Why leave home? Especially for long-distance travel. Especially for foreign travel.

For me, there are two key travel experiences that make the cost and time worth it. One is to witness superlatives not available at home.  The largest of this. The most crucial in world history of that. The greatest or least or most amazing of… something.

The second reason is to experience something personal and intimate. Conversations. Small, distinctive settings. These almost always involve people. Directly or indirectly. But they too could include delicate experiences with nature. Or when I can be alone in my thoughts, in a setting impossible from home, with beauty and sanctity piercing through the humdrum dailiness of it all.

Generally what sticks with me, what I find most valuable, are the intimacies.

As we were planning our trip to Italy and France, there were a few knowns, a few priorities and a few clear uncertainties. Let’s start with the knowns and priorities, relate them to superlatives and intimacies, and go from there.

I had never been to Italy. Thus, we knew that we had a kind of superlatives “bucket list” intent to check off.  Jean said that Venice was an extraordinary experience. And she also saw traveling in more small-town rural places of northern Italy as an opportunity for her to see new and spectacular vistas. I was not keen on either choice.

Venice didn’t appeal because it felt so intense, expensive and lacking in a non-tourist-oriented economy. Every Italian in the non-tourist economy would want nothing to do with us. Venice was high on the superlatives with low likelihood in the intimacies department.

Travels into the mountains of Northern Italy both concerned me due to potential cold weather (Yes… ironic given our later locations proved a problem in the exact opposite direction.) and I also just didn’t feel comfortable driving in Europe.

Our itinerary ended up being an unconventional mix of superlatives and intimacies starting with a week in Florence, an overnight in Lucca, a couple of days each in Toulouse, Cahors, Bourdeaux and Paris, interrupted by 5 days of heat-soaked barging up and down locks on the Lot River.  

In two previous blog entries, I focused on the Italian learning effort in Florence and the notion of physical and mental limitations, mostly related to my aging brain and body. Below, I want to share some of the highlights – both superlatives and intimacies – which made the trip a special, positive experience. We’ll break it down by place:

Firenze/Florence

Florence is a world center for art and culture. Some of the most famous artists and museums have their presence here.  What struck me as distinctive was the very prominent – even enormous – public art which dominated key plazas in the central historical area. Penises on parade. Muscles and curves and tight abs galore. The Renaissance sculptors created their vision of the beautiful and powerful human body as an ideal to celebrate. And be awed by.

We sure did walk in those plazas.  We also spent a good part of an afternoon at the Uffizi Gallery. We missed Michelangelo’s David which was housed at Accademia Gallery – you needed to buy tickets well in advance – but the Uffizi had all the penises anyone could ask for. Here are some pictures to give you a sense of the monumentalism of Florence.

I always like to connect with a Jewish part of a city’s story when I get the opportunity. In Firenze, we both saw a lovely superlative of a synagogue temple, and I had the chance to go to a shabbat service and dinner with a close friend and cousin of a South African cousin (by marriage) of mine.  The latter experience was at an orthodox Chabad congregation, where a speedy rabbi got a few of us through the required prayers, followed by amazingly delicious food and chats in English with folks from around the world. A brief note about the food in Florence.  We ate pretty good food with our school apartment host, and when she couldn’t feed us directly, she said to go downstairs to the local pizza restaurant and order what we want from the menu. Absolutely yummy. Delicious pizza with incredible crusts.   We went out for lunch at a Rick Steves’ recommended place… needed to wait in line to get served. But once the food arrived, spectacular taste at a reasonable price. Lucca The highlight of our one full day in Lucca was connecting with our friend, Jeffrey Collins. Jeffrey was spending a month plus in Italy, volunteering at an archeological dig site not far from Lucca. He not only joined us for the day but ended up driving us – at 3am mind you! – to the airport. Jeffrey has retired from a career as a national parks’ historian and interpretive guide.  He worked, among other places, at the Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia, where we met up with him a bit less than 10 years ago.  He helped us navigate that site then and so we were so fortunate to be able to share a day together in Italy.

Toulouse

Neither of us had ever been to Toulouse, which is famous as another center for art, architecture and archaeology. It is also the location of the primary global campus for Airbus.

We got a comfortable hotel in a great central location and spent a fair amount of time on our own, going where we wanted and resting up a bit.

In the central plaza, I witnessed the graduating ceremony of the French Foreign Legion cadets. There are only about 1200 graduates each year now with the entire force totalling only 9000 members. It looked like many of graduates were people of color, which is interesting in that the core function of the Legion had been to control French colonies in Africa, Asia and the Americas.

The colonial French empire was vast.  Algeria, Morrocco, Mexico, Crimea, Southeast Asia (Vietnam, etc.), Madagascar, Ivory Coast… and on and on. De Gaulle famously downsized the unit from 40K to 8K after WWII. At its largest, the FFL was closer to 100K troops strong. Today, we do get some nice residuals from the FFL in that the beautiful French language is still well spoken, and the colonial foods have enriched not only French cooking but the world’s. Not exactly sufficient justification for violent colonial oppression but we’re at now where we’re at.

The Toulouse area was originally settled at a civilization-forming level in pre-Roman times.  There was a nearby natural source of the blue dye called Woad. Apparently, this made its manufacturers extraordinarily wealthy, until the much cheaper indigo came over from Asia.

I went to the “Museum of Old Toulouse” to learn such things, and also to take in some powerful art.

On our second and last day in Toulouse, Jean and I went to the Airbus Museum.  As of late, Airbus seems to be kicking Boeings’ you know what, which I maintain is Seattle’s retribution for that aircraft maker moving its headquarters and much of its manufacturing out of our beloved Queen City. (Yeah… they call it the Emerald City now, after some chamber of commerce contest decades ago, but cool and really old locals still call it by its REAL name.)

Cahors

We took a short train ride from Toulouse to the picturesque town of Cahors, located at a deep bend in the Lot River. There we connected with our dear friend Brian Cantwell, who would function as our captain/skipper on our Lot River travels.  Brian had secured a third-floor comfortable apartment for the couple of days in which we would provision ourselves for the boating adventure.

As a relatively small town, Cahors was easy enough to get around, and we not only organized ourselves for the river trip, but enjoyed good eating, visits to a local Cathedral (Cathédrale Saint-Etienne de Cahors), a famous historic bridge across the Lot, and lovely parks.  There was a featured public artist, whose sculptures were all over town.  The pictures below can allow you to make your own judgment about his style and execution.

On our second full day in Cahors, we were joined by Brian’s daughter Lillian and her partner Lux. The five of us would be barge mates on our river voyage. Oh yes… and one cool thing about Cahors:  free public buses that went frequently and just where we needed them.

On the Lot River

It is pretty simple and mostly wonderful, really. We went up and down the river through about 12 locks.  At each lock, we needed to manually open and close the upriver and down river locks by using cranks requiring perhaps 100 revolutions per lock. And then we slowly motored away until we went to the next lock. Or, for the end of the day, hitch up to a dock and enjoy what tiny historic river towns have to offer.

I’ll just share a series of vignettes (a French word, oui?) of the river experience:

You climb out of bed on a cool morning – that promised to be 95 by 5pm.  You see your Lot River boat neighbor grab a leash and walk her dog ashore. You walk out of the boat and up the plank across the road to the riverfront park. Pass the sign that promises a festival of wines from the region on May 30, listen to the coos of the doves, smell the fresh air, say bonjour to all the folks you meet along the way, lift you head occasionally to take in the 17th century town you are a part of, and get your strides in before the efforts of the day are set to begin.  Coffee and croissants await.

Let me tell the story of one such town visit.  I sat in a church in the village of Vers.  We were moored there overnight, and it was over 90 degrees at 5pm. I was overwhelmed by the heat, but lacking air conditioning everywhere, it was in this church that I received – yes, blessed – relief. Such powerful joy I fell on Shavuot, singing in that beautiful and sacred space. And that night it would be shabbat in that time zone.

I then returned to the Boat, donned my swimming trunks and waded in the river at Vers by myself, Juani in the boat and the Cantwell clan at the hotel. 95 degrees and it was relaxing and refreshing.

Here’s another story:  I was sitting in a church sanctuary in the tiny village of Bouziès.  There are two main attributes of my church attendance. First and foremost, it is a cool respite from 90 plus degree heat. Second, it has the most wonderful acoustics.  I sung Jewish tunes and with no one to share the experience but statues of Jesus and other Christian disciples and artistic symbols. I felt a kind of rebellious spiritual elevation.

One time, we moored the boat for two evenings and took off on a taxi ride to a medieval town in the morning and prehistoric cave art in the afternoon. Juani had been there before so stayed behind, but the rest of us were treated to extraordinary cave art and… hurrah… cool temps.

Brian and I biked a bit one afternoon in the searing heat, and I bought 3 scoops of ice cream which began to cool me off, then yet another church stay advanced that restoration.

So much of this trip was also housed in the effects of world political storms. The US, Iran and Israel were at war.  The Trump administration seemingly finding the best possible way to lose not only the military campaign, but world sympathies. So, throughout the voyage, there was a sense that we felt somewhat ashamed of being an American.

Jean and I told one Danish tour guide during breakfast in Bouziès, that we are embarrassed by our country and its leader.  She said not to be embarrassed.  Hungary was a recent example of democracy throwing out a Trump- like bad guy she reminded us. The Danish lady added, “it must be difficult to be an American now.” Yet, everyone has been kind and gracious to us.  We have heard no attacks on US tourists, but we did see head shaking about US political leadership. 

Then I asked the Danish lady whether she was from Jutland or one of the islands. She said the former and I mentioned that I had spent time near Thisted in northern Jutland.  She not only knew that larger town but even knew Skyum and the farmlands near there at Skyum Bjerge.  I told my Aage Rosendal Nielsen story (https://danielinisrael.home.blog/2021/01/03/aage/). Later, I looked him up on the Internet and saw an interview with Aage that brought back memories.

The hotel we stayed that night – to get some relief from the heat – was run by a French man with his wife from Kaliningrad.   There were Asian Indians and Ukrainians working here. The Ukrainians earned money in the summer then went back to Ukraine in winter.

