Staring me in the face.

What I thought was going to be a....interesting to say the least, concert ended up being the concert that I think I found myself the most. Nashama Carlebach, is probably one of the most amazing people I've ever heard sing, speak, be in the able to experience. I thought Jews couldn't do gospel, I know we've got soul but lets face it we're not usually any Jennifer Hudson's or Whitney Houston's! I thought anyone who tried to combine Christianity and Judaism was going Jews for Jesus for sure. But that wasn't the case, and as I sat there with my own problems in my head and as I did I started to listen to her, the baptist church choir not backing her up but helping moving the audience just as much. And from her I understood, that it doesn't matter where you're from, what religion you follow or what you believe to be right or wrong, but that if we don't all start making peace with each other and understanding the it doesn't matter who or where you're from that until there's peace among us all we can't make peace in the world too. I realized that I may have my disagreements with Judaism but that's okay, we all do. But more than anything, without Judaism and music I feel empty and because of that I have to become a Cantor, it's what I was meant to do. It's what God intended me to do. I can't not help others to learn how to raise their voices in prayer and help them to find what they're seeking for. And it was staring me in the face this whole time.....silly me!

Art

I thought I'd share my art, I love it and it's another way I express myself! The large big colorful one, took first place in my first art competition this year!

The Worst in the World

I want to scream at him, I want to drive to his house and say to him "Look at me! Look how far I've come with out your help!" nearly 10 years....would you hold a grudge and not talk to someone for 10 years? I wouldn't it's stupid! how about against you child, I hope you think I'm crazy, if you do than I have faith in you that you won't do that. A few days ago my family got an e-mail from my grandfather.....who we've not heard from in 10 years, it was about something medical, which isn't really all that important to this post. What got me was that in the end of it, he said "I don't really care what you do with this and I don't really care if you answer me or not". This man, who happens to be my grandfather, who used to care about me....or at least I thought he did... doesn't care. I wanted to scream at him and I mean I don't like being mean really and truly, but I've got a rather large desire to drive up to their house and punch him in the face and scream at him for everything that he should have been there for. For everything that he missed, for making me feel special when I was nothing to him. For pretending to love me and letting his own stupid bothers get in the way. I know that your supposed to respect your elders.....how am I supposed to do that when they're stupid and ignorant and couldn't care less about me? I watch my friends talk about their grandparents, I've met them, they're awesome people, they love their grandkids and they can't seem to find one bad quality about them. Mine well 2 of them I've not talked to for 10 years....and they can't even tell you what I like or my favorite color. As far as they're concerned I'm still 9. Well I'm sick of being quiet and I know it'll piss him off more. But I'm entitled to my own opinion, and mine is that he needs to grow a pair of balls and put on your big boy pants and just deal with it and although you missed out on my life, you've got 3 other grandkids still that you can make not hate you. Well maybe only 2...or 1, ....I take that back you just royally screwed yourself and there's no going back! I want to know what I did....why was I punished....was it that great? Did it help? are you happy now? I really hope you are, because karma's a bitch, I just hope that I'm there when it happens! ...." I pray all your dreams never come true...." I'm so glad you taught me how to know exactly what not to do. I hope I never end up like you. And I hope one day I see you in the grocery store and I intend to do everything I can in my power to give you every piece of my mind that you never want to hear. I'll just make sure that when I do it, there's no way my parents will hear about it. Congratulations on being the Worst Grandparents in the World! Hey, at least you succeed at something!

Not all here....

I've been dead for so long it's hard for me to remember what it's like to live again......I'm not even sure when it first happened. But all of a sudden my daily life has become mainly getting yelled at. I'd love to say I'm not sure how I got into this place, but truth is I know exactly how I got here. Not even music brings me to life any more. I'm not really sure what I'm supposed do to get out of here. I know my world is crashing fast, and everything I love is going, and for some reason I just don't care.... I use to care, now.....everyone else seems to see what is going on and how to get out of it, but all I seem capable of is to talk...but I'm not sure how. I don't have the will to live, there's nothing good, it's so hard. What is there to look forward to any more? I gave up on going to Israel, I'm not sure if I convinced myself that it wasn't what I wanted or if it really wasn't what I wanted. I love my art....I know that it makes me happy...I think for a long time and up until now I've just made it be that if I was happy that I was living. I've not written in months....I can't even tell you how or why. I use to have so much emotion! I remember being 13 and having so much to say....now I'm not even sure what I'm capable of doing any more. But everyone else is able to see exactly what I can and can't do, yet I still have no clue. I'm not this pig headed and I know it, I use to care when someone was upset with me. It used to be the only thing I cared, I don't care that I'm graduating, I don't care about anything, and to be honest...I'm scared. I want Mom and Dad to hold my hand and help me through this....I want to know that it's going to be okay in the end, but I'm 18...that's not okay. I've always known I'm not normal, and I've just written off my behavior as normal teenage activity....but it's not, and in my heart I've always kind of known that too. It's hard, I guess at this rate I'll be dead.....within the next 2 or 3 years. I keep waiting for it to get better.....and I know it won't, but I keep waiting because it always seemed too. But it won't this time, I've always found a way to deal with it....but I don't think I can any more...I know I have to at some point. But this isn't what is good...I'm afraid of living. I've not lived for so long...that I'm afraid of what it's like to live....it's in my eyes, it's in my heart...I'm scared...and I'm a coward because I don't have the strength to get through it and be strong enough to try to live again. I'm ready to live again...I just don't know how to.....so until then....I'm silently dying......

