I
realized tonite that I have a very long history with the mad black hatters.
My first encounter was in 7th grade. We were living in Los Angeles and I developed a huge crush on my rebbe, the first black hatter. He wasn’t mad, or at least (thank GD) he didn’t do anything mad. If anything he did a lot of good. He introduced me to my first friend, his cousins, in Chicago, when my parents made the very traumatic announcement that we were moving back there.
Then
there was the mad black hatter when I was in high school. I must say he is probably my first true love
and very first broken heart. He dumped
me in a “Dear John” letter. The “Dear John” letter I received while back in LA
working at a day camp with my former friends.
That same summer, or maybe the next one, I met my cousins friend: the
soon to be mad black hatter. He dumped
me after his new found rabbi told him he shouldn’t talk to me even though I was
the reason he got involved with the religious movement in the first place.
Then my
first boyfriend, while studying a pretty religious seminary in Jerusalem. He, the first boyfriend told me he’d never
live in the US and he would never be religious, I actually dumped him. But one
year later, while home for Rosh Hashana I got a letter…no no no, NOT a dear
John letter. No, this was a “you are the
reason my life has changed for the best” letter. My Israel living non US living
ex bf was now studying in a very happy place in the Old City. And thanks to me he found religion….and his
soon to be American born Chasidic originated wife….. Need I mention that he
lived for a spell (several years) in the US?!
This mad
black hatter literally wears a black hat a black (by now white?) beard, has grandchildren,
and still some 25 years later, is in touch with me.
As you
see, my history with them is not made of happy endings…
SO, here
it is, the eve of Yom Kippur and I am still thinking about the man I wrote
about in my last post. Yup! You guessed
it! ANOTHER mad black hatter.
Why do I
keep going back to them? Especially when, those who know me in real life know I
don’t look like them…but I do talk like them, sometimes and I definitely do
believe like them in some ways. My
friend Sarah has said over the years” You can take the girl out of the Michlala
but you can’t take the Michlala out of the girl”. That is to say, I grew up there in that place
in my “formative years”. It had a huge
impact on my life and my family’s life.
I was very happy for a very long time in that world. I never intended to leave it for good. But it is not easy dancing at two weddings at
once and I really am a better fit to the life and community I am in. But the mad black hatter world still pulls at
me.
At
synagogue on Friday nite, the rabbi spoke about Yom Kippur and the different
ways to look at repentawww.andbabymakes2.comnce. He
essentially said he doesn’t look at it like that but rather, in another
interpretation as the Ultimate Day of Love: we go to the mikva, wear white,
fast, and “walk down the aisle”. These
are all symbols of a wedding, the ultimate day of love. We are trying to cleave
to our Maker and we want Him to cleave to us.
But, all you therapists out there, in order to have a healthy relationship
we need to know who we are. Only when we
know who we are can we expect to have a healthier relationship, so too, in the
rabbi’s speech with God.
So I say,
on this Eve of Yom Kippur. I need to
know who I am: I am a modern woman who lives in a very hot climate so I dress
for it. Who also only wears skirts, who doesn’t drive on Shabat or fast on 9Av.
I believe with all my being in Gd, in the Torah, in the Land of Israel and the
Jewish people. I believe that my sleeves
don’t define me but I love that my girls only wear skirts. I love that I daven in an egalitarian minyan
but have no need for it nor do I participate in it actively.
I believe
that I can fall in love with a mad black hatter even though I don’t want to
live that life…completely. I believe
that many have fallen in love with me but not enough to take a non-cookie
cutter woman as their wife.
So I
stand before God knowing who I am believing He knows who I am and that with His
help I will find the one who I know and accept and who knows and accepts me.
Wishing
you all a gut gbencht yor a shana tova and a happy healthy new year.