At another stopover, I took a walk by myself to sit and rest in the shade. I took a picture of a bee landing on a flower, sucking its nectar.  The bee, of course, was fluttering quickly between various flowers on the hillside. And I thought about the staggering genius of evolution.  It relies on ongoing diversity, selfish interest, and eons upon eons of time.

It took billions of years for those flowers, and those bees to help each other to survive. To thrive. And as I think about the details necessary for that particular mating, I find the time that it has taken to get to this point amazingly rapid.  What then is God, if not the universal force that compels an evolving creation.

Below, you will find a series of pictures on and adjacent to the Lot River, with our friends Brian, Lillian and Lux on board, and the tranquil riverside villages and forested hillsides of southern France.

Bordeaux

We took off a night early from the boat to recover in an air-conditioned hotel in Cahors along the Lot.  I found myself indulging ridiculously on pâté de foie gras – because it seemed like the thing to do, – taking some swims in the hotel pool, and generally easing myself into a less physically challenging part of the trip.

Then it was off to Bordeaux where we exchanged tranquility for nuthouse passion. The train station in town was very intense right away.  So, we called for an Uber – not public transit – to take us to our hotel.

The hotel was located about a 30-minute walk from the historic area. It was a sterile, international-capitalist third decade of the 21^st century anyplace. A Hilton Garden Inn. Our room was on the 6^th floor.

I asked the receptionist about herring. I told him that I craved the herring in oil, that I could scoop out of a crock that I had in Paris 20 plus years ago on my first trip to Europe with Jean. He looks it up and recommends one of several Bullion-named restaurants, which he says are traditional and not overly priced places to get my herring.

We eventually got to one of those places, I ate the herring from a small plate with potato and carrot bits.  Didn’t match my memory and turned out the herring was more salty and dry than oily… though I still enjoyed it.

Anyway… back to the chronological process.  After checking in, we decided to walk along the river to the city center. It is blessedly much cooler than our last week along the Lot. As we approach the center, the urban intensity gets more pronounced. As does the ethnic diversity that now is France.  Large numbers of folks from France’s former colonies have relocated to the country. The presence of Africans from Senegal, Ivory Coast, Niger, Congo, and elsewhere not only filled the streets and the names and languages of the businesses, but the first TV channels at the hotel were focused on Africa. 

The places and people we immediately saw as we entered the historic center were folks and businesses from Lebanon and Syria.  We were a bit hungry and looking for a bite before the larger herring meal to come.  But found ourselves walking quickly to stay ahead of a major Palestinian Rights protest march through the streets. We turned up various blocks with the goal of separating ourselves from that protest, but I kept picking streets that the protesters were marching toward.  Combined with my lack of French, I felt a certain vulnerability. Jean had picked a spot for a drink but I asked her to get up so we could separate ourselves from the chanting crowd.

Finally, we did pick a direction away from the Palestinian protesters, that led, amazingly, to a much much larger street event.   It was a Pride march!  Thousands of folks cheering and singing and dancing.  We tried to find a place for that small bite and drink and the cafes were completely packed. 

And it wasn’t only Pride that was bringing thousands of people to the bars and bistros in the city. A European finals cup match between Paris’s Saint-Germain football team and Arsenal of London was happening that evening. The importance of that match cannot be overstated, and the French revelers were eventually rewarded with a win.

Before the match started, Jean and I stopped by an English-themed pub, where she could get a hard cider and potato chips.  That held us together, until a long walk brought us to the herring dinner.

The Bordeaux historic area – a UNESCO World Heritage Site – is the largest site of its kind in the world. Several towering cathedrals, impressive public art palaces, and block after block of intact multi-storied pre-20^th Century residential neighborhoods.  Not just many, but most of the streets are either pedestrian/bike only, or pedestrian dominated.  But even in its massive size, the heritage site is densely packed with people there to enjoy themselves.  Eating and drinking establishments stocked with people laughing, and gesturing, and watching other people pass along the crowded streets. OK… maybe it was just the accumulated events of Pride and football that had the bars and streets overflowing that evening, but given the ubiquitous presence of restaurants, bars, cafes, and ice cream (glaces) places, the commercial viability of a massive UNESCO site looked pretty secure.

With Jean wanting to do a bit of shopping and just hanging out, I decided to take the “Bordeaux Historic City Center Free Tour.” It was quite good, all in English, and it did provide an opportunity to provide a donation at the end, which I did.  Here’s a few random things I learned on the tour:

1. Bordeaux has the longest pedestrian shopping street in Europe – Rue St. Catherine.
2. A Nazi soldier actually saved the heritage of the town.  When the war was just about over, he chose to blow up the Nazi munitions site. The Nazi plan was otherwise to destroy the architectural history of the city.  As it turned out, the historic integrity remained intact.
3. A house made of wood in the year 800ce also remains intact.
4. There were actually 300 years of English rule in this area. But apparently the English never required the locals to give up their French tongue.
5. Most of the buildings are faced with Limestone, which grows very dark unless sensitively washed.  Apparently, there is something about air-conditioning that impacts limestone, so that is banned in the central historical area. This is a major public health issue.  The temperature when we were there was down to a mild 80 degrees or so Fahrenheit. This week as I write the blog from the comfort of my downstairs lair, the high in Bordeaux has risen to 107 degrees.  Climate change is real, of course, and that temp has occurred before we even have reach July.
6. Bordeaux made an enormous amount of money as the center of the African slave trade for hundreds of years.
7. It was first settled by the Romans in Julius Caesar’s reign, 2000 years ago.
8. The same architect who designed Bordeaux’s stock market also designed Versailles.
9. Statues of Napolean and one of King Louis were constructed by them in Bordeaux, then torn down after they lost power.  Are you listening Mr. Trump?
10. Mostly, central Bordeaux was rebuilt in the 17th century and Paris in the 18th century.

And the herring? I have a new exquisite dish I ate for lunch. I had escargo to die for. Each bite was a trip to heaven.

Pictures? You want Pictures?

Paris (Where we learn that the French are Excessively Polite (everyone says bonjour) and Spasmodically Violent (street eruptions and window smashing  after football matches)

The train from Bordeaux to Paris was on a TGV. When on dedicated tracks, it travels at 200 miles per hour!  It was quite fun to see the countryside speed by.

Upon arrival we took an Uber ride to the house we would stay at for three nights. It is owned by the son of our friend Emily, and Jean had secured a great deal. We could have free lodging in exchange for French tutoring by Jean to Emily in Olympia.

After a quick orientation to the house by Nicole, who functioned as a caretaker of the site, we were off on the Metro to the Sorbonne and Jardin de Luxembourg. Jean had studied at the school as a youth and hung out in the gardens. It was a bit of a nostalgic homecoming for her. 

Later, we walked over to Notre Dame, perused Shakespeare and Co bookstore, metroed home to a lovely conversation with Nicole, then went strolling for a recommended neighborhood Vietnamese Restaurant. It was closed.

We searched for an alternative place for a small plate of something. Across the street was a tiny place for drinking wine and eating cheese and bread called the “Cave.” While trying to find the menu outside, a middle-aged man, 4-day growth of beard, smoking a cigarette at a two-person table, stared at us.

“What are you doing in this neighborhood,” he asked. “Tourists don’t come here.”

We explained that we were staying at the son of a friend.  We just wanted a small bite to eat.

He said, “well, then sit down here. This is one of the highest rated wine and cheese stops in all of Paris,” as he pointed to a map with a half dozen stars strewn around the city.

So, we did. 

He was with a bemused older guy, but this dude did all the talking.

He recommended the wine. He recommended the cheese plate.  He talked about himself and his background.  A lot. Amusing himself by sharing unsolicited his academic and business background. Clearly, he was a wealthy, internationally traveled Parisian, who was no longer needing to work and lived a pleasant existence as a retired nut job.

At one point I asked, “have you any interest in us at all?”  To which he replied, “no.”

A 35ish woman approached, glass of wine in hand, and entered the conversation.  Her husband runs the wine and cheese bar. Her young child is upstairs, and she needs to go back to him soon. Turns out she is a classical violinist. The next week involves a trip to San Francisco.  I promise to try to hook her up with James Jaffe, my cellist cousin in The City. Later, I make the email connection for them both.

The wine and cheese were fabulous and hit the spot. Jean surprised and delighted the crew with her fluency in French.  And I took it all in.

Oh yes, and the nutjob surprisingly paid half our bill!

The next day, after scrumptious coffee and pastries at the neighborhood boulangerie (also rated apparently one of the best in Paris), we went to the Picasso Paris museum. Yes, I know that Picasso had a long, famous and extraordinarily creative and changing legacy, but I find myself prejudiced by is evident misogyny. My son Zac points out that Woody Allen and other artists also behaved in dubius (at best) such behaviors and in a phone conversation with me asked if I still like him (even though Annie Hall is a masterpiece). To which my response was that Woody has lost several notches in my estimation, and I’m entitled to my Picasso bias.

What was fantastic at the museum was the downstairs visiting exhibit by a Californian artist named Henry Taylor. I found myself spending much time at each of his works. Yes, reading the museum’s interpretation, but then staring and searching and taking in the work with seemingly deeper and deeper affect. I was mesmerized by his art and amazed at how lively and evolving still images can be.

I will close the overly long blog entry with one additional scene that can only be in the “meant to happen” oeuvre.

When I was in Israel in 2019 as part of my retirement launch, I took a wonderful hike with my cousin Danny, his soon to be wife Shirley, and a close college friend of Danny’s named Arie.  We all hit it off famously.  So, when Danny heard that Jean and I would be in Paris, he suggested looking up Arie and his family.  I did so and Arie could not have been more gracious and welcoming.  He invited Jean and I to his house for dinner with his partner and children and offered to drive us to the airport the next day.

But here’s the amazing part.  Arie and family lived literally 50 meters from where we were staying! We went around the corner from our house and … there it was!  Both Arie and I were stunned by this… again, this is a non-tourist area of Paris.

We had a delightful evening with Arie, Judit and their two grown children Maya and Eital.  And fascinating.

