MY AUNT ALISSA POSKANZER

I spent a chunk of time today getting to know my Aunt Alissa who died yesterday. A strange statement, I know, but true. 

My mother’s sister was not a common part of my life growing up. I didn't see her often as a child and was 17 before I spent any time alone with her. She was seven years older than my mom and lived in Jerusalem for most of her life. Our paths crossed during my childhood on a trip to Boston and when we spent Summers in Manitoba where she also lived part time to be close to her parents. She sometimes came to visit us, wherever we were living, but more often we got news through Gramma and Grampa. Before internet, long distance phone calls or inexpensive international mail, this was normative life.

When my family made aliyah when I was 17, my aunt wanted to make up for lost time. My first few months I studied in a program in Jerusalem and she met me for lunch once a week ‘to check in’. She introduced me to the King David Hotel and brunch on the terrace overlooking the pool and bought me my first Israeli made outfit at Hamashbir downtown.

And, once I started studying at Tel Aviv University, she unknowingly gave me a sense of security that allowed me to travel and explore Israel in a way that most people don’t. Wednesdays I had no classes. So, Tuesday night I would pack an overnight bag and go down to the central bus station and wherever the person in front of me was going, I would buy a ticket as well.  Most times, it was Jerusalem or Beer Sheva (where my parents lived). Sometimes it was somewhere a little more out of the way but I knew that I could hitchhike to Jerusalem and crash at her home.

She told great stories and always had a suggestion or two about what you should be doing with your life. That, was the social worker coming through. I have to admit that colored through my youth and desire for independence, I didn't always listen as closely as I should have, not to her advice and not to her stories. I think it was an issue of familiarity; how could someone so close be important. She was my Aunt Alissa, and I didn't really give her history before I got to know her much thought. Often my mother would explain things as we drove home. “You know, the woman she mentioned, that used to borrow eggs to cook breakfast? That was the mother of the current prime minister” “When Aunt Alissa talks about serving in ‘the army’, she’s talking about the Haganah and the Palmach”.

When I performed as an actress for the first time in Hebrew, she came to the show and sat next to my mother and beamed in pride. When I performed in little hole-in-the-wall theatres in Jerusalem she came and sometimes even invited friends.

And when I decided to come back to North America for a year after getting out of the army, she dug into the back of her closet and pulled out a navy blue Holt Renfrew coat and insisted it was the only thing that would keep me warm in a Winnipeg Winter.

When I went back to Jerusalem years later as a rabbinical student, she ticked me off by telling me I should have stuck with acting because she didn’t believe women should be rabbis. She felt that I was so talented an actress; I couldn't possibly succeed at anything else so I shouldn't try. Of course, she was right about my acting talents but would change her mind later about the rabbi part. She came to New York to hear me give my senior sermon at JTS. Sitting with the family later she said that she had decided I was going to be an amazing rabbi and not only was she proud of me but she knew my grandfather, the Talmud scholar, would be proud as well.

Most recently, she had taken to ‘following’ me on Facebook. She would send a little email note to say she had enjoyed something or to correct or add something I didn't know about our family history.

My mother called this morning to tell me she had passed away. I started sharing stories with my husband and realized how little I knew about her outside of her role as my aunt. So I did what we do; I googled her.

Alissa Poskanzer, nee Freda Flam was an amazing woman. She arrived in Palestine by boat in the early 1940s, studied at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, worked for the youth aliyah department, believed in equal rights for all Israel’s citizens, was involved early on with absorbing the Ethiopian community, wrote and published a book about that work, published numerous papers and spoke at conferences internationally, raised two wonderful children, my cousins, Ethan and Dafi, who in turn raised wonderful children and served as a role model for me and countless other women that you could love, have a family and a career. And she was  a role  model for both men and women that you not only have to stand up for your own thoughts and desires but you need to fight for others as well.

May her memory be a blessing

http://books.google.com/books/about/Ethiopian_Exodus.html?id=Qn6gAAAAMAAJ

http://www.haaretz.com/eight-grandmothers-battle-so-their-grandchildren-can-live-in-peace-1.50332

http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF02249354#page-1

FEAR

There have been times in my life when I have been afraid.  Not thunder and lightning afraid or ‘Boo! You jumped’ afraid but fear so raw that it made me hyperventilate. It was fear so intense that my basest survival instincts kicked in.

I think that those are the moments in every person’s life when you get the gift of clarity.  You get an answer to the question of how you will react or behave when your life is truly and unequivocally in danger.

It isn’t important what the situations are, it’s how we respond.  

I once had a conversation with a bouncer from a bar who was not a stereotypical bouncer He was smaller and not very imposing and yet he had one of the best records for safety and diffusing ‘iffy’ situations  He would go up to the drunk with a knife or a broken bottle and calmly put his arm around him and explain how he wasn’t concerned about the drunk using the knife because he knew the drunk was a great guy, but he was concerned for who might want to challenge the drunk to a fight and as a favor to him would the dunk let him put the knife out of the reach of the jerks who might not be a great.   He diffused the situation and he did it without violence and he had an almost 100% success rate.  He did it with no body armor, no gun and no deaths.

