Festive Meal
So what was served at your seder?? I’ve got to get MomGiraffe to send the recipe for the chicken because it was AWESOME. And the other stuff was pretty darn good too!!!
Was it a chicken seder or a brisket seder? And what did my pre-Noah, veggie friends eat???
Commitment
I have a great life. I married my prom date and we are still in love. We have three sweet and loving children. Overall, we are all in good health. I do important and meaningful work.
Do PC and I ever bicker? Of course. Do the children get along all the time? Hardly. Was this a tough year what with all the ear infections, stomach viruses, lice, etc.? Absolutely. [Not to mention the kid on the Spectrum.] Do I ever have a bad day at the office? Sure.
But come on…it really is life filled with blessings.
So why am I unhappy?
Mah kasheh l’Frume Sarah? [As mentioned in an earlier posting, when looking at a pasuk, we often ask mah kasheh l’Rashi in order to uncover what difficulty Rashi might have had with a word, a turn of phrase, or even an entire verse.] What’s bugging Frume Sarah?
This is the season of my discontent. Do not worry. Unlike Steinbeck’s Ethan, I have no plans to report anyone to immigration or to encourage anyone to engage in any destructive behaviour. I am just feeling out-of-place here in America.
In my ongoing frustrating experiences with Beernut’s school, I received an invitation to a luncheon honouring volunteers…for next week. And I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that there is not going to be supervision.
I’m tired of having to make choices all of the time when it comes to asserting my Jewish identity. And I am finding it harder and harder to feel like a welcomed and included part of the cultural landscape.
This Monday is Patriots’ Day. If you are not a New Englander, you might not even know that there is a day set aside to commemorate the start of the Revolutionary War. The battles at Lexington and Concord were fought on April 19th and in 1969, the civic holiday was moved to the third Monday in April. [Hm…sound familiar??] Since 1897, The Boston Marathon has been run on Patriots’ Day — which this year coincides with the second day of Pesach.
Not affecting most of the participants, the juxtoposition of Patriots’ Day with Passover raises a real dilemma for Jewish runners. To run or not to run?
Nothing is ever simple with us, is it? As a dyed-in-the-wool Reform Jew,
I reject the notion that an additional day needs to be added to the festivals in order to make certain that Jews living outside of Eretz Yisrael are celebrating the festivals on the correct days. If seven days of Pesach were good enough for God, surely it is good enough for me.
That being said, I recognize that a goodly number of Jews living in the Diaspora do add the additional day — making Rosh Hashanah 2 days, Sukkot and Passover 8 days, and Shavu’ot 2 days. And though it is not my personal practice and my shul davka is open on Monday, for a significant percentage of the American Jewish community. Monday is a holy day.
Which is why this really bothered me. Running the Boston Marathon during the intermediary days would be tough but possible to do without violating the holiday. But to participate on either the first two or last two days is a public desecration of the holy day.
I don’t remember anyone saying that being Jewish was convenient. It means making choices. Choices that sometimes preclude our participation in activities in which we desire to engage.
If you believe that Judaism is a way of life, than it must really impact what and how you live. Like it does for these folks.
A sweet Pesach to all! FrumeSarah will return during the Intermediate Days of Pesach…
Pesach Frenzy
It would be accurate to say that I am ahead of the game. But to think that I’m actually on schedule?? That’s another story.
Every year, darn it. Every year I pledge to be better. To begin my preparations for Passover as soon as the last hamantachen has been consumed.
I think about it. I really do. Just cannot bring myself to… I dunno. Tackle the insurmountable task of cleaning? Figure out what my family is going to eat for seven, loooooooooong days?
I wish that I didn’t care. I wish that I could just leave all the chametz right where it sits all year long and not have it bother me the tiniest bit. I wish that I was Sephardic. Heck, there have been years I have wished that I was Catholic (although it occurs to me that presents its own problems…).
But I do care. And the leavened foodstuffs do bother me. And my family is really, really Ashkenazic. And the Catholic thing is a topic for another day.
Pesach is still two days away and I’ve done much of my shopping. The fridge is sparkling. The pantry is nearly done. Our local food pantry will be the happy recipient of a LOT of beans. [Note to self: remember to ask PC why we have so many cans of beans.]
Yes, yes. I know that because of the placement of first night directly following Shabbos that I am behind the eight-ball as far as the chametz issue is concerned.
What can I do?