Arie was born in Israel, but after his parents separated when he was very young, ended up living with his mother in Argentina until he was 18. While his mother was indeed Jewish, she was quite secular, and Arie didn’t have a focus on his Jewishness until one day, he ran into several antisemitic bullies and was severely beaten up. He was hospitalized for awhile from the incident and it got him to thinking. “Being Jewish is a risk, whether you are religious or not.”

 

So, he decided to make Aliyah (immigrate to Israel), went to an ulpan to learn Hebrew and joined the IDF. Arie’s main language at that time with Spanish.

Meanwhile, Judit’s heritage was as a Moroccan Jew, but she was born and grew up in Paris. She too at an early age was moved to explore Israel for immigration. She decided to go to ulpan and there she met Arie. But for awhile Judit decided to go back to France even as she stayed in touch with Arie.

As Arie explained it, he was very much into “playing the field” at that point and hadn’t promised Judit marriage or commitment.  But Judit said, ‘I’m going to make Aliyah.” She did and moved to Israel.  She and Arie started “dating” again, and they just never stopped.  With a first child coming, though, Judit and Arie decided to move to Paris… at least for a while. And they have been there ever since.

Our evening with Arie’s family was filled with delicious food off the grill and great conversation.  Loud political talk, including clear distinctions between parents and children’s attitudes toward Israel. Rapid conversations in English and French.

The multi-national sense of the family was striking.  They had passports from Israel, France, Argentina, and Canada. As the war continued between Israel, Iran, the US and spillovers into Lebanon and elsewhere, one really got a sense of an Israeli perspective.  These folks were the Israeli “liberals.” Yet, regarding the war, they were appreciative of Trump’s actions if not his humanity. They didn’t like Obama re Israel. I was taken by Judit’s desire for a “once and for all” resolution on Iran.  That sense that it may be difficult for many but if victory is won, the future can be better.  There was a dominant, and fully understandable fear based on Jewish historic trauma.

And yet… we also did lots of laughing and life sharing. We had a lot of fun.

The next morning, I had breakfast with Arie and then he took us both to the airport.

Superlatives and intimacies experienced … through the end of our long European journey.

More than 25 years ago, Jean and I put personal adds in Match.Com, where we talked about wanting to learn Spanish. Apparently, that became enough for a first date and translated six months later into me quitting my job, relocating for nearly 3 months in Mexico for Spanish language classes, and Jean joining me for the last month in those same classes as well as home visitations with natives. Intensive language acquisition became not only our way into love, but our mode of international travel.

Since that initial foray into language travel, Jean (who became Juani to me on that first foray south)  and I have returned several times to Mexico, using the same method, and immediately upon retirement I spent nearly three months in Jerusalem trying to learn Hebrew in the same fashion.

The sad reality, however, is that for me, it hasn’t been enough to truly get comfortable in any new language.  Juani has followed up those experiences with ongoing Spanish fluency efforts, including her own language teaching efforts, conversation groups, and book clubs all in Spanish. She refuses to speak Spanish with me at home because I’m so poor at it and she needs a break from that kind of teaching.  My Spanish, while adequate to have very simple conversations and get around while traveling, is nowhere close to fluency.

Yet that method of travel has still appealed. So, when we decided to go to Italy this last month, a nation I have never visited and a language neither of us knew, we enrolled in an intensive Italian program with the same native home stay format. This time  located in the city of Florence.

The Firenze-based (Florence in Italian) program was for only one week. We had no expectations for this to be more than a mere touch of the language. Because of Juani’s fluency in other Romance languages, French and Spanish, she had major advantages over me. Yet, I enjoyed, and felt a warm familiarity, with the approach to language learning. I genuinely took pleasure in trying to keep up with the daily assignments, found opportunities to smile on the rare occasions of actual word recognition and memory, and found the language-learning process oddly satisfying in the daily moments even as I  acknowledge complete long-term failure. As of now, I can’t remember 5 words in Italian!

A few particulars of the language learning experience:

1. Our teacher Alice was excellent. Later, in France, we also interacted with a woman named Alice.  Same spelling. But a very different pronunciation than English or between Italian and French.  It is fascinating how language evolves.
2. Fellow students were from all over the world.  There was a Chinese cook who wanted to learn Italian cooking so that he could open a restaurant in his home country. A Ukrainian woman living in Spain during her war and wanting to pick up Italian as another option.  An American woman – who insisted on me relocating my seat on our second day because she had to stay in the same seat all week – who was studying long-term to teach Italian.  Later, by the way, we had a lovely walk into town with her. The chair weirdness, notwithstanding, she was a nice young lady. A German man… not sure why he was there. A Korean woman, classically trained pianist, whose husband was in Switzerland as a visiting professor, and she wanted to pick up Italian for the fun of it. (And yes… of course I asked her to play a few bars on the piano in the room!) An older American woman who kept asking the teacher to slow down and needed translations into English. In other words, the world was learning Italian around us.
3. During our daily breaks, Juani went for coffee.  We found several options near the historic city center which provided a nice physical respite from the intellectual rigors.

Okay… now repeat after me these numbers in Italiano: uno, due…!

I am sitting in front of my lap top computer, beginning to type the first entry in Jean and my three-plus weeks in Italy and France. We are on the 6^th floor of an air conditioned corporate-generic Hilton Garden Inn, able to look out to a view of Bordeaux’s gothic masterpiece, the Cathedral Saint-Andre in the distance, and seven of the more proximate construction cranes used in the building of modern offices outside of the historic city center. To my right flows the Garonne River, a key access for the city to the Atlantic Ocean. Tomorrow morning we take the superfast TGV train to Paris, and two days after that, fly home to SeaTac.

We are exhausted. There have been many wonderful moments, and new insights along the way, and I intend to share some of those in an upcoming blog entry or two. But as of now, what has struck me as a clear learning, is that this trip has brought forward a strong reality:  As one ages, there are more physical and mental limitations that must be respected than when one is younger and more resilient. I turned 71 years old on this trip, and that which I could have managed before, became much harder this time.

To wit:

*Mental Capacity/Language Learning: Jean and I had our first bonding travel experience together 25 years ago. As a French and ELL teacher, Jean has stronger language acquisition skills and experience than I.  But when I quit my job, and spent nearly 3 months in Mexico, ostensibly to learn Spanish, I pretty much met my goals.  I was able to get around nicely, even have some professional conversations in the language. Jean joined me for the last month and we were both doing well in the intensive classes we took (she quickly got beyond me, but that was to be expected.)

This time in Florence, we took introduction to Italian for 5 intensive days. I worked at it and did indeed enjoy myself in the program.  But two weeks later?  I retain almost nothing!  In the future, I need to give in to the reality that my brain just can’t retain new languages at this stage.

* Physical Comfort: The weather in Florence, and later in Lucca for one day and Cahors for another, was quite pleasant.  Rain occasionally, but temps in the high 60’s to low 70s. That changed when we started our one-week boat trip up and down the Lot River. 

Near record-breaking heat accompanied us for the entire week. Highs every day 90 degrees or more.  There was no air conditioning on the boat, we were in cramped quarters, and part of the boating experience was to open and close river locks to make headway up or down stream. Opening and closing locks consisted of lots of physically demanding cranking. 

The pairing of the heat, physical exertions and tight headway which didn’t allow me to fully stand up for parts of the trip, took its toll. I was overheated and could not find adequate relief for large portions of the trip.  Jean had not experienced that heat in her same trip a year before.  But by the time our week was nearly over, I needed to get to an air-conditioned hotel room a day early, just to recover.  

*Writing: The above limitations have definitely affected my ability to write, record perceptions, and find meaningful things to share. That is itself a limitation I need to recognize.

But with that said… I am looking forward to a couple of days in Paris.  We will meet up with a close friend of my Israeli cousin Danny, Arie, who is living with his family in the City of Lights. We have the same place to stay in our friend Emily’s son’s apartment as Jean stayed last year.  I’m still on the hunt for herring in oil that I remember from our first trip together in Paris 23 years ago.  And we will find a museum or two to visit. OR… do a bit less and accept the limitations of our energies on the tail end of a long and fruitful trip.

These are, as I’m confident all of you who are reading this blog will agree, particularly challenging times to be Jewish.  The US and Israel are at war with Iran. Israel is actively bombing Lebanon and intermittently doing the same in Gaza and the West Bank.  And generationally, there are extraordinary shifts in Jewish opinions about Israel in general and Zionism in particular. The younger you are as an adult in our country – and really throughout the world – the less supportive you are likely to be of Israeli actions or even the continued existence of a Jewish state. And the confluence of antisemitism and opposition to Israeli actions is both controversial and undeniable.

As president of the largest Jewish organization in the capital city of Olympia, and at a time when our rabbi is on sabbatical, I am finding myself approached by various congregants, asking the temple to be explicit in taking positions on politically sensitive topics, or if not taking a specific position, then asking for inclusion into the temple of what are permissible topics for discussion.

With that as prologue, I will provide below two written pieces I have recently written that relate to the general topic of governance at Temple Beth Hatfiloh, and our role in the civic life of our community.  The first piece is my monthly President’s Report to the Board.  The second is my speech, written down, supporting the recently passed Olympia City Council Proclamation of Jewish American Heritage Month in the city.  That is followed by a picture of members of our temple and the Mayor (a Jewish one at that!) and City Councilmembers in front of the council dais.

President’s Report – May 2026 (for 19 Iyyar 5786)

Temple Beth Hatfiloh is, of course, not a political entity at its core.  We are a spiritual center with a vision of serving broadly the entire Jewish community. And yet… we are all affected by civil governance and the public debates of the day.  And so, I have found myself, as President, often approached by people and institutions in ways that have me/us asked to take positions or stands on civil issues.

How do we at TBH deal with global, national and local political issues and forces? What is our role, as a Jewish institution, in responding to or initiating positions, programs or other actions that can affect us as part of the Jewish people?

In these past few weeks, here are some examples of what I have been faced with regarding the “Politics of TBH.”

1. Jewish American Heritage Month in Olympia: Just want to remind Board Members, on the off chance that you will actually read this before the Board meeting, that I will be representing TBH at the signing of a proclamation in the city of Olympia designating May as Jewish American Heritage Month.  I want to encourage everyone to join me at 6pm on May 5 in Council Chambers.  You get a picture with our Mayor and City Council Members – suitable for framing! – and an opportunity to take pride in the recognition of our heritage.