What's the point?!!?

After starting a research assignment in my English class about 
Photoshop and how its effected girls psychologically it disturbs me 
how much something can effect how someone perceives them self. Being 
someone who tends to swim in the opposite direction of the fashion 
trends, I wear shirts that aren't skin tight, and dare I say it?!?!? I 
don't wear make-up most days, and when I do it's generally unnoticed 
compared to the wild and more....noticeable styles in the hallways. I'm 
okay with walking into school and wearing sweats and a t-shirt, I'm 
okay with not showing every piece of skin available to be shown, and 
I'm okay with not exposing my boobs all the way down to my nipples. 
Believe me I'm way okay with wearing shirts that hit at my collar 
bone! I've always realized that images in magazines were edited but 
never truly to exactly HOW edited they where. To look like these 
models us girls would have to somehow manage to eat practically 
nothing while going in for plastic surgery in order to make ourselves 
look healthy while also reshaping, plumping, and enhancing everything. 
We'd have to have perfect skin, minimal pores, and if your lashes are 
less than 2 inches long, well, don't even try to put on that mascara! 
We'd have to make sure that our teeth were white enough, our eyes 
large enough and your skin better be either extremely tan or deathly 
pale. I've never considered myself an ugly person, but if you look at 
these standards of beauty I'm the ugliest thing to walk the planet! 
Thankfully I don't care about these things. I love my flaws! My 
freckles make me different, my eyes area not huge like an anime 
character's but that's okay, I don't need 5 inch corneas that make 
tennis balls look tiny. Though many girls complain about things like 
chest size and other things, I feel that mine fits me, it's 
proportional to how I'm supposed to be. My legs may not be toned and 
the size of pencils, and my stomach isn't perfectly flat and tan, but 
that little bit of fat on my tummy means that I can support life 
without a problem and my legs, though not thunder thighs by any means, 
mean that I actually use them to walk with, not spread wide for 
everyone in the world to have sex with. My face may not be the 
clearest of them all, but acne is a given, everyone gets it! So what 
if you've got a pimple on your nose! Everyone does at some point or 
another. What is even more beautiful to me is that I'm noticed for my 
personality before my looks, people notice my love for Superman before 
they notice my imperfect eyes or my not so slim nose. People notice me 
for being me, not for how I dress, they notice that I actually know 
what is going on in class rather than what label my jeans are. There's 
a poster in my health class that summarizes everything! In 30 years in 
won't matter what jeans you wore or what you looked like, it'll matter 
what you learned and how you used it, and if you were true to yourself!

I will always love you

It's over. 6 months came and went, they were bliss, even the things we fought over, even his traits that honestly I hated. I still love him for exactly who he is. It hurts...it hurts that I wasn't worth trying to fix the problems. It hurts that I wasn't worth enough to talk about it, instead he kept it bottled up, but he's no good at hiding anything so I knew something was up, but he'd still say "nothing". With him I laughed harder and longer, life seemed sweeter. I knew that I had him to lean on. But now, now my heart hurts so badly that I want to cut it out and put it in a box, never to have to deal with it again. Everyone tells me I'll get over it, time will heal my broken heart, but I don't think this ones the same. I think he was my besheiret, my soul mate. Anyone who can love me for exactly who I am, and nothing more or less, that's what I want. My friends tell me that he's just as hurt as I am, but I don't think he is, he looks at me a lot, he laughs a lot more than I do. I think he's sad, but not as crushed as I am. I want to run up to him and hold his hand and I want to hear him say "I love you, always and forever" like he usually does. I want to talk about what our wedding will be like, I want to talk about how many kids we're going to have. I want to be myself, as scatterbrained as that may be. I want to be angry at him, but when I see him I just want to smile, I see him walking towards me and I think, "he's going to take it all back!" but I know that's not true. I want to be back in his arms, I want him back so badly. The pain in my heart is enough to kill me. Just when I think I've cried my last tears, there are more that come. I'd kill for one last chance to hug him, truly hug him, and to tell him "I love you, forever and always" and to hear him whisper back, " I love you, always and forever". Just one last time. And if you're reading this, I will always love you.

