A Year of Kaddish

Here’s an important article on end-of-life issues in The New Yorker’s August 2 issue. Many of the issues discussed came up for our family last year.

We were sitting in shul, waiting for the tenth man to make a minyan one evening recently. Mincha, the afternoon service, was scheduled for 8:05 p.m., which gave us nearly 10 minutes before shkiah, or sunset, as we reached closer to the summer solstice. This week , for example, the afternoon service doesn’t begin until 8:15 p.m.

I am forever learning something new within the world of ritual and prayer, especially at Beth David Synagogue, the Orthodox shul I daven at most mornings and evenings these days.

In walked the tenth man, and we were set to go. Tradition has it that one of the avelim, or mourners, leads the service. And if more than one is present, there’s an intricate practice of splitting the service, having one, for example, do mincha and one do ma’ariv, or one daven Monday morning and another Tuesday morning. Normally, the gabbi, the one in charge of running the service, coordinates that. But he was away at a conference in Serbia that week, and so us commoners were left to rule on our own.

One of the guys who arrived that evening is a longtime member and someone who also is saying Kaddish for his mother. But he doesn’t come regularly. He and I were the only mourners that evening, and since I’m the new kid on the block, my nature was to defer to him.

But apparently he knew I’ve been coming regularly, and so, he insisted that I daven, that I lead the service. “It’s your place,” he said. I asked him a couple days later when I next saw him what he meant by that, and he explained. “This is where you daven regularly. I’m not saying Kaddish everyday.” If I came in to your house I wouldn’t presume to sit in your chair. I wouldn’t take your place. It’s the same here, he went on.

It got me thinking later about the concept in Jewish ritual of makom kavua, a fixed place for prayer. Traditionally, one has a special or set place, your seat in which to pray. When the process of mourning begins, tradition has it that one moves to another place to symbolize the deep change in your life, that things no longer are the way they used to be.

My fellow davener’s kind gesture, insisting that I lead the service, as has been my custom – more or less – was in someway an extension of that concept. Showing honor, respect and support for the sacred places where one finds comfort and connects with God.

As I rode off on my bike that evening, I thought about other places in my life where I touch the sparks of holiness. One is a path along Trout Brook where I walk and run our two dogs. I cross over a couple blocks of sidewalk and through a busy intersection; and there I am — in the midst of a grove of maple trees, grassland and a gurgling brook, separated from everything. Sometimes, I even feel like I could be hundreds of miles away in a wilderness or in the Green Mountains of Vermont or the granite tops of Yosemite.

As it happened last night, I returned to the minyan at Beth El, the other synagogue in my life. It was the second Tuesday of the month, which meant Beth El’s monthly board of trustees meeting, the last meeting before this Sunday’s annual meeting. For me, it also represented a closing chapter: after three years on the board, I’d decided not to stand for another two-year term. So last night was my last board meeting. In the chapel before the meeting,  I took my designated seat, four rows from the bima, left side, next to the center aisle, the place I had chosen when I returned from California after sitting shiva last summer.

I admit, it felt a little bit like re-visiting my old high school since I haven’t been attending weekday services there much anymore. One of the regulars even said, “Welcome back,” when I walked in.

I took my seat, waiting for the service to begin, and I wondered if I’d be asked to lead part of the service like I used to when I was a regular. Then I recalled my recent experience at Beth David, and I said to myself, Why should I expect to lead? There are probably other mourners here leading the services in my absence. I settled back in my seat only to hear Beth El’s gabbi call to me from the back of the chapel: “Len, you want to do mincha?”

“Sure,” I said, walking to the bima and feeling honored.

I woke up around three this morning, but could not fall back asleep. Finally, around five, I think I dozed off, but it didn’t feel like quality sleep. That French Press coffee (caffeinated) that I had with dinner at 2T must have done it, I thought. Or maybe it was the call with a friend and teacher from Vancouver after 9 o’clock last night that got me thinking in the middle of the night.

Whatever, when I woke again and looked at the clock, it was six o’clock, the time I normally get out of bed to go to minyan. For a moment, I thought, I’m going to be tired all day if I get up now. And I turned over, burying my head in the pillow, hoping and praying before official prayer services began that I might get some quality sleep. I’d skip the minyan this morning. But another voice, the voice who pushes me, who believes I can suck it up and follow through, yanked me from my false slumber.