2. A few weeks ago, I was approached by a member who wanted to talk with me about forming a group within TBH that would be explicitly non-Zionist in nature.  This individual had also spoken with Rabbi Seth about that same topic.  I agreed to meet with that person along with another member to discuss the question.  I asked them to provide me with a statement of intent for such a group and we had a couple of extensive conversations. I also knew, as they did, that there was a high potential for such a group to be inflammatory and divisive for our TBH communi

I consulted with Kayla as to what she knew of Rabbi Seth’s intent. He had suggested that instead of a specific “affinity group,” which was their request, that establishing a book group, consistent with other similar groups at TBH (e.g., Modern Mystics) could be valuable and supportable.  In my discussion with the two members, I asked whether the book group approach, part of our regular quarterly program set, would be acceptable.  They agreed to that.  So, they will be working with Kayla to set that up for this summer, starting after Rabbi Seth returns. He, apparently, wants to be part of that group discussion.

3. A few weeks ago, I was approached by another member of TBH. She sought Board approval of a political endorsement opposing state Initiatives IL26-001 and IL26-638. That opposition is being spearheaded by a group called  “No Hate in WA State.” Rabbi Seth had indicated personal support for opposition to those initiatives, and noted the specific process in our polices for such a Board endorsement. This process include two Board votes with outreach to our general membership sandwiched in between those votes.

As of now, our existing queer peoples group, Beit Ha’Keshet, is scheduled to meet on May 13 to organize and put together the materials for Board consideration at its June 3 meeting.

4. Then there is the internal “politics” of TBH.  My sense is that all of us have experienced the famous line “two Jews, three opinions.”  We have our fair share of strong, opinionated personalities (yes, I’m unfortunately high up on that list). As a Board, and in our temple committees, we often deal with differences and conflicts of ideas and personalities.  That is why it is so important that we have asked a group of our members to develop a Code (Brit) of Conduct policy to help guide us through those times when conflict resolution is so essential. 

We are hopeful that a draft of that Brit will be ready for Board consideration in June and ready to be shared with the entire community at the Annual Meeting on June 21.

Jewish American Heritage Month

Honorable Mayor Payne and members of the Council,

My name is Daniel Farber, I live at 219 West Bay Drive NW on Olympia’s West Side, and I am proud to represent Temple Beth Hatfiloh as its congregational President.  With me in the audience you will find other TBH leaders including Barbara Soule our Vice President, several Board members…. and other members of our congregation.  

Unfortunately, the two rabbis leading Olympia synagogues were not able to make it tonight, but I have spoken with both, and they send their support and thanks for the proclamation. Rabbi Seth from TBH is on sabbatical and Rabbi Yosef from Chabad is celebrating the festival of Lag Ba’Omer. That festival is not a religious holiday, but rather a festive cultural event, so not to worry about this event’s timing.

On behalf of TBH, we are pleased to support the powerful statement you are considering that proclaims May 2026 as Jewish American Heritage Month in the City of Olympia. We are not only in favor of this proclamation, but also so thankful for the support that this city, its governmental leaders and staff, and its people, have provided to our Jewish community for over 150 years. 

Jewish Americans have found in our beautiful city, broad freedom to worship and carry out our cultural practices.  And with that freedom, that tolerance of religious differences, there have been great dividends for Olympia. As the proclamation states, Jewish Americans have been “woven into the tapestry of our community.”

For decades, businesses such as Goldberg’s furniture at the prime corner of 4^th and Capital, and Olympia Supply with its humorous spokeswoman Sadie Kumquat sharing the latest weekly specials on KGY radio, were centers of commerce and community life. Jewish Olympians have been leaders in the establishment and growth of social agencies like Community Youth Services and the Dispute Resolution Center. Instrumental in the relocation of St. Peter’s Hospital and the provision of a range of medical services. TBH has been a major supporter of Interfaith Works, promoting dialog with Christians, Muslims and other faith communities.

More than once, Olympia’s voters have elected Jewish mayors, as well as Port Commissioners, School Board members, and other civic leaders. Our small Jewish community has been intimately connected with the health and welfare of Olympia almost from its founding.

But our city’s ideals of inclusion and tolerance have not always been met.  We have experienced antisemitic incidents of property destruction and threats of violence at our synagogue. Antisemitic messages have been scrawled on our city’s buildings and along our streets.

It is to these realities, when our values are truly challenged, that we have seen Olympia’s city government rise to our defense.  When our security has seemed at risk, the city’s police department has come to protect us.  During times of difficulty, city elected officials have sat with us in our synagogue, demonstrating solidarity.

So, we are here to support and thank you for this proclamation.  And also, to thank the city of Olympia for the many actions it has taken and continues to take, that advance social justice and religious tolerance for Jewish Americans and all members of our human family.

For your proclamation, we give you a hearty Yasher Koakh!, which in Hebrew sings credit for a job well done.

Thank you.

I’m the guy holding the proclamation standing beside our wonderful mayor, Dontae Payne, with temple members, city staff and council members surrounding us. Photo credit Jean Michalski Farber.

I was searching for a particular document on my electronic storage site, when I came across the below piece I wrote more than 5 years ago. It was written for Keith Eisner’s writing class relatively soon after I had retired. For those who are also recently retired, does the below ring a bell?

Week 1: Preparation

Now that my work life has come to a satisfying close, and the accolades from former colleagues for a job well done has wafted long enough across my proud brow,  it is essential to set clear short, medium and long-range goals for the rest of my life and see each day as a grand opportunity to advance those goals.  Self-discipline is essential.  So here are my commitments: 

For my body, I will exercise every day.  Stretching and warm-ups always must start the ritual. No fewer than 10,000 steps.  45 minutes of cardio.  Exertion of all muscle groups.

For my mind, I will write a journal entry or other longer piece of writing each day.  No exceptions. A minimum of 2 hours of free-flowing prose, with longer academic or professional pieces added based on timely ambition.

For the community, volunteering to help the needy or advance society in some fashion. 10 hours per week, minimum. 

For family, I will cook and clean and support the household every day.  I will always ask how my wife is doing and think about how I can improve the quality of her life as well as the lives of our children. Every day. 

For recreation, I will take up guitar, improve my table tennis game, join a choir, and travel the world.  I will attend to the lives of my friends, invite them to participate in grand occasions and grow closer to them in our shared lives.

Week 2:  Execution

The stretching in the morning was so affirming, and the beautiful walks during the warm summer mornings made 10,000 steps a breeze. Heck, on Thursday, I even made 14,342 steps! I found that I really didn’t need to go the full 45 minutes to get my steps in. 30 is fine.  How unfortunate that I strained my shoulder on Wednesday. Ouch… need to take it easy there. 

I sure love to write!  I did miss Tuesday’s journaling because Joe needed help with his yard.  It probably is important to stop writing on shabbat, so Friday and Saturday will be no writing days. There are priorities to balance. 

I’m sorting through 5 different organizations that could use my volunteer help. Several look promising.  I’ll interview them next week.

I made 5 dinners and 3 lunches this week.  Boy that was fun.  My wife wanted to make other meals, so I let her.  Nice shared work.   Cleaning up was a breeze.  But it’s only fair I share the duties on that as well. 

Research on travel options was a gas.  So many choices! Joined the choir.  Looking into guitar teachers.

Week 3: Realization 

Sprained my right leg.  In a cast. Great for upper body strength but need to take it easy in the future.  Doctor says 6 weeks before I can begin a steady regimen of walking. 

Hmm… what to write about?  I think I need to watch more TV to get ideas.  Thank goodness the impeachment hearings are going on.  So mesmerizing and the human condition is on insightful display. Much to write about there. 

When I volunteer my time, I need to be sure I support what an organization is doing.  After looking into the 5 organizations last week, I found serious fault with all of them.  Need to investigate others. 

Hard to cook and clean when you can’t easily walk around.  My wife has graciously agreed to take on more of those household chores, and we have found great take-out options.

My friends and I talk about impeachment on the phone.  We really agree with each other. How gratifying. 

Week 4: Disillusionment

The flu has done me in.  Fluids and rest, fluids and rest. 

The world is bleak. Trump will never be convicted.  Why write?  I’m not a good writer anyway, It isn’t like there is a paucity of book writers who are better than anything I could ever produce.

I’ve concluded that you cannot really help another person.  Volunteer for the needy?  Any help one provides is just enabling their dysfunction.   Better they live their lives and I live mine.

My wife is sick of cooking and cleaning and sick of me.  I don’t blame her. What good am I anyway?

As for friends, who needs them? They only gripe that I am not the same man they’ve known for all these years. 

You know, after I get over the flu, I’m wondering if they’d take me back at the morgue. It was a great job with super benefits, and we were always cracking the best jokes.

I am in the midst of writing a blog entry about my connections with the city of Berkeley, linking my own youth to a recent visit with Zac, Vicky and grandson Alden. For research and memory purposes, I went back to look at a eulogistic piece I wrote near the time of my Aunt Sarah’s death in 2019. The piece captures well my emotional connection not only to Sarah and my Uncle Joe but to Berkeley as well. You can read it below as prologue to the next blog entry I intend to post soon.

Memories of Sarah

Sarah was a reluctant participant in technological change.  Wait. Reluctant is too weak a word.   Resistant?  Luddite-like? Indignant?  Yeah, that’s a closer fit.  

“I will get a push button phone only when I cannot reach Kaiser with my dial phone,” she insisted.  Eventually she had to get the tonal phone.

It is at least ironic then that it took the Internet to easily answer one of her core puzzles in life: What are the real words to the One Day at a Time theme song? It sounds like “wop on deet.” The answer, which really isn’t the important part of this story, is “up on your feet.”  I read the lyrics on You Tube and listened to the theme song again and again. Still sounds like “wop on deet.”

Aunt Sarah died on August 21, 2019 at the age of 85. Never met anyone remotely like her.  The arc of her life took her to extraordinary places and connected her to talented and accomplished people.  And she was brilliant and creative and loving and thoughtful of others and self-limitingly fearful and quirky[1] to her core.