We are trying to consume the remaining chametz as fast as we can. Beernut is going to take a few sandwiches, have a LARGE bag of M & M’s, and a variety of other verboten items in his lunch tomorrow.
Probably not appropriate to send him with the leftover beer from Peach’s birthday party…
Permitted?
Pesach 5761. Beernut was 9 months old and had recently joined the ranks of Cheerios-loving babies. In my usual state of pre-Pesach panic, I called my rabbi.
Dad, what am I supposed to feed the baby?
He wasn’t really certain what the problem was. After all, with so many kosher-for-Passover products on the market, he was certain that I would be able to find suitable substitutes for the little guy.
They even have ersatz Cheerios!
Like the dutiful Jew (and daughter), I removed all traces of chametz from our townhouse in time for Pesach, replacing all of his favourite foods with permissable alternatives. On the first morning, I cheerfully prepared the baby’s breakfast.
He took one bite and with narrowing eyes, spit out his Crispy-O’s. Regarding me with great suspiscion, my little baby went on a food strike, refusing anything else offerred to him throughout the week.
[And for the record — they really were vile!]
Ach…what a loooooong week that was.
Fastforward to this year. Pesach 5768. With a little one still consuming baby food and formula (to help supplement my waning milk supply) — not to mention his Cheerios love-affair — I was prepared to have yet another child vent frustration against me, the culinary traitor. And then I took a look at the Orthodox Union’s site and was really pleased to find the following:
Most infant formulas are made from soy products. At first glance, one might assume that this presents a problem of Kitniyoth on Passover.
However, the custom of disallowing the use of ‘Kitniyoth’ (soy, for example) was never applied to infants nor to people who are ill. However, you must take care to keep bottles, nipples and formula away from the general kitchen area. Any mixing or washing should be done in the bathroom sink and NOT in the kitchen sink.
A very moderate position. Moderation, reasonable approaches allow us to observe the spirit even when we cannot observe to the letter.
When I mentioned this ruling to the aforementioned rabbi, he shrugged and said something to the effect of “babies are like pets in that respect.” Implying, I think, that one need not get crazy when it comes to babies or pets in such matters.
Of course, there are those who do not permit even their goldfish to eat leavened fish food during Pesach.
[Thanks for the link, Ima!]
Extra, Extra
Martha Stewart Living for the slaves…
Perspective
I sat with a 96 year old woman awaiting surgery to repair a spiral fracture in her femur.
A spiral fracture is when the bone has been broken due to a twisting type motion. Its name describes the spiral-like pattern of the break which runs parallel with the axis of the broken bone.
Though a tad loopy from the morphine drip — which was the only thing capable of controlling the excrutiating pain — the woman remarked that life had treated her well.
Widowed for over three decades, she has outlived her devoted sisters, rejoiced in the births of four grandchildren and eight grandchildren, and in her old age, left behind a life back east in order to make a new life here in Southern California. Aches and pains? Eh. One doesn’t reach such an age without some minor complaints.
How many people can look back over nearly ten decades and honestly say that life had been good?
It’s all about perspective…
Carnival!!
No, not the festival meaning “farewell to the flesh” [thinking ya didn’t know that’s what it meant…]. A blog carnival.
A blog carnival is a virtual event tbat is dedicated to a particular topic with permalinks to other blog articles on that topic. [See here for a more thorough explanation…]
Anyway, There is a Jewish blog carnival called Haveil Havalim. Founded by Soccer Dad, Haveil Havalim is a carnival of Jewish blogs — a weekly collection of Jewish & Israeli blog highlights, tidbits and points of interest collected from blogs all around the world. It’s hosted by different bloggers each week and coordinated by Jack. The term ‘Haveil Havalim,’ which means “Vanity of Vanities,” is from Qoheleth, (Ecclesiastes) which was written by King Solomon. King Solomon built the Holy Temple in Jerusalem and later on got all bogged down in materialism and other ‘excesses’ and realized that it was nothing but ‘hevel,’ or in English, ‘vanity.’
Haveil Havalim #162 – Pesach Edition is up over at Esser Agaroth and it will really help get you in the mood for Passover 🙂
And you’ll also get a sense of some amazing Jewish bloggers out there.
Different Strokes…
Glancing around the room, I was aware that the room was filled with people enjoying themselves. And I was not one of them. Even sandwiched between two other Seder-attendees, arms intertwined and swaying to a Debbie Friedman song, I could not have felt more isolated. More alone.
Welcome to my first and only feminist Seder experience.