I got up. I got dressed. I grabbed my tallis bag and my tefillin bag. And I was out the door and on my bike, riding to shul. I felt better after leading most of the service. It was warm and sunny outside when I walked out.

I’ve been thinking lately about what it means to stick with a commitment, to follow through, especially for the long haul, now that I’m rounding third base, as it were. The 11 months of saying Kaddish is nearing its end. The 16th of Tammuz marks my last day, which corresponds to June 28. It may be a mitzvah or a commandment to say Kaddish daily in my circumstance, but how does that play out when we live in a world where feeling commanded by a Higher Authority is not a given? There’s a concept in something called neo-traditionalism called “voluntary obligation.” Which sounds like an oxymoron, but it may be what got me out of bed this morning. I know there are other places in my life where, commanded or not, I could benefit from  feeling moved to push harder, climb higher, be a better person.

We’re into counting these days. I’m not talking about the question that people ask me now and again: “When are you done saying Kaddish?” I’m talking about Counting the Omer, the ritual done each night from the second night of Pesach to Shavuot, the next major festival on the Jewish calendar.

The way I see it, part of the count is a way of also keeping track of any growth we’re making from our symbolic, and hopefully real, exodus from Mitzrayim, to the point of revelation. At our seder, we made the point that the exodus from Egypt is more than a historic or Biblical event; it’s something that we are commanded to do every year, to examine the places in our lives where we feel ensnared or trapped and realize that we too can leave those narrow places.

It might be easy to lose track of what day in the count we’re at were it not for the many reminders all around me. Besides the Hebrew calendars we have in the house, I get a “Counting the Omer Reminder List” from Torah.org daily which arrives in my e-mail Inbox. I’ve also added an app on my smartphone called Sefirat HaOmer, which tells me the day and even provides the prayer or blessing recited. Today, by the way, is the 16th day of the Omer. There’s also a reminder that plays off the fictional TV character, Homer Simpson, called The Homer Calendar.

But there’s another count, and that’s how many times a week I make it to a minyan to say Kaddish. Whether I attend Beth El or Beth David, the two shuls I go to most often, I go nearly 14 times a week. Morning and evening, although with the change to Daylight Savings Time, I’ve missed the last couple Shabbat services Saturday afternoon and evening, which now begin around 7 p.m. Otherwise, I go.

So in that respect I’ve been faithful to fulfilling my obligation. On the other hand, I haven’t been very good about following the advice one rabbi gave me early on: “What I tell couples is to check in with each other regularly and ask, ‘how’s this working for you?’” Actually, that’s not entirely accurate. We do check in with each other regularly. I just haven’t let up on going to services.

Last night I decided I would. At least, for this morning. I didn’t set my alarm, and so this morning, though I still woke up about 6 o’clock, as I do most days, I turned over in bed and slept for another hour or so. Instead of quietly slipping out of bed, quickly dressing and carefully exiting the house as the sun is rising, I got up that hour later, made coffee, and scanned the three newspapers we still subscribe to while eating my oatmeal.

Then I went to work. I looked at the clock at one point, noticed it was 8:15, and thought, they’re done, no matter which minyan I might have attended. And today’s service was a bit longer because not only is it a morning when the Torah is read, but there were extra prayers to mark Rosh Hodesh, the new month of Iyar.

I’ll return to shul this afternoon/evening and go tomorrow morning and Shabbat the following day. But as I count the days between festivals this spring, I’m reminded that to others in my life there are other things that count as well.

“Sounds like you’re having an affair!” We were sitting at Starbucks. I was telling a friend my dilemma when he interrupted to offer his take. We were not talking about another woman. We were talking about another shul.

As many of my friends know, I’ve long been fascinated with other shuls and independent minyanim. Even before I began saying kaddish. I was curious how others do it, and by that I mean, how they pray and create spiritual space on Shabbat or any hectic weekday.