Sarah was born on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, to an MD father and supportive wife.  She had a big brother who emotionally abused her, terrified her (“Maybe you’ll wake up in the morning, or maybe I’ll kill you in your sleep.”), and in general made her childhood home a torturous memory. Yet the neighborhood itself held its treasures and protections as a place to escape from familial dangers.  She told stories of Mrs. Zabar (of Zabars Deli fame) giving young Sarah free sweets, and smiled while remembering winter days with friends, ice skating in Central Park.  Her father made house calls in the neighborhood and his lovely, quiet daughter drew reflected respect and appreciation from his patients.

As she went through puberty, her extraordinary beauty provided – as they do for the beautiful – opportunities and risks.  She became a high-fashion coat model. Sarah told the story of her Jewish boss protecting her from the clutches of predators by saying “Don’t touch that one. She’s a landsman,” which referred to Sarah’s Jewish heritage. Yet, Sarah was not only secular and unlearned about that heritage but actively irreligious, demurring from any focus on her ethnicity.

Sarah the coat model

She married at age 17, principally as she told it, to get away from her frightening brother. Her husband, Marvin, was in the theater industry in New York.  She got hit on by Walter Matthau – and others whose names haven’t lasted the ages – and was highly uncomfortable with the socially prominent in-crowd.  Much the introvert, she decided to divorce husband number one.  While attending a musical performance, an acquaintance of Sarah’s, Joe Jaffe, asked her how Marvin was doing. “I don’t know for sure,” she replied. “I’m going to leave him.”

“Well then, I’m moving in on you,” Joe stated matter-of-factly.  Sarah recalled this event with bemused awe.  But Joe’s overture evidently met with Sarah’s approval. They were married for 60 years.

Joe too was in the entertainment field.  At least for a few years.  He played banjo and became a virtuoso with the instrument just at the time the post-war folk music movement in New York’s Greenwich Village was taking off.  He played with Peter Seeger and Woody Guthrie and other folk luminaries. Pete gives credit to Joe in his classic book How to Play the 5 String Banjo for teaching him a thing or two.

Joe was a caller for square dances, a session instrumentalist during jams, but never a major soloist. He was asked to join “The Weavers” folk music group as they were forming but turned them down to pursue higher education.   But not before – he claimed – teaching them an Israeli song he heard, Tsena Tsena Tsena, which the group converted into a smash popular hit (# 2 on the Billboard charts) in 1950[2].

Joe eventually became a chemical engineer, working for Standard Oil of California at its Richmond refinery. A creative, if unorthodox, catalytic chemist (he tended to go with “hunches” which often proved correct), we are left with over 30 patents in his name.  But the draw for Sarah originally was not his scientific expertise, but the joyousness with which he performed both the banjo and the guitar, and, apparently, as she endearingly recalled, his thin yet shapely legs.  I think she found that he also had a sense of assurance that appealed.  He didn’t seem fawning over her. And he was her competitive match in the quirkiness department (and well beyond her capacity for cringe-worthiness!).

Sarah loved to tell what became classic Joe stories. The only student in the history of the program to fail the “Factory Trips” class at engineering school (he refused to turn in a write-up of his trip).  Saying “Ah, so!” to the waiter at the Chinese restaurant. Stubbornly refusing orders from exasperated military authorities during the Korean War, which led them to keep him out of reach of any soldier other than during his entertainment gigs (he led music performances for the troops). Collecting tool kits at garage sales, not because he needed any more tools, but because they were such deals. Keeping an abundant collection of tapes (Scotch, electrical, and the always useful duct), that somehow marginally held the plumbing and wiring together. Heaven forbid one actually calls a plumber and upgrades the damn house.

The couple relocated several times, following paths to a series of Joe’s engineering jobs.  From New York to New Jersey to St. Louis, and finally to Berkeley, California. 

Sarah loved Berkeley. She loved the weather. Never hot, never cold. Fog rolling in each summer afternoon, leading to a specific window opening and closing and shade lowering and raising procedure that kept the house comfortable year-round. She loved the brilliant azaleas, sprawling oaks, fluffy “broccoli trees” and tasty loquats.  No Pacific Northwest “pointy” trees for her. She loved Tilden and Live Oak Parks, Mt. Tam and the Marin Headlands, Point Reyes and Redwood Regional, and in the summer, long treks in Yosemite.  She loved Strawberry Creek gently flowing down a UC Berkeley campus filled with old, classically designed buildings.

Joe and Sarah hiked weekends, and when their two boys grew old enough, the four of them would take off to the High Sierra.  They joined the Berkeley Hiking Club and the Sierra Club. Initially, upon moving to Berkeley, they rented a home for a couple of years on Walnut Street. While looking to buy they found a 1920’s cottage in the Berkeley Hills on Scenic Avenue, just four blocks from Shattuck (then known as the North Berkeley “Gourmet Ghetto” now called the “North Shattuck District”). They bought it in 1963 and settled in forever; two brilliant, funny, talented, quirky people, living in that quirky house until each of them died there.  Joe 3 years ago, Sarah in August.

When bought, the house had no dining room, a tiny kitchen, a poor foundation, a dysfunctional fireplace and chimney, ancient plumbing and electrical systems, paper-thin walls upstairs, and a hell of a wonderful living room with five knotless redwood beams and a magnificent view of the Golden Gate Bridge and Mt. Tam.  Sarah could send her boys to walk down the hill to get a pint of milk.  A basketball hoop was set up below the house on the street… a 30-step walk down from the front door.  The yard had a lemon tree, that never produced much, and a persimmon tree that produced plentiful, flavorful gooey fruit.  It was a low-maintenance yard, with a minimum of non-irrigated grass down from the upper steps, a dominance of English ivy upfront and along the road, and a brick patio and small hillside of native bushes out back. Over the years, the English ivy had its way with the back hillside as well. And Sarah never watered the landscape. That would only “encourage” the plants, causing more work for her.

Two blocks up the street was Codornices Park, with its kid-friendly, 40-foot concrete slide that worked best by grabbing a large piece of cardboard, jumping on top of it and letting gravity do its thing.  There was the park’s softball field by the EBMUD reservoir, and the twisting forested trails up into the upper Berkeley Hills where one instantly became immersed in the smells of pine needles, bay laurel leaves and eucalyptus buttons.  There was the small children’s playground often filled with wee ones whose parents’ kid-centered gazes occurred with inverse frequency to their children’s ages. And there was the echo-ready tunnel under Euclid Avenue which connected Codornices to the Berkeley Rose Garden, tennis courts and famous Golden Gate sunset viewpoint. Codornices was an integral part of Sarah’s walking loop into the hills, her sturdy broad strides interrupted only occasionally by a lesson to her touring partners on the history of the Berkeley Brown Shingles architectural style, or the distinctions between cedars and cypresses, or manzanitas and madrones (always delivered with a thick German accent because of the German friend who first described to her those distinctions).

Four blocks down the street was Shattuck Avenue, with the Berkeley Food Coop, the post office (it didn’t have those “great deals” on packages found at the El Cerrito Post office but it was convenient and “goodness no” would one put one’s mail into one’s own mailbox for it would surely be stolen!), the Cheeseboard Collective, Alice Water’s Chez Panisse restaurant, and the French Laundry coffee and pastry shop. It was at first, second and third glance a kind of neighborhood commercial paradise.

On the other hand, urban crime and violence and the general crazed intensity of Berkeley’s politics became an increasing cause of concern and fear for Sarah.  She wouldn’t go to Saul’s Restaurant because she was convinced the anti-Semites would bomb it (though from grandson urgings, she would relent a bit in later times for a tasty breakfast).  The 30-step climb to their front door probably saved Sarah and Joe from the fate of apparently every other household on their block – a break-in and theft.  She hated the new and hideous buildings on the UC Berkeley campus. She lamented the city’s lack of road and parks maintenance, as its city council prioritized national and international political stances over municipal services.  Increased pressures on housing prices and demand, saw the city accept proposals for high-rise developments, which Sarah opposed. She wrote a letter to the council and a poem decrying the city’s caving to the whims of the development interests. As the years progressed, Sarah bemoaned the loss of the historic municipal idyll that was her Berkeley at first sight. She and I, her urban planner nephew, would have long discussions about city policies.

At a different scale, the domestic life in the Jaffe household seemed remarkably stable. While Sarah did work outside the home for a few years, leading music and doing some teaching in a Berkeley pre-school, for the most part, she was a stay-at-home mother and wife.  She shopped, cooked and cleaned and did yard work, as Joe went off to the lab for about 25 years.  Hilariously, and with successful determination – obstinance?! – once Joe retired, Sarah pledged to never cook a meal again. Other than taking on the turkey and a few other dishes at the annual Thanksgiving feast, sharing the cooking load with vegetarian daughter-in-law Janie; and other than the almost daily Sapporo Ichiban Original Formula Ramen to which she added broccoli and other greens and claimed, without convincing rationale, wasn’t actually cooking; she pretty much pulled that off.

Post retirement, Sarah and Joe became restaurant mavens in the diner’s bliss that was the East Bay Area. Renee’s Place (orange chicken), Pasta Pomodoro (mista salad with soda pop that she whisked for minutes to get the fizz out), The Meal Ticket (just about anything was always good), Christopher’s (add the bowl of guac regardless), Gregoire’s (potato puffs), and Poulet (an assortment of salads). I could go on! So I will.  There was the Fatapples we go to (El Cerrito) and the Fatapples we don’t go to (Berkeley, even though it was much closer). For Joe’s unhealthy comfort foods, there was Brennan’s piled high meat platters and HS Lordship’s weekend brunch buffet by the Berkeley Marina. Tandoori Nites in Stockton was a requirement when visiting the Stockton Jaffes.  Sarah could no longer handle the spices but would revel in other’s pleasure.  And for guests like me, at all the restaurants, and even for the food bought at the supermarket and brought home to Scenic Avenue, the rule was “Because I don’t cook anymore, we pay for all food when you visit us.”  Sarah said it was “Joe’s rule.”  I knew Joe. Everyone knew Joe.  Everyone knew it was not Joe’s rule.  But for Sarah, it was Joe’s rule.  I would cheat when I could.  “But Sarah, this wasn’t food. It was entertainment and that isn’t covered,” I’d counter. We’d look at each other, smile, and sometimes I’d get away with it and sometimes not.  But mostly I didn’t, and she would ask me to show her the receipts and take out her wad of bills – she never paid seemingly anything with checks or credit cards – and reimburse my costs.

