back from Toronto

We are back from Toronto. (I haven't begun to catch up on my friends yet.) The trip was mostly pleasant; I always enjoy spending time with Dani's sister (Debby) and many of his other relatives. Debby is especially nice and considerate; she asked me up front about restrictions for Shabbat and Yom Tov (the holiday, Pesach day) and also about food during Pesach, and she made sure that she wasn't going to put me in any awkward positions. She even went out and bought special kosher-for-Pesach food that she wouldn't normally have bought. She remembered pretty much all of the details, which is pretty impressive for someone who is not herself observant. Extremely considerate and impressive, especially as my own husband, who lives with observance, seems unable to keep certain basics straight such as that I won't go out to a restaurant on Shabbat. (Yes, this came up while we were there. Sigh.)

The first seder was with Dani's father's family -- actually, this time, hosted by one of Dani's father's wife's kids (follow that?). Dani's father and wife are still in Florida; this is the first time they've not been in Toronto for Pesach since I started going there. The theme of this family's seder always seems to be "let's race through this and eat", which I find disappointing. (We don't even do the second half.)

The second seder was hosted by Dani's mother and was smaller (her, us, Debby's family, and two friends). Dani led the seder, though "leading" in this case is about herding cats, as we always go around the table reading the haggadah. I guess he got to pick which songs we sang. It was fun (and the aforementioned friends are neat people), though the family's home-brew haggadah leaves out a lot of parts that I probably would have inserted myself if I were leading (like all the brachot!).

I guess between the two I got one more-or-less complete seder. It's not ideal, but shalom bayit and all that...

The people from the first seder usually go off to watch hockey playoffs after dinner, but this year it's too early for that. They taped "West Wing" and we were there when the people still remaining decided to watch the show. I had never seen it before, but it was good! Cleverly written, and fun. I'll have to check it out. (I'd heard of the show, but somehow had the idea that it was a medical show -- west wing of a hospital. It's actually about the (ficticious) president of the US and his staff.)

Friday Debby wanted to go to a crafts festival, and I don't accept the second day of holidays [1], so we went along. Saw some neat stuff, though I didn't buy anything. I almost bought a very nifty stained-glass nightlight for the bathroom, and if I had remembered in time that Canadian dollars are much smaller than US dollars I actually would have bought it, but I spaced on the price and thought it was too high. Oh well.

Saturday night after Shabbat we went to see a new play called "Belle", about two ex-slaves in the Reconstructionist era. It was very episodic and somewhat lacking an overall plot. Debby and Tucker (who go to a lot of new plays) said that's the trend these days. I don't care for it, personally.

[1] One-day holidays are extended to two days outside of Israel because of calendar uncertainty. I hold (as do pretty much all Reform and many Conservative Jews) that now, in the 21st century when we know precisely when the new moon is, we do not have this uncertainty and thus do not need the extra day.

Holy Blossom

I went to Shabbat morning services at Holy Blossom (a 15- to 20-minute walk from Debby's house in Toronto). I had intended to go for Pesach morning and Friday night, but there were logistics issues and I didn't. But I got there for Shabbat morning.

With a name like "Holy Blossom", I was kind of expecting some sort of new-age earthy-crunchy-granola-type service, but it wasn't. It's a huge Reform congregation (somebody said 2500 families), and congregations that big tend to stay pretty near the center of their movements, I would think.

[Jewish geekery ahead.]

The service used the "old" Reform siddur (blue Gates of Prayer), with God referred to as "he" and no apologies made. The service had both more and less Hebrew than I expected -- some parts were Hebrew that we never do in Hebrew, and other parts that I'm used to in Hebrew were English instead. The Torah reading consisted of most, but not all, of the parsha, not the very short excerpt that many Reform congregations do. It included Haftarah (again, some Reform don't). They read Song of Songs, which I thought was only done for the Pesach service and not for Shabbat, but I just checked the luach (the what-to-do-on-each-shabbat guide), and I was wrong. So they did that right. They also did the full hallel (or at least as full as it gets in Gates of Prayer, which I think is actually pretty close to complete), and did not abbreviate it.

There was a bar mitzvah. At my home congregation, the bar mitzvah reads as much of the Torah portion as he's learned, and that's it. Here, the bar mitzvah hadn't learned the whole thing, and they had someone else read the parts he didn't.

Also at my own congregation, the bar-mitzvah service is centered around the bar mitzvah and his family. Not so here. Yes, he read Torah (and sat in the congregation, not on the bimah, the rest of the time), and the rabbi said a few words to him, but the parents did not address him during the service, there was no elaborate ceremony with getting the whole family on (or in front of) the bimah (I've seen this), or any of that. A Shabbat service with a bar mitzvah, not the other way around. Refreshing.

They had a cantor, who was about 70 (I'd guess) and tended toward what I've heard described as "old-school performance cantoring". He wasn't leading us in prayer and song; he was singing, and sometimes we could sing along (though it wasn't clear if we were "supposed to" -- I did anyway), and other times it was too elaborate and unpredictable and we had to just listen. The cantor did the lion's share of the service; the rabbi did small bits (and gave a sermon). The rabbi looked to be pretty young -- mid-30s, maybe -- and I wonder if there's an age-related dynamic going on there between the two of them.

Random people-watching: most men who wore tallitot wore the full-sized ones, not the little ones that have become popular of late. I saw one woman wearing a tallit. (I didn't take mine -- I don't unless I know that it will be ok where I'm going.)

(Aside: my tallit belonged to Dani's grandfather, who died about 35 years ago. It is the smaller variety. So this isn't only a recent phenomenon. I don't know what it means. It's even possible that this tallit goes all the way back to his bar mitzvah and that he never wore it again except maybe for Yom Kippur; Dani's family isn't observant and doesn't tend to go to Shabbat services.)

Anyway, Holy Blossom was an interesting experience, especially for the religious anthropologist in me. I didn't get to meet the rabbi; I knew that Debby et al were waiting on me for lunch, and the service ran somewhat longer than I had expected (forgot about Hallel, didn't know about Song of Songs). So I didn't stay for the kiddush.

Next time I'm in Toronto I'll probably go someplace different; Debby said there's also a Conservative shul within walking distance.