In just a few short days, we will engage in the ultimate bibliodramatic exercise – the Passover Seder. Martin Buber wrote “We Jews are a community based on memory. The spiritual life of the Jews is part and parcel of their memory.” No where else on our liturgical calendar is this truer than the traditional Passover dinner which is essentially a reenactment of our journey from slavery to freedom. We gather not to commemorate a one-time event but to relive it as an annual rite-of-passage. As we read, “in every generation, it is one’s duty to regard himself as though he personally had gone out from Egypt.”
Did you read that? “Himself?” “He?” Wait a minute. What about me? I’m neither “him” nor “he.”
And that has never bothered me.
In a traditional Haggadah, the focus of the story is on God. God the Redeemer. God who heard our plight. Who liberated us. Who led us to the land promised to our ancestors. Strikingly absent is Moses. With careful deliberation, the Rabbis made a special point to place God at the center of the story lest Moses take on some type of larger-than-life stature. In other words, he’s not there! His name is not mentioned even one time. What about the other male figures in the Haggadah text? Well, there are the four sons as well as a number of our Sages. Yet not once during my youth or adolescence did I sense that my story was not reflected in the wine-stained pages. The saga of emancipation was one that transcended gender-issues. ALL Jews were victims of the Pharaoh.
It was not until I was in rabbinic school that I was made to feel as if “real women” see misogyny lurking behind every corner, hidden in the very sacred texts that had always pulled me closer to the Divine. “If you don’t realize how much our Tradition has historically kept women down, then you are in denial,” one well-known female rabbi admonished me.
At that feminist Seder, Miriam, the midwives, Moses’ mother, and Pharaoh’s daughter were prominently featured – ironically surpassing Moses’ importance in a traditional Haggadah – as well as God being addressed in the feminine – essentially rendering the deity a Goddess. This was not my story. This was not my history. How ironic that the only Seder experience where I felt “other” was a feminist one.
The awesome potential of liberal Judaism is that it ought to include all voices. The harsh reality, however, is that it too often drowns out the less-popular ones. A Seder that excludes the men’s voices is no different from a traditional Seder that is accused of drowning out the women’s.
So, on my Seder table you will find no Miriam’s Cup. No orange. No symbols whose express intent is to distinguish between my redemptive experience and that of my husband, son, father, brother.
As we retell our story this year, may its message of hope and freedom be heard by all. And may we strive to create an environment open to all the voices in our community.
**********
What’s your Torah? Let’s see what the Ima has to day today.
Code 35
Did you hear the news? The Frummies are moving!! That’s right. We bought a house in Irvine and the congregation is raising dues in order to pay the mortgage.
Exciting news, don’t you agree? Except that it’s not true. Not one word of it. But that didn’t stop someone from starting this rumour. Or sharing it with people. And if you remember the old shampoo commercial, one person tells her friend, and they tell their friends, and so on, and so on.
What’s the harm? Who really gets hurt when a tale is passed from person to person?
The Torah is pretty clear; You shall not be a talebearer among your people (Lev. 19.16). That’s right. You spread a rumour and you are breaking Jewish Law, pure and simple. The Rabbis use this as their prooftext to draw out three types of negative speech.
1. non-defamatory and true
2. negative and lies
3. lies and rumours
The Talmud then points out that listening to gossip is actually worse than spreading gossip for the listener is the one who has the power to determine the course of conversation. A righteous person will gently (and privately, if need be) alert the talebearer that he or she does not want to hear the gossip.
It is hard to be that righteous! Everyone loves to tell stories. It is how we create intimacy within a community. Sharing a juicy bit of gossip can give the impression that we are “in the know” or that we have an in “with the in crowd.” Or sometimes we share stories in order to elevate ourselves in the eyes of the listener.
LaShon HaRa — evil speech. The numeric value equals 35. So if you want to gently caution someone, you can simply warn “Code 35” without causing embarrassment.
For more information, I HIGHLY recommend one of my favourite rabbis, the Chofetz Chaim who codified the concepts and laws of proper speech.
May the words of my mouth…be acceptable to You, O God, my Rock and my Redeemer (Psalm 19:15).
Passover Prep
Perhaps it is because my life is so hectic that this holiday creates a great deal of stress. No matter how much I intend to get a head-start on the cleaning, scrubbing, reshelving, prepping, etc. — it just doesn’t happen.
So I asked my friend Meira to share her helpful hints for our spring Festival.
**********
2-3 months before Passover:
Invite guests. Get feelings hurt b/c many people already have plans and don’t want to come.