Household evenings back during the child-rearing years in the 60’s and early 70’s were spent singing songs together as a family. Sarah would ask Joe to get out his guitar – sold (given?) to him by Woody Guthrie and famous for the “this machine kills fascists” line written on its back – and they would sing and play the folk music learned in their youth.[3]  Both had incredible memories for lyrics, and they would sing the evenings through.

As the boys grew, they too were encouraged – required – to play music. Sarah did the initial introductory lessons on the piano to both Michael and Peter.  Michael gave up on it after a few years – to the chagrin of his mom.  He took it up again later when out of the house and plays and composes to this day.  Peter, the older, continued for a while on the piano, but then seriously took up the violin.  He was a prodigy with perfect pitch and went on to a career in music, marrying a musicologist, and becoming symphony orchestra conductor of the Stockton Symphony, other regional orchestras, and a guest conductor and teacher throughout the world. Sarah was not only proud of her son’s musical aptitude but felt great joy in attending regional performances for decades.

When the family wasn’t sitting around together playing and singing music, they watched shows together on the TV, and listened to records, both musical and comical. Fawlty Towers ran as a virtual loop (Basil!). Beyond the Fringe’s The Great Train Robbery and The Miner, were preps for the main course, Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner’s The 2000-Year-Old Man LP. The latter became an essential rite at every visit with the Jaffes.  Quoting from it seemed to fit any conversation. Sarah would call me every October 15 just to say “Not yet, October 16^th” which was the date the 2000-year-old man would actually turn 2000.  “The major thing” became anything that came next, as long as you weren’t eating fried foods. “It was so simple, I didn’t know it was eloquent,” was the latest insight.  “How you doin’ Pop?” substituted for the ungratefulness of children. Landing a man on the moon, or any dramatically positive accomplishment was said to be “good too.” “Hitting a tree with a piece of stick was already a good job,” told of one’s career objectives. “Some good things,” was any measure of satisfaction. Nectarines were in fact not “half a peach, half a plum,” but it didn’t matter.  It was all familiarity for the soul.

So was Sarah’s devotion to the original Star Trek and quotes would usher forth at appropriate times.  While all the other women in my life have justly described the show as “just dumb,” not Sarah, who indeed knew it to be dumb, but was reassured by the familiarity of its characters and didn’t mind seeing it for the 5^th and 6^th time. Always filled with fears for the future, Star Trek, appealed to her need for a hopeful, positive human destiny.

In the sweet years of family life, Sarah would call out to her youngest son:

“Michael, come down and watch Star Trek.” 

“I can’t Ma, I have homework,” he replied.

“But this is the episode with the amoeba.”

“I can’t Ma, I have to finish this paper.”

Visits to Sarah and Joe

When our family moved to Seattle from New York in 1955, the most proximate relatives – whom we didn’t know well – were in LA. When Sarah and Joe moved to Berkeley in 1961, they became the nearest relatives. We visited them as a family a couple of times in my childhood and they drove up a couple of times to visit us. I was close in age to their two sons. Peter was a year younger and little brother Michael about two years younger than that. When I became a teenager, we somehow got the idea that I could visit with them in Berkeley by myself. Because my sisters were already out of the house, there was probably a relief factor for my parents to have a breather of complete independence from all the kids.

I think I visited with the Jaffes at least twice for extended periods (a week or two) in my teens. Joe was still working then, so he was not around as much as Sarah and the boys.  I felt a great bonding with her at that time.  She was younger and “cooler” than my parents.  Once, she picked me up at the airport and she drove over to go grocery shopping before reaching home. As we left the car, walking along the street to the Berkeley Food Coop, Sarah said matter-of-factly “watch out for the shit.”  The teenage me loved that.  Just saying the word “shit” as opposed to a euphemism. She was nonplussed. “Well, that’s what it is.”

The Jaffe’s two cars in the 70’s were called Big White and Little Blue.  Joe drove Big White – a ginormous Oldsmobile Delta 88 gas guzzler. He explained that after the 1973 energy crisis, the price of gas increased but the cost of buying a used gas guzzler plummeted.  Always trying to save a buck, he calculated in favor of guzzling.   Little Blue, on the other hand, was a tiny, high-gas mileage Austin America British import.  Horribly constructed, marginally functional (wouldn’t start when it rained), Sarah saw the car as a “sweet little boy with bright blue eyes in a tidy blue sailor suit.”  As I turned 16 and secured my driver’s license, I convinced Sarah to let me drive Little Blue.  She gained confidence in my driving and she complimented me on it.  She would, of course, NEVER let Joe drive Little Blue – or drive her anywhere with any vehicle – because he was such a frighteningly horrible driver.   Her confidence in me was affirming.  Around Sarah, I felt respected.

And appreciated.  She didn’t praise Joe’s cooking, but she loved mine or at least did a magnificent job of feigning it.  I made her chicken cacciatore. She would respond with characteristic pleasurable mming sounds as she ate it. “Mmmmmm, oh, mmmmmm, it is so delicious!” she would say as she leaned into the plate and slowly savored each bite.   

Between the time I graduated from high school to the time I went to UC Berkeley – about six years – I did not see the Jaffes often.  For a few months prior to being accepted to grad school in Berkeley, I was hanging around various portions of the state trying to establish California residency (for cheaper tuition). Sarah and Joe made it clear that while I could visit them for short periods, I couldn’t stay there. They were setting appropriate boundaries. Then when I did get accepted to Cal, we saw each other a lot more, though not as much as I would have expected.  We enjoyed each other’s company, but Joe was still working hard, and in fact, so was I.

My experiences with the Jaffes in general, and with Sarah in particular, were always centered on humor. We made each other laugh.  Laugh hard.  Laugh till it hurt. Laugh till tears were shed. Laugh till the stresses of “the real world” were peeled away. Laugh till the love for each other was sealed.  And the laughter came from … where? They weren’t jokes, pe se.

“I was just talking with my friend Ted Phlaff,” Sarah starts out.

“How do you spell that,” I interrupt and inquire?

“P H L A F F”

“No, I knew that. I was asking about Ted.” 

Sarah and I bonded not just with humor but also in part with a critique of my parents in general and my mom in particular. When a teenager, Mom and I had a lot of difficulty with each other.  Sarah, over the years, likewise, had some very negative experiences with Mom, and we talked with each other about our mutual difficulties.  The themes were overlapping if not identical.  For Sarah, Art and Ruth (my parents) were the much older, quasi-parental effete academics, who didn’t respect her.  Sarah’s critique of Mom – that she was unspecific, aloof and kind of dishonest – met my assessment perfectly. Sarah was less harsh about my dad, but she sensed her failure to meet his standards as well.

In every relationship there are strengths and weaknesses. Places to go together and places you can’t, or at least aren’t satisfying if you try.  One warm autumn morning when attending UC Berkeley, my sister called to tell me that my dad had just died. He was in Israel, traveling with my mom on his sabbatical. I immediately called Sarah and Joe and asked to come by their house. They said sure.  With a hyperactive surge of adrenaline, I rode my bicycle shakily down the streets and over to their home in the throes of this emotional event. Boy, did they not meet the moment.  Sarah ended up criticizing Dad and Mom and Joe didn’t know what exactly to say. They were simply not able to cope empathetically with a young man at a critical moment of loss. I felt a disappointing distance from them at that point, and while we continued to see each other and enjoy each other’s company, I came to accept the limits of certain emotional connections.

About 10 years later, a horrible reality of my life drew us closer together than ever. I got married at age 29 and divorced at 35. One term of the divorce decree was particularly tough to swallow. The provision stated that I could have my son Zac up to 9 days during spring break from school only if I took him out of town.  Not prepared to spend a lot of money for hotel rooms, and not having a lot of out-of-town connections, Zac and I ended up visiting with Sarah and Joe virtually every spring for those 9 days.  It turned out to be the most wonderful times he and I shared together in his childhood.  Sarah, who had professionally led singing and read to preschoolers, was extraordinary.  She and Zac bonded closely. She drew pictures of “Pickles and Sauerkraut,” two rabbits living in a tranquil garden, and she told tales of their rabbit lives. They read Oz books and Thurber, and other children’s favorites. My image of them curled up together on the love seat, Zac nestled under Sarah’s arm, enthralled by some book Sarah was reading with delighted emotion, is indelible in my mind and in my heart. And I was fully able to relax, knowing Zac was under beloved care.

These visits became springtime and sometimes summertime opportunities to be “home.”  To feel safe and happy and with people who loved us, and we loved them.  We of course laughed a lot.  Zac developed not only connections with Sarah and Joe (who playfully called him Schmendrick) but also saw that I too was a respected and loved person in my own right. A welcome respite for me from my perceived role as dad the maligned divorcée.

In those trips to Berkeley, there were both bundles of quasi-obligations (Well, we’ve GOT to go to Godfather’s Pizza of course and Indian Rock Park!) and basically nothing to do at all.  Sarah put together video tapes of various – usually PBS – shows, and we would figure out in the week we were there, what we would try to accomplish.  How could we get it all done?  There was laundry to do and a doctor’s appointment, and several restaurants that were musts. That was already a big week!

After Zac turned 12, his annual trips to Sarah and Joe ended. For the rest of his childhood, he stayed solely with his mom.  But my trips back to Berkeley continued.  As my intense work responsibilities remained, connections with a new wife and step-children solidified, and my mother faded into Alzheimer’s, I recognized that by then, the closest thing I really had to a childhood home, and the closet thing I had to a parent who unconditionally loved me, was Sarah in Berkeley.  Joe was a treasured connection as well, and his humorous wisdom still applied regularly to my life (“increase your options”, “alive with imprisoned carbonation”). But as Joe would say, I was Sarah’s third child.

