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dinner++
The descriptions of dishes, while being passed, suffered some signal degradation: "one of the lamb dishes", "vegetarian something-or-other", "meat, um chicken?, with spinach", and so on. Fortunately, we were all somewhat aware of what had been ordered, so we only needed to disambiguate, not fully specify.
Later my mother called to try to figure out when we can get together. (Her birthday is Saturday.) This turned out to be challenging:
Her: Saturday?
Me: It's Rosh Hashana. Sunday?
Her: Your father has [schedule conflict]. Next Sunday?
Me: Well, Yom Kippur is that night, but we could do lunch.
Her: If that's a problem, what about Saturday the 11th?
Me to self: Do I want to explain to them about eating in the
sukkah?
Me to her: Um, that's Sukkot. Let's go back to that previous
Sunday...
Her: What's Sukkot?
Me: One of several holidays that are going to complicate this
exercise for the next few weeks. :-)
Later I ended up explaining Sukkot to her anyway (quickie version) and she said it sounded neat, so if we decide that next Sunday doesn't work, they'll come out for Sukkot lunch or something.
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Ooh, me, me!
OK: Sukkot is the feast of Tabernacles.
Just kidding. I hate definitions like that (Tefillin? Well, they're phylacteries. Everything clear now?)
Sukkot is a harvest festival where Jews build temporary structures (sukkahs), eat (and, ideally, sleep) in them, and wave around bits of foliage and produce during services.
Now, for an encore: Shmini Atzeret in one sentence:
Shmini Atzeret is a holiday for no specific reason that falls at the end of Sukkot.
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I frequently tell the story, especially around this time of year, of my friend Donna, whom I met in college. Donna was a physical therapy major, and the program was quite rigorous. In her junior year, I believe, all the fall Jewish holidays fell on Thursday-Friday (with Yom Kippur on Saturday), in early October. When she explained to one of her professors that she was going to have to miss class again (the professor was Jewish but only observed Rosh Hashannah and Yom Kippur), the professor asked why. The following exchange then occurred:
Donna: "It's a Jewish holiday."
Prof: "No, it's not. I'm Jewish and I don't know of any holiday on Thursday."
Donna: "It's Shmini Atzeret."
Prof: "That's not a real holiday; you're making it up."
Donna: "If I were going to make up a holiday, do you really think I'd give it as ridiculous a name as 'Shmini Atzeret'?"
The prof didn't buy the argument; the Hillel rabbi had to intervene on Donna's behalf, but Donna was able to miss class without penalty.
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*laugh* She has a good point, you know. :-)
Our associate rabbi likes to complain (good-naturedly) about "poor, neglected Shmini Atzerer, lost in the shadow of Simchat Torah", but I think he misses the point that if Shmini Atzerer were actually about something, it wouldn't be in anybody's shadow.
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I tend to think of it as the generic holiday, an experience of the holiday-ness with out the specificity of funky foods (Passover, Shavuot) or locations (Sukkot).
Shmini Atzeret?
Two stories --
At U-Mich, the buildings are pretty much shut down between Christmas and New Year, and all us "christian-oid" folk take the whole thing off for a holiday. Saves TONS of money for the school on electricity, etc. But, folks who are not Christmas-oriented may take their holidays when they fall (ie, Rosh Hashashana, Yom Kippur, Passover, etc.) but come in to work on the days between Christmas and New Years. About half really come into the cold, icky buildings.
And:
When Jen was born, her pediatrician was Dr. Mrs. Singer (to distinguish from Dr. Mr. Singer, also a pediatrician, but with radically [and I mean radically] different views on nutrition for the first year or so.).
The Drs. Singer always were on call for their Christian practice members on the Christian holidays, so that the holidays could be spent with the others' children, rather than having to go to the ER and deal with someone ill. I thought it was rather sweet. And, their practice members reciprocated, which was also really nice. My current GP, also Jewish, does the same thing, which is very nice of him, I think.
Re: Shmini Atzeret?
Shmini Atzeret? Yes, of course it means something. The problem is what, exactly, it means. Maybe it's supposed to be a holiday that we don't understand, just in case we get all full of ourselves about how much we know...
Re: Jews working on Christian holidays (and vice versa): yes, this is a very nice practice.
Re: Shmini Atzeret?
Re: Shmini Atzeret?
You have to understand, I went to college at Brandeis, which is secular, yet Jewish. That is, there's nothing unusually religious about the school, but it was founded by Jews, and the considerable majority of the student body is Jewish. That said, I'm not unusual in having gone there because it's a good liberal-arts school, rather than due to its religious/ethnic background. (While I'm Jewish by heritage, my family has been pretty secular for a couple of generations.)
It shouldn't surprise one that Brandeis' holiday schedule is built around the Jewish holidays. Which leads to the following conversation among the freshmen, hundreds of times each September:
Student 1: Shmini Atzeret? What the heck is Shmini Atzeret?
Student 2: It's apparently some sort of Jewish holiday.
Student 1: I've never heard of it.
Student 2: Are you going to complain about getting the day off?
Student 1: Oh, no, no, no. Shmini Atzeret, that's a terribly important holiday in my family...
Re: Shmini Atzeret?
Drs Singer....
Re: Drs Singer....
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