cellio | Friday night

Friday night services went pretty well. I got there only about a minute before the scheduled start time (I was aiming for 10), because I massively under-estimated the effect of icy sidewalks. Most people on Shady Ave don't clear their sidewalks, so my experiences walking to my shul (along Forbes, where more sidewalks are cleared) wasn't helpful. Oops. Fortunately, the rabbis (they were both there, surprisingly) were very understanding.

This was the first time I'd done the early service. There were a lot more kids there than there are at the later service, and they have some kid-oriented stuff in the service like inviting them up onto the bima to say the Shema together. I got most but not all of the relevant cues.

In the pre-service huddle I said I don't know the melody for Magen Avot (they had it on the list for me to lead). This came up a couple times ago and Rabbi Freedman offered to make me a tape, and I dropped the ball on it. Or so I thought. When I said this he said "didn't you get the tape I mailed you?" I didn't even know he had made a tape. Oops. So he'll re-make it and either leave it for me at the synagogue (and tell me where to pick it up) or send it again and tell me he's done so.

(It's a little odd. When they first recruited me I asked the senior rabbi for a tape of some of their melodies -- the ones that either we don't do or we do differently. So we sat in his office and he sang into a tape recorder, but somehow we managed to skip just this one prayer.)

Friday night

no subject