For a woman who lived constantly with various fears, after Joe died, I thought Sarah handled the last few years of her life pretty much exactly as she wanted to.  She never did leave her cherished house on Scenic Avenue – though hospital stays occurred from time to time and senior residential sites were considered. She insisted on independence until it was no longer possible.  And then, only for a few short months, did she both accept in-home support and determine an effective way to control her destiny.  She wanted to go, and she wanted to minimize pain.  Sarah had a full and delight-filled life, and how gratifying it is that she lived that life and left that life, as much as any of us can, on her own terms.

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[1] Okay, what makes quirky? Try these on for size.  Sarah and Joe kept almost all the furniture remaining in the house that they bought in 1963 and never replaced any of it.  However, she said that she hated the big mirror in the living room, and the dining room table was wobbly and dysfunctional!  Quirky?  All around the house, Sarah wrote in exquisitely clear print, instructions on how to manage various home peculiarities. “Hold the flush handle down until all water has been replaced in the bowl.” More quirky?  Never blow your nose, just squeeze.  Telephone books used as dinner plate props to improve posture.  Recording the growth of boys with height marks on the inside of the dining room doorway. In ink. Keep track for 50 plus years. Need still more quirky?  Read on below.

[2] As an aside, Joe also claimed that his father – my grandfather – created the slogan “Good to the Last Drop” for Maxwell House coffee.  Both the Tsena and Maxwell House claims do not stand up to Internet searching scrutiny, but Joe made the statements with such pride and authority, that I’ll run with them here for family lore purposes. What’s truth?

[3] Joe took the guitar and messed around with it.  He removed the “fascist language.”  Scraped and carved its inside and removed interior bracings. Inserted replacement structural elements.  Replaced the headstock and fretboard.  And produced the sweetest, most deeply resonant-sounding guitar I’ve ever heard or had the pleasure to play.

I’m sitting at a tiny desk in my room in a cute, brick-faced historic boutique hotel on the main street of the stunningly gorgeous, revitalized downtown of Phoenixville, Pennsylvania. How I ended up in this spot was more or less pure chance.  It certainly wasn’t the original plan to stay the night in the nation’s “most beautiful” small town the day before attending an historic preservation event in Philadelphia.  Yet here I am.

Sometimes writing themes for blog entries just slap me in the face. And this 8-day visit to the East Coast has prompted a doozy of a theme. Um… let’s start with the original purpose of the trip.

My Olympia synagogue, Temple Beth Hatfiloh, has been awarded a 50% matching grant by the National Fund for Sacred Places program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. The grant is to replace the roofing and other ancillary support systems of our historic sanctuary building. NFSP provides funds for grant recipients to fly out to Philly and receive training in planning, fundraising and project management. We even got our meals and hotel rooms paid for by the private, non-governmentally funded program. As President of TBH, and someone who has a background in both construction project management and historic preservation, I chose to insert myself as one of the participants in the training along with our rabbi and lead temple administrator.

While Philly was the destination, I decided to kill several birds with one stone (Yes, I visited the John James Audubon Center yesterday, but the analogy would work even without that prompting!) The international center for the Jewish Reconstructionist movement has its administrative headquarters and seminary just outside of the Philly city limits, and I wanted to tour that.  I also wanted to visit with friends and relatives in New York, which is just a couple hours away by car (when traffic is light, but it is almost never light).  So, I planned an elongated visit beyond its core original purpose.

What of the faced-slapped theme? Well, “Reconstructing Judaism” (RJ) is the name of the institutional organization of Jewish religious practice of which our synagogue is an affiliate, and the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College (RRC) is the name of its co-located seminary. Our current and former rabbis graduated from that college.

The action of rehabilitation and/or reconstruction is also a core element that all NFSP grant recipients have in their projects.  

Reconstruction. The very word requires two priors. Construction for one.  But also some level of destruction, or at least of abandonment and natural deterioration. The concept of historic preservation for structures fits that term to a tee.  But so too can the act of living itself, as I will explain through the episodes of this trip described below, focused on a theme of reconstruction.

Episode #1:  Reconstructing Judaism

The 20^th Century was certainly a mixed bag for Jews. The Holocaust, mass migration, the founding of a Jewish political nation after a couple of millennia, great accomplishments by individual Jews that advanced human knowledge (Einstein was no slouch for example) and extended lifespans (28% of Nobel prize winners in medicine have been Jewish), as well as our share of schmendricks and those far far worse (how about mafiosis like Bugsy Siegel and Meyer Lansky and schmucks like Stephen Miller?).

In the world of organized religious practice, the 20^th Century also had Jews going in many different directions. When faced with extraordinary changes in the scientific knowledge of the atom to the universe, massive reorientations to the social norms of gender and class, and transformational political alignments, how would religious practice respond in ways that were both sacred and relevant? What of the spiritual dimension of Jewish living?

An American Jewish philosopher, writer and spiritual leader named Mordechai Kaplan developed a theory of the case. Instead of maintaining standard religious practices and theology in the face of enormous change, Kaplan came up with a structure for being an observant Jew which he saw as meeting the needs of the moment and the future of the Jewish people.

Perhaps his most famous line was that Jewish traditional practice “had a vote, not a veto.” He believed that it was up to the Jewish people of every generation to look closely at historic religious practices, and rather than simply discarding or accepting them fully intact, to re-evaluate and reconstruct them as necessary and proper to meet the day’s conditions and concerns. Ancient Jewish doctrine and behavior for Kaplan would never be the final word, but current means of observance must always be in the interest of Jewish peoplehood and continuity.

I am no scholar of Jewish practice, but hearing of Kaplan’s basic approach just felt “right” to me for many years. I found a comfortable spiritual and intellectual home as a Jew with “reconstructionism” as its core.

Now, our temple is in the middle of a strategic planning process. As a leader in that process I want to know more about the status of RJ, RRC, affiliated synagogues and the movement as a whole. I am aware of some recent tensions that have flared, with potential to drive a wedge within the movement. Is schism on the table?  Is the movement at risk? And even without controversies per se, my decision to visit RJ reflects an interest in understanding the center of the Reconstructionist movement’s own sense of its health and vibrancy. Could what happens there effect what happens in the coming years at our temple?

The most dominant current issue with potential to seriously challenge RJ membership and stability is identifying the place for anti-Zionism within what has traditionally been described as a “Progressive Zionist” movement. I intended to raise that with my tour hosts and get their assessment of the issue.

But at the start of the tour, my host, Rabbi Maurice, introduced me to several RJ administrative staff and then we went off immediately to a RRC Torah-reading class.  There were 6 students sitting around a table with one professor, Rabbi Maurice and me. Each student was asked to first read a few lines of text in Hebrew, then translate that text into English. That was followed by a discussion exploring the translation’s accuracy and nuance. There was also discussion on the substance of the message within the portion.  What lessons were being taught? What examples from modern life can fit within the torah story? Active minds were at work!

I found the instructional methods fascinating and effective at building both language skills and the capacity to marshal rational arguments. Discussion amongst rabbis is, of course, the heart of the Talmudic tradition, and it was illuminating to see it played out before me.

After the class, Maurice took me to a lunch/breakroom at the college. We were met by both RJ administrators and students eating their lunches.  It was there where I first raised the thorny question of how the school deals with the different political positions of anti-Zionists and Progressive Zionists. I raised it in the context of trying to understand the impact of that controversy on student enrollment and world-wide affiliation.

At one point, as Maurice and an administrator and I were talking about the subject, a rabbinical student overheard us and asked to join our conversation and say a few words. That was great!  She responded directly and eloquently to the core issue, identifying what I have come to understand as the movement’s “position” on the matter.  The position, in a simplified way, is to continue to identify Progressive Zionism as the movement’s fundamental orientation, but to accept anti-Zionists into the school. There would be no “litmus test” on the question of RRC student enrollment. And for the future… well, everything can be reconstructed, right?

After our breakroom discussion, Maurice and I joined other RJ leadership, including the RRC dean, for a lunch and further questions and interactions in a separate meeting room. (The hummus and eggplant pita sandwich was delicious!) This time, the wide-ranging conversation included the anti-Zionist/Progressive Zionist question, but we also explored the health and stability of the movement in other areas, and the social and observational changes that have been emerging.  For one, I was surprised to hear that self-described 2SLGBTQ+ rabbinical students – the Dean used the term “Queer” as an overarching description – now represent 50% of the enrolled population not only of Reconstructionist seminaries, but collectively in all of Renewal, Reform, Conservative, and Modern Orthodox ones as well. We are in the midst of a massive cultural change in gender identity and sexual orientation.

My overall take is that the kind of disciplined, embracing, openness to new ideas and formulations of what it means to be a Jew is a tall order for assuring Jewish continuity. The Reconstructionist model has relatively few adherents (one internet reference I saw was 40,000 members of the 90+ US congregations and maybe as many as 180,000 Jews who associate themselves with the movement in one way or the other). And it is not now a growing portion of the Jewish world.  At my synagogue, which has experienced consistent growth over the past 10 – 15 years, there is little emphasis on our Reconstructionist affiliation.  We have chosen to be a broad tent, open to all Jews and Jewish-adjacents who can coexist peaceably. That has worked, substantially, because we have a national caliber rabbi who has made a multi-decade commitment to our community. Reconstructionism itself is not the prime attraction.  But given that it is in MY comfort zone, I find myself rooting for RJ and the whole movement to succeed.

How would you like to walk into a building and be greeted like that!

Jacob Weinburg and Rabbi Maurice Harris coordinated my visit and led me through an orientation to the building, programs, students, leaders and… a delicious lunch!

Put a flag on the worldwide affiliate synagogue locations within the Reconstructing Judaism movement.

Kaplan, the theological philosopher of Reconstructionism, is honored throughout the building.

Pictures and letters by and of Kaplan

On the RJ walls are also pictures of the proud graduates of the rabbinical college. The smiling fellow on the upper left corner of the shot is our current beloved rabbi, Seth Goldstein, a half a lifetime ago.

Episode #2: Reconstructing a Life after Loss

Life is filled with trauma. Inevitable trauma. Trauma of memories. Trauma of expectations dashed. Predictable traumas. Avoidable traumas. Random traumas. And all traumas involve, in one way or the other, destruction.

How do we recover from personal destruction?  How do we reconstruct? 

Upon leaving RJ, I knew I was off to visit with people who have recently experienced a great traumatic loss.