Trying to balance home life, work life and my obligation to say kaddish daily offers its own set of challenges. My synagogue, Beth El Temple, holds weekday services at 7 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. It’s 2.2 miles away, according to Google Maps, and takes about five minutes by car. But what was I to do on a night, for example, when I had another evening engagement? Sometime last fall, I discovered, a way to meet both commitments. Beth David Synagogue.

At least to date, when the sun still sets earlier, especially during the autumn and winter months, I have been able to attend services much before 7:30 p.m., because Beth David provides a full mincha service just minutes before sunset. It’s followed immediately by the evening or ma’ariv service. The synagogue is three blocks from my home, where I also work. I can get there in a minute; in nice weather, I can ride my bike, walk or jog over there. In the middle of winter, when services were starting around 4:30 or so, it provided a nice break from my desk.

My friend laughed, shaking his head. “Classic stuff. You’re trying to justify why you’re cheating on Beth El. What about on the days when they need you for a minyan? Don’t you feel bad?”

“Believe me, “ I said, “I feel the guilt. Jewish guilt, ” I said. “But there’s more,” I said.

I like the services at Beth David. I like walking there and back home on Friday evenings, as Shabbat arrives. I like walking back there late Saturday afternoon for their seudah shleshit, a traditional third meal between mincha and ma’ariv, when a couple hauntingly lovely z’mirot or songs are sung, as Shabbat is about to depart and the new week is about to begin. I like the more complete repertoire of Psalms chanted in the mornings during Pesukei’ D’Zimrah.

On the other hand, I still go to Beth El. I go every Shabbat morning.  I go two or three other mornings a week, and an evening or two.

But then, I told my friend, something happened about a month ago that really changed the relationship.
He leaned in closer. Took a sip of his coffee, wondering what the juicy details could be.

They asked me if I wanted to daven. To lead part of the service. Since I’m an avel, a mourner. By then, I had been going to services at Beth David enough that I was able to confidently say yes. And from my experience leading at the Orthodox shul in Oakland last winter, I knew I could do it. I did it a few times during the afternoon and evening services and parts of the morning service as well.

“Jeeze,” my friend said. “You’re in deep.”

“I don’t know what to do,” I said. “It’s stressful. I feel like they both expect me to show up.”

He laughed again. “Who would have thunk? You’re quite the catch.”

My barber, who I can’t quit, try as I have for more than a year, called me last week: “Lenny,” he cried into his voice message, like a subdued Stanley Kowalski calling for Stella. “How the hell are you?”

It’s been five months since I tried to tell him I had made a decision: I was going elsewhere for my haircuts. It was between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, that time on the Jewish calendar of teshuvah, of committing to examining your life and making change, or literally, of returning – returning to what? To God? To what really matters? To a way of being that you have fallen short of becoming?

Admittedly, leaving your barber, albeit the guy who has cut my hair for 20-plus years, may look like small step toward change. But, I reasoned, you need to start somewhere. And if not now, when? I had actually thought of much more significant change I wanted to commit to. I had even brought a big-change goal to a one-day workshop called “How To Say No By Saying Yes to What Matters Most,” led by my friend, Guthrie Sayen, a life coach.

But when I told the group my big-change idea, Guthrie smiled and then said: “For the purposes of this workshop, can you think of something a little more manageable?” So I thought while the others announced what they wanted to say “No” to. When my turn came up, I said: “I’ve been trying to leave my barber for several years. But it’s hard. I’ve been seeing him for years.”

We worked on what Guthrie called the Positive “No” Model, which included staying connected to what nourishes and anchors one, standing up for one’s self and connecting to the world. Within a week of the workshop, we were supposed to actually speak our Positive No.

I walked into Ralph’s barbershop, actually a hair salon. I didn’t do a very good job of explaining that I didn’t like the way he cut my hair anymore. It had been a couple months since my mother had died, and I used that as an excuse to explain why I hadn’t been coming around regularly anymore.

My God, I thought. Has it come to this? Using my mother’s death to try to leave my barber? He looked at my hair, annoyed at whomever the barber was who had last cut my hair. “They just chopped it in the back,” he exclaimed. “It’s going to be months before it grows back.”

