a pleasant Shabbat

This Shabbat was very good in a number of ways.

( Friday, featuring halacha of organ donation )

Saturday the 20s/30s group held an afternoon gathering -- a combination of study, socializing, getting to know each other, prayer, and singing. It was really nifty. (I was joking with the organizer Friday night about how I'm participating as much as I can with that group now, because in September I become inelligible. We joked about "happy 40th birthday -- now scram". :-) )

( prayer, golden calves, and various discussions )

Thursday night at the board meeting the organizer asked me if I could lead havdalah, as both rabbis would have to leave before then. (It went something like this: "Do you know the havdalah service?" "Sure, I do it every week." "Great, could you do it for us this week?") Friday night she asked me if I could also lead bentching, the grace after meals (the afternoon included the customary third meal of Shabbat). Both of these went well (got compliments, even), and I learned that in the case of music, sometimes chutzpah can substitute for knowledge. Specifically, I had forgotten the melody to part of the bentching, so I just made something up on the fly and people sang along. I know they hadn't heard the melody before, because I hadn't heard the melody before either. :-)

Some of the people there weren't familiar with havdalah, so I ended up giving a little talk about the symbolism before we did it. So ok, I can stand up in front of a small group of sympathetic friends and lecture, but I'm still very uncomfortable teaching classes more formally. Weird.

The afternoon shared many elements with our morning minyan's annual Shabbaton (retreat for all of Shabbat, not just the afternoon). That's coming up again in May, and I'm really looking forward to it.

I realized this morning that this spring I'm chanting Torah twice, and neither is at my synagogue. I have to pester my rabbi again about getting a shot at that. (I'm chanting a little for that women's service I mentioned a few days ago, and I just got permission to chant my "birthday" portion on a Thursday at Tree of Life again this year. Last year I did the first two aliyot; my goal for this year is to be able to do all three. For this portion, the third is a little longer than the first two put together.)