His theory was that tonight he was the bouncer and someone else was drunk but tomorrow he might be the drunk and someone else the bouncer.  In his words, ‘We're all really just human'.

In those moments when real fear kicked in, I was lucky enough to be scared not only for myself but for others nearby.  There are situations that having been in them and been fearful, I will spend my life trying not to be in them again. And there are situation for which I will volunteer because I trust my response more than others

It is how we react to fear that distinguishes us.  

Do we turn internally from our fear, close ourselves off from anything that has potential to scare us?

Do we strive to understand the fear; the what and the why and also the cause? To try to understand the thing that frightens us and possibly lessen the fear?

Do we denigrate the fear itself as well as the cause believing that if the cause has no value then the fear will subside?

Do we inflate the cause and demonize it to mythical dimensions thereby justifying our fear?  ‘See how scary the other is? No wonder we are scared.’

Perhaps we should embrace the fear; acknowledge it and accept that I am afraid. It is a flaw in me, not in you.

I don’t care how scared you are or how demonic the person coming at you seems, there is no reason to shoot one unarmed person six times.

FAILURE

BANG  BANG  BANG  BANG  BANG  BANG 

Six shots from a non automatic gun - Six pulls on the trigger.

Imagine

Six pumps on a spray cleaner
Six pumps on a hair spray bottle
Six pumps of breath freshener
Six sprays of hand sanitizer
Six presses on the elevator call button
Six pumps of flavored syrup in a fancy shmancy coffee

How many is enough?

BANG

My life is interwoven with people of different hues and shades. We are coworkers and study partners and neighbors and friends. I fear I am in a minority for that statement alone.  My life is also interwoven with people who have never spoken to a person born in another country, and some who assume stereotypes are the only option and some who are set in their ways and can't imagine why they should change and still others that don't grasp how much the world has changed or how much it hasn't.

And through it all I hoped for a better world.  I not only hoped; but I tried to create the world I want to be part of; to be the change I think we need.   

But somewhere along the way we didn’t succeed. We didn’t make a safer world; a gentler world; a smarter world for all of us.  Yes, here and there are pockets or glimmers but in general we as a society have failed.

BANG

In successful societies, we support unconditionally until circumstances are no longer supportable. We give the benefit of the doubt until there is no doubt. We presume innocence until our own innocence and that of our future generations is compromised.

We failed to follow through.

BANG

We’ve failed our children; black and white and any other shade. We’ve failed to give them a safe environment to thrive in. We’ve failed our minority groups; whether color, gender, sexual orientation, or religion. We have failed to give them the same laudable American experience previous generations had.

BANG

We’ve failed our police officers. Protect and serve is not mitigated by preferences of the person in uniform. One does not get to choose. They should be trained better; should be trained to respect as well as protect. We failed to train them in alternative methods, failed to teach them empathy or compassion and failed to teach them that every life is worthy. We failed to give them the tools needed to do the job.

BANG

We’ve failed by not expecting each and every person live up to their potential. We have allowed the ‘soft prejudice of low expectations’ to impact on our neighbors and communities.

We’ve failed ourselves and our future. But we’re not done. Now the hard work towards success needs to start.

Before the next bang.

My Ideas On the Jewish Community 

This week, I have participated in several discussions in which people have used terms like ‘left’ and ‘right’ to describe different sections of the Jewish community. Politics and observance seem to be the most acceptable things to describe in this way. The ‘left’ thinks this and the’ right’ thinks that.

Usually, we put Jewish denominations/groups on a line ranging from Reform to Orthodox with other groups falling in between.

My problem with this way of describing people’s ideas or actions this way is the assumption that we are on a continuum. We may believe in some things more or less than our neighbors, friends or relatives but I don’t think we are always more or always less in everything we do. We don’t live our lives on a continuum.

I prefer to think of the Jewish community, politics, observance and interactions as anything but a straight line. Judaism doesn’t work on a continuum. We don’t stand on a straight line only interacting with the person/group right next to us. We interact across and around and through the continuum line.

To me the interaction among Jews should be more like a Jewish star.

All of the different groups intersect and interact at different points. There are no better points or lesser points- joint connecting points. You can’t have the star without the straight lines and the angles. Orthodox intersects with Secular and Halachic as well as Conservative with Liberal and Chabad.

Without the interaction, without the intersection, we wouldn't be able to have a star and the community would be flat.

So, rather than saying 'more' observant or 'less' observant, the community becomes an interaction between different types of Jews in order to create a greater, stronger community. Without each other, and a variety, the community will not succeed.

Confessions of a Pushke Thief

I was photographing tzedaka boxes this week for a project and came across a simple blue and white can, like the ones we had when I was growing up. I was reminded of an interesting experience I had a few years ago.

