As a Jewish community the importance of a people’s connection to their land is at the center of our Torah, our sacred text, and so I am grateful to Andre for beginning today’s vigil with a land acknowledgement, recognizing his people’s connection to the land on which we are currently gathered. Thank you to all Continue Reading »
Click here to watch the video! There was a man who found the cocoon of a butterfly. One day a small opening appeared. He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far Continue Reading »
How’s it going? How are you? How are things? We get asked this question, or a variation of it numerous times a day. But, when I first moved to America, I had to get used to the fact that “How are you?” is not necessarily a real question. The Cultural Atlas actually warns newcomers to Continue Reading »
A story is told of six blind men who were fascinated by elephants.[1] They had heard so many tales of these majestic creatures, but of course they had never seen one. One day word came to them that an elephant had arrived in town and so they all set out to meet the animal. The first Continue Reading »
It started in Israel as so many innovations and moments of progress often do. Once again, they were the leaders and the ones who were blazing a path for the rest of the world to follow. It began with a new type of photograph shared on social media. A picture of two masked people, one Continue Reading »
At 2:15 on Wednesday afternoon I got a text from my father: “What is happening in your country?” with 3 question marks for effect. At the time I assumed he was simply talking about objections to the democratic process and the fact that elected politicians were challenging the validity of the election that sent them Continue Reading »
One of my favorite psychological experiments is the so-called marshmallow test. It was pioneered at Stanford by a psychology professor named Walter Mischel in the 1960s.[1] To refresh your memory; a child aged 3-5 years old would be left alone in a room with two identical plates, with different quantities of marshmallows, pretzels, cookies or another Continue Reading »
Our four-year-old son Benny does not like losing. It doesn’t matter what the game is or who the competition is, for him a defeat is often followed by stomping his feet, wailing loudly about the unfairness of it all, and then running away. Recently, he and Gabby have been playing a game on our swingset, Continue Reading »
Given the way the last few days have gone, it may be time to declare that the American election is actually a Jewish holiday. The preparation for the day feels like it goes on for months, the main event begins in the evening at sundown; and then it doesn’t end, but lasts for several days. Continue Reading »
I’ve had a great idea. I love donuts, and so I’ve decided that moving forward I am going to eat donuts for breakfast with my coffee. And the truth is that I can rarely limit myself to one donut, so I’m going to make sure that I always have a dozen on hand so that I Continue Reading »