I read Shalom Auslander’s heartbreaking, hilarious, staggering Foreskin’s Lament during Rosh Hashanah – an interesting time to do that to say the least. The book resonated a lot – and, though I don’t believe in god, I loved the relationship Shal has with him: the constant dialogue, the bickering, the signs. It made me think of the hyper-awareness I feel every time I go back to Paris, a space where I’m with my modern orthodox family and where the subject of god, and small miracles, is a lot more present.
There are so many little moments of magic – good and bad – in my world. I wanted to capture some of them, and invent others (disclaimer: these are not all true!), as an homage to a phenomenon which I associate with my parents’ house even though it happens everywhere: the feeling that god occasionally, when he’s bored, plays with our lives in small, insidious ways – maybe to make us believe, maybe to get some small revenge for all the badmouthing we (or at least I) do over his lack of existence. In the words of Shalom Auslander: that's so god.
I drop the back of my earrings on my bedroom floor at the beginning of the Yamim Noraiym. I can't find them for 7 days, but they resurface just in front of my bed the night of Yom Kippur.
I go shopping in Copenhagen on shabbos. He lets me shop just fine, but my card gets a security block as soon as I arrive to check into my hotel, then the hotel bathtub empties itself on my bedroom floor. That'll teach me.
I rush to catch a Friday evening flight. I miss it.
I rush to catch a Friday evening flight. I catch it, but really at the last minute.
I'm hungry for the last three hours of Kippur and I fantasise about the meal that's waiting at home. Once the fast ends though, I eat one cookie and I'm full.
I move next to a synagogue. For my first five weeks, the rabbi is off sick. I never go to the synagogue again - he gets better.
I try to catch a bus on shabbos. The bus stops are diverted and I end up walking an hour to the right stop, then deciding I might as well finish my journey by foot.
I clean my apartment for passover. It scares the mouse that had been feasting on my chometz and I never see it again.
My great - grandmother dies as I'm on the train back to London. My grandmother dies the next morning as I'm on the train back. Both times, my seat is in an isolated area at the start of the coach so I can cry in peace. He owed me at least that.
I go through security at the airport before a flight to Israel. The two haredis ahead of me in the queue bicker because the wife thinks her husband is checking the shiksa behind them (me) out. I correct them in Yiddish. THAT'LL teach YOU to add insult to injury.
My manager sends me an invite for my annual performance review the day before Kippur. You thought I didn't know it was the day of judgement?
I'll be adding more of these as I go along. If you have any anecdotes you'd like to contribute, feel free to message me and I might just add them in!
Comments