A man had made an appointment with me but wouldn't tell the secretary what it was about. He said he used to be a member, many years ago, and that now that the shul was closing; he had some things he needed to get off his chest. I anticipated some irate person telling me about some perceived wronging from eons ago.

Instead, he was mild mannered, very nice and very uncomfortable. He said that 35-40 years ago when he was a teen, he and a friend had been wandering in the shul instead of being in the sanctuary. They apparently had found a blue and white pushke, and had taken the money inside.

He came into the office to tell me that this has weighed heavily on him all these years and he really would like to make a donation to the fund that the original pushke would have supported.

I explained that I assumed the money would have gone to Keren Kayemet (The Jewish National Fund) and that he can still make the donation and gave him the contact information. And then I asked if he felt that would help him sleep better. He said he wanted to know more about the emotional/spiritual side of the amends. I talked a little about the process of T’shuvah (repentance), how you need to acknowledge and ask forgiveness form the person you have wronged. We talked a little about who that would be. And so he decided that with a check to JNF, he would write a note explaining why he was making the donation.

He left the office after telling me that he really had expected to come into the building and stick a check into another blue and white box and be done with the whole thing. But, he also said he thought this way was more meaningful.

It certainly was for me.

Toldot and Reconcilliation

The parasha this week, Toldot,  talks about the birth of Jacob and Esau and how even before they were born, the differences in their personalities were apparent. The Torah tells us “vayitrotzetzu” that the two ran around or became excited.

The commentators talked about what this movement might have been and in Midrash, in Bereshit Rabah, they explain that while Rebecca was pregnant when she walked close to a place where Avoda Zara (foreign worship) was being practiced, then Esau became agitated and wanted to get out. And when she walked close to a place of worship and study, Jacob would become agitated and want out. The Midrash tells us that lest we think that the adversarial attitude between the brothers came out only after birth, we see signs of it before they were born.

The word for adversarial “v’n’sdaveg” can mean adversity or confrontation but it comes from the root zug (couple or partner) which has connotations of intimacy. The intimate relationship which Jacob and Esau had also started before they were born.

It is interesting to me that the nations throughout history are compared to Esau and Jacob and not to Ishmael and Isaac. Ishmael and Isaac were half brothers born years apart who, after Hagar and Ishmael were banished, do not meet again until after their father’s death. Esau and Jacob were twins who grew up together and who later in life reconciled.

And it is that reconciliation based on the recollection of the intimacy they had as children and in the womb, which gives us hope today.

Both Esau and Jacob put their arguments and complaints aside to embrace each other as brothers.

Enough time has passed and each has ‘let go’ of the feelings which may have caused the rift they can remember the intimacy of their youth and get to know each other as adults.

It is that reconciliation which is ultimately the point to learn from this story …to let go of old perceptions and grow to new understandings of the people around us and the word we live in.

Shabbat Shalom

Mothers' Day 2014

Its Mother’s Day and I am sad.

Firstly, because I think that it’s an arbitrary day to celebrate the women in our lives who so vastly influenced and it seems silly to even try to cram all our admiration into one arbitrary day.

And secondly, because I can’t celebrate with my own mother.

My mom was and still is one of the most amazingly accomplished women I have ever known.  She was a cool, chic, avant- guard personality before any of those things were cool, chic, or avant- guard. Imagine Auntie Mame and Marmee Marsh in one. She led an interesting exciting life before having children and then she instilled in each of us the tools to create our own lives. She loved us unconditionally and supported us in all our paths and always made sure we knew we would have a home if and when we needed or wanted one.               

My mother can walk into a room full of strangers and come away with more details of people’s lives than their best friends know. She is the person at the supermarket or doctors office of food court who starts a conversation and is more interesting than the book you have been carrying around waiting to read. She is fascinated by people and she is fascinating.

She also doesn’t often remember that.  In fact she often doesn’t remember a lot of things.

My mother, who studied Talmud in junior high school, traveled extensively, dated a son of a future king, appeared in plays with future Oscar and Tony winners, made lifelong friends, raised three children, crocheted blankets, owned her own antique store, ran a multimillion dollar nonprofit organization, appeared in a full length feature film and survived a broken back has always been a positive role model for me, and my family and friends.

But you won't hear that from her. It is painful to know that as often as we forget who she was, she forgets even more.

One of the hardest parts of senility is that as your memory diminishes, it seems like others' memories of you diminish as well. 

Conversations with her are sometimes difficult. Often she doesn’t recall even broad topics we have discussed and certainly details need to be repeated.

And so Mothers Day is sad for me. My mother is often absent and talking to her is not the same as talking with her. O course, it’s not all bad; interspersed, there are wonderful lucid moments where my mother shines and the woman she was pushes through. It happens in the third time she asks the same question and then stops herself and completely and correctly summarizes the last two times I answered. It happens when she forgets to call on my anniversary but a card that she remembered to buy and send comes perfectly timed in the mail. And it happens when she recognizes my voice on the phone and I hear that smile of joy she has always had whenever I or any of her kids or grandkids approach her.

Happy Mother's day to all the women who are and were our mothers.