For three nights I stayed with my cousin Michael and his son David, who live in Westchester County, just north of New York City.  I’ve known Michael since I was very young, visiting him and his brother at their parents – my uncle and aunt’s – home in Berkeley. Michael recently lost his wife of more than 45 years to cancer. His grief is, of course, profound. And we were able to spend some time talking about his late wife, listening to recordings of her singing with a magnificent, powerful and angelic voice. It was deeply moving to share those memories. 

Michael and I also talked about what he can do now with his life. We talked about choices to reconstruct a new center with new purposes.  But in the immediacy of the time together, Michael had a very specific project that we decided to do for the better part of a day. It was to record a song Michael had written – words and music – for his 95-year-old mother-in-law named Sue. It was silly and weird and fun.

(I don’t know how to link the recording of the silly song to the blog, but let me know if you’d like a copy and I’ll email it to you.)

Michael enjoys music, playing it, creating it, talking about it. (We laughed as we recalled our addiction to Brahms Quintet in F Minor, playing it ad nauseum as kids on our home record players.) He thought that if he were to make friendships in the future, it would be around the notion of music making and performing. That’s reconstructing!

Coincidentally enough, living a half mile away from Michael was a high school friend of my sister Laurie named Kathy, who I had known since I was about 10. Kathy also recently lost her longtime husband, and I asked her whether she was interested in spending a day together in Manhattan. I would be meeting up with other friends and going to the Museum of Modern Art, and Kathy said she was more than game to join in.

She too was in the stage of reconstructing her life after a large traumatic loss. We had a wonderful day together, taking the train down to Grand Central Station, visiting the New York City Public Library, which featured a wonderful exhibit on The New Yorker magazine, Bryant Park with its seasonal outside skating rink in full form, St. Thomas Episcopal Church, where an organist was being tutored, and finally MoMA, where we were hosted by my old friends from Olympia – now living in NYC – Howard and Angela.

Sure, it’s a stretch, but throw in a bit of Jackson Pollack and some Picasso, and you can make a case that there was some destructing and reconstructing going on inside that museum.  Below you will find a few snapped pictures of the MoMA exhibitory, including an absolutely fantastic solo exhibit by Ruth Asawa. I can’t say that Asawa’s work fits this blog’s theme, but it was just so amazing I had to share!

Arriving at Grand Central Station

Eating at Grand Central Station

I loved the rush of being in the greatest city in the world!

Ice Skating in Bryant Park

An exhibit of the story of “The New Yorker” magazine in the hallways of the New York City Public Library.

A family not paying a great deal of attention to Moses as he is about to smash the 10 Commandments on the rocks due the misbehavior of some naughty Israelites. I think, with this painting, the New York Public Library is trying to affirm the importance of reading.

My sister’s good friend Kathy and me are outside the New York City Public Library. We’ve seen each other two or three times in the last 60 years, yet felt an immediate and warm reconnection to our youth

MoMA has all the most famous artists.  Here’s Diego Rivera deconstructing his life and wife Frida Kahlo. Followed by….

Frida Kahlo, holding her own place in the world.

Not, in my humble opinion, the best use of a baguette from Salvadore Dali.

I’m not the greatest fan of his paintings, but these Henri Matisse sculptures are extraordinary.

On the 6^th floor that was a one-woman exhibition from Ruth Asawa. I found the distinctiveness, versatility, patient application of details, and refined skills of this artist to be the most profoundly moving of my life. If you can… see this exhibit!

Given that this second episode on reconstruction focuses on deeply personal, emotional responses to trauma, I’ll mention that on another day in Westchester County, I met up briefly with my friends Martine and Stephen as they traveled down from Massachusetts to visit their grandkids on Long Island.  Martine and I had lived in a group house in Olympia as college students, and our lovely, but short, visit at a Wegmans Supermarket reminded me of all the losses experienced by our 5-person collegiate friendship group. Two spouses had died. Two sons took their own lives.  Two divorces. And we all, in one way or the other, have had to reconstruct our lives in many many ways.

Episode #3: Reconstructing for Survival

On the way back to Philadelphia and before the start of the grant workshop, I had an extra day to travel, see a few sights and be ready to drop off my rental car near the airport. I decided to go to Valley Forge National Historical Park, which I knew as a revolutionary war site but little else.

In the beginning of the winter of 1777-78, the war for independence was not going well at all for the colonies. The individual colonial militias were pretty clearly being outfought by the British.  The civilian population was all the more often siding with the Brits as loyalists than with the colonial revolutionaries.  At Valley Forge, Washington decided to make an effort to bring the various militias together as one army of the republic. It was a brutal winter.  One-third of his troops died of disease at Valley Forge. But after 6 months of military training, the army of the republic emerged united, re-imagined… reconstructed.  The war for independence would last many more years, but Valley Forge was a key to the eventual outcome. Out of loss and destruction, came resolve, purpose, and construction of an identity which would become the United States.

Episode #4: Reconstructing a Community

At the Valley Forge interpretive center, I asked a representative from the local visitor’s bureau where a good place for lunch might be and a place to stay overnight.  She directed me to some corporate locations nearby.  Upon reaching her recommended area I found it utterly sterile – modern commercial anyplaces USA.  So I went to the web and punched in “boutique hotel nearby.” That’s how I ended up in the amazingly sweet and beautiful downtown Phoenixville, mentioned at the start of this blog.  Need a picture? Sure.

Downtown Phoenixville, Pennsylvania

In addition to participating in the national Mainstreet program for downtown commercial/mixed use areas, Phoenixville also has a lovely intact residential area filled with 100+ year old homes. An economy and lifestyle that is now quite different from a century ago, but a reconstruction nevertheless of a place that now works well for its time.

Episode #5: Reconstructing a Reputation?

In the last few years, the standing of the namesake of the National Audubon Society as taken some pretty large hits.  John James Audubon was an artist, naturalist and ornithologist. His color-plate book “The Birds of America” put together in the 1830s inspired a movement not only to study and protect birds, but to recognize the vitality and importance of the natural environment more broadly. The national and local chapters of the Audubon Society have been leaders in ecological awareness and public policy environmental protection for many decades.

But as it turns out, Audubon himself held views and carried out his life in a manner that is deeply offensive to today’s values and laws.  He was a slave owner and proud white supremacist. And as his personal attributes have become a more significant part of his renown, some Audubon chapters have been renaming themselves away from his identity.

The exhibits of the John James Audubon Center in Audubon, Pennsylvania, make no reference to its namesake’s views on race. As one enters the center, you are instructed to go first to the left, where there is a wonderful series of exhibits on the distinctiveness of birds. Their capacity to fly. Laying hard-shelled eggs.  Nesting.  So many attributes where natural selection (and/or G-d!) made nearly perfect adaptations to fill countless niches. 

On the right side of the center is the story of Audubon himself. His background as a lad in France.  His inheritance and emigration to the USA. And his work to popularize the study of birds. But nowhere in the exhibition is there mention of his reputational controversy.

So of course, as is consistent with this blog’s theme – and my want – I asked the staff sitting at the interpretive center’s entry about Audubon the man and the impact on the organization of his recently focused historic deprivations. There was a young woman and young man there at the counter.  The woman responded briefly to my inquiry. The man went on and on.

“Yes,” he said, there have been impacts from the revelations. “Yes, there have been affiliates that have changed their names.” But, somewhat like the controversies in the Reconstructing Judaism movement, he made the argument that we can be both appalled by Audubon’s beliefs and practices and still honor the historic and positive impacts of his work.

This was not exactly an effort at reputational reconstruction. The young man was not defending Audubon’s positions. He did not seek Audubon’s “redemption.” But he was arguing for sitting those views in their historic context. 

He said that the interpretive center leaders were working on additional exhibitory that will touch on the controversy, even as they have decided to keep the name of the place and property the same. Fair enough in my view.

Episode #6: Reconstructing Socialist Ideals

Ok… I’m really stretching this thing.  But given my focus on the word, it is hard not to look upon the results in the mayoral elections of New York City and Seattle as a kind of reconstruction of the use of the term democratic socialism. It has gained an electoral legitimacy that it has not had for many decades in our country. As mayor-elects Zohran Mamdani and Katie Wilson meet the realities of their offices, we will see how this reconstructed socialism plays out in policies passed and implemented.

Episode #7: Reconstructing our Synagogue Roof

And then, finally, we return to the core reason for this trip: the $175K grant to reconstruct our synagogue roof.

I had come to the training/workshop for grant recipients with a page and a half of specific questions about implementation and grant administration.  I left with every one of those questions answered.  Better still, answered in a way which makes the process for our temple easier and more robust.

A few distinctive aspects to the proceeding and we’ll call this entry far too long but over.

There were 30 grant recipients, representing 29 churches and us, the only synagogue.  As I met various participants and introduced myself, I hilariously kept getting the response, “Oh… YOU’RE the Jewish recipient.” It wasn’t offensive in the least.  We were just kind of an interesting curiosity to them. Apparently there have only been six Jewish recipients of the sacred places grant in the 10 years of its history.

Funding for the sacred places program of the National Trust for Historic Places has never been higher. The previous year there were 26 recipients and the year before that 16.  At a time when federal funds for historic preservation are drying up, the constitutional separation of church and state has resulted in a kind of protection of religious structures through private initiative.  Since the feds have never really weighed in with support, they can’t take it away now.

The three of us temple folks sat at a table with a couple from a Washington DC Lutheran Church. One of them was the pastor, the other a Board member.  The latter gentleman had worked at the highest levels of the Pentagon, telling us stories about the depredations of the Trump Administration, its unethical bearings and foolish and damaging policies.  He quit rather than be a supplicant and now finds value through his church in feeding the poor and engaging in other social justice efforts. And raising funds to reconstruct its steeple!

Episodic Conclusion

Acts of reconstruction.  In the last week, I found opportunities for inspiration. Joys in accomplishments.  I have shared in the memories of losses, and felt the sadness of those losses and the unavoidably difficult challenges in moving toward renewal. 

There is an intrinsically heroic nature in the flow of construction, destruction and the effort at reconstruction. What do you need to reconstruct? What do you want to reconstruct?