I shrugged and gave a look that said, “I know. What are you going to do?” I felt the discomfort of saying, “Look, Ralph. I’ve decided to get my haircuts elsewhere. It’s nothing personal.” And instead I took the easy way out: “Well, I’ll see you around.” And that was the last time I saw him.

Then last week, I heard his voice message. Maybe, I’ll give him a call, I thought. I looked in the mirror at the back of my head. Maybe he was right. Maybe it should be a little longer in the back.

This small episode in my life came to me as I thought about my commitment to blogging about a year of saying kaddish. Like Ralph, you, my loyal readers, my be wondering, how the hell am I? Or where have I been. Am I still saying kaddish? Yes. And what’s been going on over the last month? Well, Ill tell you. Lots to tell, in fact. Lots to catch up on.

More to follow. Stay tuned. I promise, I’ll be back.

Today would have marked my parents’ 59th wedding anniversary. They made it to 58-1/2 years. “Not bad,” as my mother, who had a knack for the understatement, might have said. Or “pretty good, don’t you think?”

I’ve heard the story of how they met and got married hundreds of times, and it got told a lot last August after the funeral and during shivah to the delight of everyone, not the least my father who relishes its telling.

My dad was a Holocaust survivor. He and his brother, Don, were the only survivors in his family. When the war ended, they made their way to America from Poland or what is now the former Soviet republic of Belarus. Their destination was San Francisco, where Auntie Katie and Uncle Reuben Ungar lived. Katie was my paternal grandmother’s sister. She had immigrated between World War I and World War II, and my father remembers hearing his mother saying she hoped to get more members of the family out of Poland during those interwar years. But U.S. immigration quotas of Polish citizens were low and the number who wanted out was high.

When my father arrived in San Francisco, he got a job selling Watkins products and later plastics, as in plastic table clothes, house to house. When other opportunities knocked on his proverbial door, he traveled north to Petaluma, Calif., where he peddled his wares from ranch to ranch and to a nickel-and-dime store. One thing led to another. Before long, he was selling in Portland, Oregon.

Portland was good to him. After first taking a room at the YMCA, he found a room to rent in a Jewish family’s home, when one day his life changed for good, though he didn’t know it at the time. Another Jewish family, the Sliffmans, across the street invited him to the wedding of their daughter, Shirley, on Christmas Eve 1950. And who knew?  Maybe he might meet a nice Jewish girl at the wedding.

The groom was a nice Jewish boy named Ben Benson from Toronto, Canada. Also at the wedding were Ben’s parents, Rose and Joe Benson, and his sister, Pearl, who had planned to spend the week in Portland before returning East to her job in Toronto.

That night at the wedding Stan met Pearl. “Would you like me to show you around town while you’re here?” Stan offered. “Sure,” she said. “That would be lovely.” They went out once. And then again and again and again.

A week later, New Year’s Eve, Stan proposed. In some ways, it was a perfect match. Stan was an immigrant to America. Pearl had grown up speaking Yiddish at home. And in a sense Pearl served as a bridge to this new land for Stan. As his Aunt Katie in San Francisco said, “Canadians are half European and half American.”

Six weeks later, on February 11, 1951, they got married in Vancouver, British Columbia at the home of one of Pearl’s aunt’s, Ann Cohen.

The newlyweds settled in Seattle, where I was born along with my two brothers. Seven years later, in 1958, we packed our station wagon and moved to California and the San Francisco Bay Area.

And as they say, the rest is history.

You know that song from the Broadway musical, “Rent,” that starts “Five Hundred Twenty-Five Thousand Six Hundred Minutes…”?

Well it came to me as I was driving away from shul this morning. By The Gregorian calendar, which is to say our everyday civil calendar, this Saturday will mark six months since my mom’s passing.

The line in that song — it’s called “Seasons of Love” — that speaks to me is the one at the end of the first section that goes “How do you measure a year in the life?”

So I divide that in half today and ask myself, how do you measure six months in a life? Or how do you measure six months after a death?

