Friday, October 7, 2011
Oct. 7th, 2011 11:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bearshortyHappy Birthday, Marianna!
Today was the easiest teaching day since I was just proctoring the rough draft of the midterm. I did have office hours in the morning and afternoon and I had to do some photocopy but in general, I really didn’t do much work. I made sure to eat lots of fruit and snacks during the day to stack up for tomorrow.
Mama actually picked me up from work today at 3pm. Usually, on Fridays, Papa and I commute together and he picks me up after his work around 5-5:20. So I have a few hours to grade or go to the library. But because Yom Kippur was starting at sundown, we all had to make sure to be home before then to eat and drink extra water. I got all clean and ready to go to services too and I wanted to leave at 6pm so as not to miss the Kol Nidre prayer. Papa did drop me off on time. In my family, only I go to synagogue at all and not often.
I only go to synagogue once a year, really, for Eve of Yom Kippur or Kol Nidre services (named for the first prayer). I started keeping Yom Kippur – fasting – in my senior year of high school. That year I lasted until maybe 3pm. But the following year, the first year of college, I went to services for the first time and fasted the whole day. I’ve been keeping Yom Kippur ever since, except for one year when I was sick and I did have water and light food. There are five things you can’t do on Yom Kippur, for 25 hours: eat, drink, wash or wear perfume, wear leather shoes or have sex. The not drinking is the hardest. You supposed to pray all day but as a rabbi put it to us in college – the fasting is the most important bit so that takes precedence.
The services went a little long, until 9:30pm but there were not the longest I've ever attended. I love the melodies of many prayers and over the years this service is just very familiar to me. This year, we had a great prayer book too, with some transliteration of the most important and the rabbi led some readings in English too. You are supposed to read the prayers in the language you understand anyway. But because I know the Hebrew letters and can kind of, haltingly read – I was able to follow where in Hebrew we were – which was kind of cool. So I followed along as the cantor sang Kol Nidre. The sermon part was a little break – the rabbi was mentioning the Book of Job and God testing everyone and how we, but not observing as much anymore, are failing God’s test. But other than that it was actually a really good service. Not too crowded this year.
Kol Nidre prayer. The prayer asks God to forgive and pardon and cancel all vows and promises make to him during the past year so that people are not judged for not being able to keep those promised. The vows cancelled are only between God and men, not between two people.
My favorite prayer is Ki Hihe Kachomer. There are a lot of images of crafts and God molding us as if he were a potter or ironmaker. And I just love the melody.
Some links for today:
Three women share Nobel Peace Prize. Yay.
“Princess Bride” reunion. I can quote most of that movie. While Bear and I don’t really have a song, we do have a movie. And this is it.
This is just wrong. Topeka doesn’t have money to persecute domestic violence so they just won’t.
Today was the easiest teaching day since I was just proctoring the rough draft of the midterm. I did have office hours in the morning and afternoon and I had to do some photocopy but in general, I really didn’t do much work. I made sure to eat lots of fruit and snacks during the day to stack up for tomorrow.
Mama actually picked me up from work today at 3pm. Usually, on Fridays, Papa and I commute together and he picks me up after his work around 5-5:20. So I have a few hours to grade or go to the library. But because Yom Kippur was starting at sundown, we all had to make sure to be home before then to eat and drink extra water. I got all clean and ready to go to services too and I wanted to leave at 6pm so as not to miss the Kol Nidre prayer. Papa did drop me off on time. In my family, only I go to synagogue at all and not often.
I only go to synagogue once a year, really, for Eve of Yom Kippur or Kol Nidre services (named for the first prayer). I started keeping Yom Kippur – fasting – in my senior year of high school. That year I lasted until maybe 3pm. But the following year, the first year of college, I went to services for the first time and fasted the whole day. I’ve been keeping Yom Kippur ever since, except for one year when I was sick and I did have water and light food. There are five things you can’t do on Yom Kippur, for 25 hours: eat, drink, wash or wear perfume, wear leather shoes or have sex. The not drinking is the hardest. You supposed to pray all day but as a rabbi put it to us in college – the fasting is the most important bit so that takes precedence.
The services went a little long, until 9:30pm but there were not the longest I've ever attended. I love the melodies of many prayers and over the years this service is just very familiar to me. This year, we had a great prayer book too, with some transliteration of the most important and the rabbi led some readings in English too. You are supposed to read the prayers in the language you understand anyway. But because I know the Hebrew letters and can kind of, haltingly read – I was able to follow where in Hebrew we were – which was kind of cool. So I followed along as the cantor sang Kol Nidre. The sermon part was a little break – the rabbi was mentioning the Book of Job and God testing everyone and how we, but not observing as much anymore, are failing God’s test. But other than that it was actually a really good service. Not too crowded this year.
Kol Nidre prayer. The prayer asks God to forgive and pardon and cancel all vows and promises make to him during the past year so that people are not judged for not being able to keep those promised. The vows cancelled are only between God and men, not between two people.
My favorite prayer is Ki Hihe Kachomer. There are a lot of images of crafts and God molding us as if he were a potter or ironmaker. And I just love the melody.
Some links for today:
Three women share Nobel Peace Prize. Yay.
“Princess Bride” reunion. I can quote most of that movie. While Bear and I don’t really have a song, we do have a movie. And this is it.
This is just wrong. Topeka doesn’t have money to persecute domestic violence so they just won’t.