D'var Torah: Naso

At 176 verses, Parsha Naso is the longest Torah portion of them all. It only seems fitting to me that I be allowed to speak on this parsha, as 4 1/2 months is the longest time I’ve ever been away from my family, on my own ever in my entire life. There are three main parts to Parsha Naso: the Nazarite laws; the Sotah; and the priestly blessing. I’m going to put most of these three things aside and talk to you mostly about the Nazarites, those long haired feaky people.

The Nazarite laws state three simple things:

• they cannot drink wine or any form of grapes
• they cannot cut their hair
• and they cannot touch the dead.

Not too demanding right?

Nazarites are the only people who are as holy like the priests but without any of the responsibilities. Any one can be a nazarite too, you don’t have to be only from the tribe of Levi like the Kohainim or the priests do.

Interestingly enough the people who historically chose to be Nazarites where often adolescents who were trying to escape the negative temptations of the world. It makes sense to me that teens would choose this, since even in today’s world we face so many temptations: physical, mental, sexual, experimental, temptations on who we want to be, look, act, dress, speak, think, play.

People would become a Nazarite in order to detach themselves from society, but still be a part of the practices and worship. They rejected any form of grape product in order to not derive any of the pleasures of life, which is what wine symbolizes. By not touching or coming in contact with the dead they detached themselves from the unpleasant parts of life as well. The nazarite in today’s terms embodied the ideals of abstinence, the idea of resisting and waiting for the right and socially accepted time to give in to these temptations.

The priest cut off all of they’re hair (except for their payot) and nazarites didn’t cut their hair at all. The two extremes showed holiness. The idea of trimmed well kept hair speaks to the idea of balance and being able to restrain oneself from to much of a good thing and still maintain some holiness as well. Today we are able to understand how to limit ourselves and rejoice and enjoy life’s pleasures but still know when enough is enough. The nazarite showed sometimes you had to go to the edge in order to know where the middle is.

The idea of allowing anyone, man or women, or elderly, be as holy as the priests is in itself a very interesting and unique idea. It implies that being holy isn’t something to be reserved for only those of a certain tribe, age, gender, or social strata - that holiness is available to all. In a way, it permits the fulfillment of Hashem's commandment that we be "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation".

No one is 100% certain why anyone would want to be a Nazarite. The Torah doesn't say. But I understand on a personal level that compelling need to be holy, to live your life differently than the path normally taken. You see, the path I’m on isn’t leading straight to college or the other normal things. I’m looking more at the path of making aliyah and going into the Israeli Army.

That is, the road less traveled.

The land of Israel draws me to it like the letters to the torah. During the past four and a half months I grew in ways I didn’t know I would, or even could. Spiritually I grew, waking up every morning to see the sunrise and pray morning shachrit because to miss one sunrise would have been a shame. Hearing that sweet and beautiful ancient Hebrew language spoken all around me lulled me to sleep every night and followed me everywhere. While on yam l’yam - literally "sea to sea" - I hiked across Israel from the Galilee to the Mediterranean, on the last night of our camping and smelling very much like the Israelites who wandered through the desert for forty years probably did, we slept out under the stars. I didn’t sleep that night, I couldn’t, and everything was too beautiful to close my eyes. The breeze was to sweet smelling to let my sub-conscious mind take over and for my senses to not take it all in.

Why would I want to live a life so extremely different from the one I was born into? The same can be asked to that of the Nazarites - why would they want to do what they did? Maybe we’re the same people, Israel for me is that lover I long to be with, and without him I’m lost. Like the Nazarite, I’ve made my own vows: to come back to the home which, although far from my family, is where my my heart truly lies.

In Israel, I sit around and didn’t get a tan like the other girls, (I don’t ever tan, I reflect!). I didn’t try to meet any boys - Israeli or otherwise. Instead, I met up with my future. I saw myself driving through Jerusalem on my way to my home in Hertzelia, or where ever it may be; meeting up with my friends and making Shabbat dinner; singing daily prayers and psalms. At one point I wrote home saying “I've begun to feel myself being wrapped in eretz yisrael, as I become one with it. In more than just one way I found my family here.”

My Dad says "writing well means never having to say 'I guess you had to be there' ", and that in my words I've been able to bring people along on, to help them experience a connection without having to be there.

Maybe that's the secret to the Nazarite - they wanted what I want: to choose to live differently not out of selfishness, but in order to share, to serve as a link between the daily life which is important and necessary and the extraordinary and holy.