Get feelings really hurt b/c parents refuse to come at same time as MIL.
Pout 😦 Guilt parents into visiting at end of Passover. “Threaten” a last-night seder. : )
Invite next bestest friends and super-lovely family. Cheer when they accept. 🙂
6-8 weeks before Passover:
Spend too much time during workday looking at oytoys and aish for ideas of games and ways to make the seder fun. Plan to buy sticker placemats and coloring books.
4-5 weeks before Passover
Think, “I should really start cleaning.”
Start looking through cookbooks and imagine self whipping up exotic Moroccan Passover feast including fabulous lamb entree.
Determine to figure out how to make kosher-for-Passover brownies and muffins that are also free of eggs for food-allergic toddler. Try to find kosher-for-Passover baking powder.
Cry a little. ; )
3 weeks before Passover:
Look at calendar and realize Passover is quickly approaching. Let mind reel at all the non-Pesach related commitments and chores to do. And Pesach-related chores and errands.
Panic, just a little.
Remind self to order sticker books and placemats for seder.
Continue to scour internet for what to feed multiple-food-allergic toddler during Passover. Wonder if G-d would forgive us not just our rice milk but also a box of organic cherry cereal bars, too.
Look for nutrition information for Manishevitz products. Wonder how they stuffed 28 grams of sugar into one serving of cereal.
Decide to practice making lamb entree prior to seder as have never cooked lamb before. Lament lack of time to cook on weekends with adorable toddler underfoot.
Cheer a little more when super-lovely family offers to bring matzoh ball soup to seder.
Start eating up chametz.
2-3 weeks before seder:
Wonder if can get sticker placemats and coloring books on rush order.
Remember toddler’s birthday occurs two days before seder. Resolve to bring (homemade-allergy-safe cupcakes to school for “party.”) Thank G-d she’s two and doesn’t quite understand birthday parties.
Realize there’s no chametz in our bathrooms and ask husband to hire cleaners just before MIL arrives to do not ritual Passover cleaning. Thank G-d we live in Texas and it’s affordable. 🙂
Revise seder menu to a handful of make-ahead salads and hard-boiled eggs, lovely-guest soup, baked salmon and chicken drumsticks (instead of lamb), roasted potatoes (instead of time-consuming matzah kugel), steamed or roasted veggies, and baked apples in the crockpot for dessert.
Breathe sigh of relief. Have 7 full days to be weighed down with matzah and potato starchy-goodness. No need to peak with heavy food too soon . . . .
Clean out pantry. Give unsafe-for-toddler food to colleague who can use it. (recently found out she has more allergies than previously known, so many formerly ellie-safe items really are not)
Use up more chametz.
1-2 weeks before seder:
Start cleaning out bags and pockets of bags.
Shop for K for P mixes and snacks before the stores run out.
Remember that forgot to get coloring books and sticker placemats online. Print coloring pages on computer. Pick up Passover books from library.
Make sure house is well stocked with lovely k for P wine. (Did I mention that my parents arrive two days after MIL leaves???)
1 week before sede:r
Make the make-ahead salads.
Prep other ingredients for seder as far ahead as is reasonable.
Day of Seder:
PANIC. 🙂
**********
So how are you with YOUR Pesach Prep???
Available 24/6
Frume Sarah is Shabbos-observant -- in a Reform way, that is. Please note that from Friday afternoons until one hour after sundown on Saturday evenings, Frume Sarah will be unavailable, in observance of the Jewish Sabbath.
Comments made during this time will be held in a queue, to be moderated afterwards.
Thank you for your understanding...and gut Shabbos!!! Recent Comments
Passover is Over: A… on Conflicted Passover is Over: A… on Kitniyot Follow-up Meira Shayna on A Teachable Moment Adding not Replacing on Here I Am Yeah, It’s All… on The Perfect Mother’s Day… Join the Club
Don\’t Miss A Moment!
What Did You Expect?
Vote for Me!
NaBloPoMo
>
Take the Pledge
Site Meter
JTA- An error has occurred; the feed is probably down. Try again later.
Frume Sarah is Shabbos-observant -- in a Reform way, that is. Please note that from Friday afternoons until one hour after sundown on Saturday evenings, Frume Sarah will be unavailable, in observance of the Jewish Sabbath.
Comments made during this time will be held in a queue, to be moderated afterwards.
Thank you for your understanding...and gut Shabbos!!! 
Frume Sarah's World 