What I love about the song is that it measures that profound question in ordinary events. “In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee…”

And I believe there’s an assumption in those lyrics that each of those events contains more than just the passing of time. Rather, they suggest that it’s not the counting of our time that matters, but making our time count, as my rabbi often says when celebrating someone’s birthday. Which is to say that what matters is that we make ourselves aware that each moment has the potential to be so much more. That those cups of coffee, those daylights and sunsets can be infused with conscious living instead of just going through the motions. I try to live by that philosophy, I really do. But like all of us, I ain’t perfect.

If all this sounds like a buildup to new resolutions, maybe it is. Since returning from the West Coast, I’ve been re-reading two life-affirming books, one of which you might say is practical, the other of which you could say is spiritual. But in fact the two have much in common. The so-called practical one is “Getting Things Done,” by David Allen; the so-called spiritual one is “Everyday Holiness,” by Alan Morinis, a wonderful guide to building a Mussar practice.

One of my goals for today is to capture all the open loops in my life and then begin to process them, to decide what action I need to take to “get things done.” If that makes no sense, read “Getting Things Done.” I’ve got three magazine assignments to get to work on and more digging to do on a couple others. I’ve got a desk to clean and organize. As I look outside, I’m aware that the temperature here in New England this morning is below freezing, but what I see out my office window, is a blue sky and the sun shining on rooftops and bare trees.  Our two dog are quietly sleeping nearby, a beautiful sign of peacefulness. I can’t help but feel grateful right now. Cue the music :

“Five Hundred Twenty-Five Thousand
Six Hundred Minutes.
Five Hundred Twenty-Five Thousand
Moments So Dear
Five Hundred Twenty-Five Thousand
Six Hundred Minutes
How Do you Measure – Measure A Year ?

In Daylights – In Sunsets
In Midnights – In Cups Of Coffee
In Inches – In Miles
In Laughter – In Strife…”

Today would have been my mother’s birthday. She would have been 88. I’ve written a few checks today and besides having to remember to write 2010, the date rang with a certain familiarity every time I wrote it or looked at a calendar. Funny how the mind works. It knew that I no longer had to make a phone call to wish her a happy birthday.

It also knew that I didn’t need to be reminded weeks earlier to buy and then mail a card so it arrived on time. That’s something, I must say to be honest, I did not learn from my mom; she was terrible at getting cards to us on time. She might buy them in advance, but she just would rarely remember to mail them or to mail them days in advance to arrive on or just before the birthday date. That’s an especially critical skill when you have family that lives on either end of the coasts. When they did arrive on time, it was an event worth noting.

After my mother’s funeral, after sitting shivah that week in August, I returned home to Connecticut. I remember the first morning back; Still on Pacific Time, I woke up, observing Eastern Daylight Savings Time, to make morning services by 7 o’clock. By mid-afternoon, I was exhausted and I decided to take a nap. But first I called my dad to check in and see how he was doing.

He wasn’t home when I called. Instead the voice mail kicked in.

“Hello. We can’t answer the phone. Please leave a message and we’ll call you back as soon as possible.” Nothing unusual about that.

Except the voice on the message was still my mom’s. It was at once unsettling and welcoming. I left a message and then fell asleep. In the middle of my nap, I heard the phone ring. I answered it. I started talking. It was my mom. Midway through the conversation, it dawned on me. Something’s not right here. Her voice grew faint. Then I realized I was dreaming. I woke up, shook my head and smiled.

But over the last four months, when I’ve called out to California and got the answering machine, I’ve gone from hanging up because it just felt too weird to looking forward to her message before saying, “Hi Dad. Just thought I’d call to see what’s up. Call me when you get a chance.”

Tonight, after returning from minyan, I called. My dad’s been doing all right, all things considered. He’s learning how to use the computer, send emails, and talk on Skype, all modern tasks he’d left to my mom before her passing. The phone rang tonight. It was 5 o’clock in the West. It rang enough that I knew I’d get the voice mail recording. When it came, I was surprised. The voice was my dad’s.

“Please leave a message.” He had figured out how to re-record the voice-mail greeting. I wondered: had someone told him he ought to change it? Had he decided on his own that four months was long enough to have his wife, of blessed memory, still answering the phone?

I’ll ask him when he calls back. I must admit, a part of me was disappointed that she’s no longer screening calls. But then, all things must pass, right?