Shabbat shalom!

This was my father's letter to me, sent right before I came back home...

---

Prelude
The Kabalists tell us the story of creation through their mystical lens:

Hashem, infused in every molecule
spinning inside each atom and neutrino.
The first act of creation was to make the nothingness,
hanging holiness like lanterns to light the way.
The spherote shattered in a-dam/dirtperson's first sin
Godliness spilling, blending, twisting, merging,
ruining the perfect havdallah

Premise
Our mission, which we accepted
mere moments ago
at Har Sinai
is to expose, uncover, unveil, unearth
the bits of blessedness
collect it to us
tuck it safely in the deep pockets of our nefesh
to be delivered at the end of our travels

Preparations
In these last hours and minutes,
remember that job,
the task you took on during that infinte moment
when God's voice plucked at the strings of our soul,
Truth singing through you

I can't explain how you could
Walk out in the morning's first light
spread your arms, hands, fingers wide, like a net
collect the rays of sun.
I have no trick for catching the wind,
capturing it in your hair, your cloths
So that it will survive the 7,000 miles to us

So do this instead:
Before you go, walk barefoot across the ground.
Promise that no matter how clean you get,
Israel's soil will remain between your toes.

During your break, ignore the doctor's advice
go out without your hat
until you feel the tips of your ears heat from the sun
Promise that even after red fades to tan and eventually to peach,
You will always walk in Jerusalem's light

If you can get back there,
walk once more to the Kotel
Rub your hands raw against the ancient stones
Promise that even after the scabs and scrapes fade
Holiness will be held in every handshake

Imprint Israel, make it part of every sense

Promises
I won't say don't cry.
What a waste that would be.

Cry for the joy of the gift you have received
Cry for those who didn't live long enough to see the things
that became mundane to you, in the months you were there
Cry in frustration for the friendships that will fade
when the distance between you is more than a dorm room.
And cry for joy at the ones that won't.

Water the Land with your tears.
Plant a seed fashioned from your soul
and marvel at what will grow
in holy soil.

T'shuva (Return)

Outside in the warm Israeli summer air, the chatter of girls is all around me, sitting outside, trying to concentrate, trying to clear my thoughts. My head is distracted by thoughts of leaving. My heart is heavy, filled beyond capacity it seems with the the friendships that I know will be hard to keep in the weeks ahead.

Here in this place of chaos I've learned so much about myself - things I never thought possible, things I didn't even know existed. I've learned how I survive without the guidance of my parents, without the constant reinforcement of “the rules”.

I will be going home to a different chaos, which I know won't be as relaxing as I am wishing it to be. I want to stay, I want to never leave. I want to know that this period of fun and learning, this time of kesher (connection) will stay with me forever.

These people who walked so calmly (at least they seemed calm to me, frazzled and frenzied as I felt inside) into my life and made such a difference - I want them to come home with me.

I feel sick inside. Going to Israel is called “Aliyah”, “going up”. But it's as if the transition home is giving me the bends, as if I am rising up out of the depths of learning, out of the complete immersion of The Land and back toward the thin glaring harshness of the surface, where nothing is as meaningful.

I am comforted knowing that not a single moment spent here in Israel was wasted. Every laugh was cherished every smile had a reason, every song sung with passion. Everything happened for a purpose, not one moment was spent without knowing that it was not the happiest time of my life.

It's come down to the last 2 weeks, and I feel as if I will hate them and and love them more than any 2 weeks of my life. The strongest and most sincere emotions are coming forward, and I don't know how I will deal with it all.

But with the help of these amazing friends that I've made, for the rest of my life and on, I know that I'll get through.

Perspectives: Returning from Poland

A butterfly was caught in the window of a gas chamber. How it got there, and how it continues to survive there, I don't know.

In Poland I felt like there was a piece of glass between me and the rest of the world - something that was keeping me from being able to reach out emotionally and connect with or be a part of the rest of the world.

When the plane landed back in Israel that barrier shattered into a million pieces - 6 million to be exact - and I swept all 6 million shards of glass up and buried them all individually into the holy ground of Israel. I found myself making many vows (privately, to myself only): To never cut my hair, after seeing the clothing and sea nets that they made out hair taken brutally and painfully; To put others before me, because by making sure that I act humanely, I win against Hitler; To choose my words more carefully, as I've seen they effect people just as much as blood and war and death can, if not more. I vowed to face the world as it is, because pretending or ignoring lead to suffering.

I vowed to never forget that I'm strong and can handle it.

I vowed to move through this life with eyes wide open, taking it all in. Nothing is to be forgotten and nothing overlooked.

I'm no longer a butterfly contained by the glass in a window. The window is open and it's my time to fly.