received this awesome picture from Purim. ND is a fire fighter. I'm fire. That's a Manischewitz bottle next to us doing Gabbai.

Phone Call

I had to do parent-teacher conferences today. In the middle of a break my cell. phone rings with U's number, but it was ND on the line.

"Hi."

"Hi. How are you?"

"At Chuck E. Cheese I got a loose tooth."

Right on schedule, a bottom front tooth for a 6 year old. I kind of felt, though, that when I came home a  full-fledged adult would be waiting for me. Some of these landmarks feel huge.

Self-Care for the benefit of others

I put a lot of effort and focus into self-care. Yoga in the morning, trying to eat well during the day, breathing deep to dissipate stress and so on.

And I often feel guilty doing all of this because I know many people's response might be "You have time for that?" 

But one of the benefits of having sort of a rocky inner landscape and a tentative immune system is that I've learned I'm the only one who can take care of myself, and that if I don't, there will be consequences.

So in theory I feel pretty good about the choices I make and hope I can inspire others to do the same in whatever form it takes for them.

Add into that the helplessness I feel when someone is not doing well and I can't fix it for them... if they try their best and want my help, I'm empowered to try and do something to get them there.

But if they're not, well, we're kind of stuck. I don't like how that feels. I hope I can keep from putting others in that position by doing the majority of the work myself.

Hilchot Deot

I'm posting below a letter that I wrote and will be sharing in shul this weekend for Parsha Zachor while we make a small siyum for our learning of Hilchot Deot. 

To the Sandy Hook Community,

You don’t know us. We are a small Jewish community in Englewood, New Jersey. We have no direct connection with you.

However, last December when tragedy struck your community, we were heartbroken for you. Like millions of others, we felt pain, loss and hopelessness on your behalf and wondered what we could do.

What we chose to do was to take this as an opportunity to come together ourselves and work towards becoming better people. While we rarely set aside time for communal Torah study, we came together over a period of seven weeks to learn a classic Jewish text called Hilchot Deot which guides us towards being the best people we can be.

We continue to feel heartbreak for you but hope that this gesture may in some way help to make our world a better place.

May we know no more sorrow.

                                                Sincerely,

                                                Kehillat Kesher Community

                                                Englewood, NJ

Returning

I just got back last night from a trip to visit family. After living a different way in a different place for a few days, there is a way in which my regular routine doesn't quite fit yet, like clothes coming out of the drier that are way too wrinkly or maybe a little shrunk.

I feel the urge to clean and purge.

I think this is a normal feeling for me, but it's always a little unsettling.

On another note, I'm not on the blog much and I think it's for two basic reasons. I'm writing a whole lot more towards publication, and doing so successfully, so there's less time to put in here. Secondly, I feel the need to guard privacy more. Is that because of the writing? Is it because of Facebook? Is it a new stage in my life? Not sure. Interesting though. I'm glad to still have this forum available when I want it.

IPads In The Classroom

Another article of mine up as of yesterday -- Using and Not Using iPads To Teach Reading.

The Movement Of Water

I had a second piece of fiction published this week. I'm very proud of this.

I also got a rejection letter last night from the same group. No, not a rejection... a tentative acceptance if I make some revisions. No, not a rejection at all. I'm on a role, but it's hard work. The story I'm referring to is one I already worked on for about a year and a half and I don't want to have to go back into it, but I know they're right in what they said.

Ah well... flying to Austin to visit family today. Maybe I'll have some inspiration on the long flight.