A NEW YEAR’S CALL: GO TEACH!
Here we stand at the eve of another Rosh Hashanah – Jewish New Year – and the introspection to which we are called by God leads me back to recollections of equal measures of elation and grief. Such is this memory:
When I was in the throes of my deepest depression, I would lie in my bed and watch reruns of Rhoda at 2:00 in the afternoon. If you know about clinical depression, we lie in bed not because we want to, but because life, as we perceive it, has left us no option.
Out of its depths, though, I took a nanosecond of faith to spend a weekend in Brooklyn, with a Chasidic friend who was an adherent of the Grand Rebbe of Lubavitch. There would be no pressure. We would stay with his parents. His father, serendipitously, was private secretary to the Rebbe. If nothing else, it would be an insight into an arcane world, surrounded by empathic people.
The Rebbe was imputed by his disciples to have supernatural powers, and to be granted an audience was regarded a metaphysical encounter. My friend’s father arranged such an encounter for me. It would take mere moments and its primary gift would be the Rebbe’s blessing, which, he assured me, contained influence above.
Whether or not you are a believer, the Rebbe radiated an aura of ethereal sunlight. But, apparently he stopped short of a blessing for me, at least in so many words. Instead, he stroked my arm, peered through crystalline eyes, and spoke to me softly: “You should teach.”
Upon my departure, my friend’s father asked almost accusatorily, “So what did the Rebbe tell you?”
“He said I should teach.”
“Did he bless you?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Listen, he blessed you. So when will you start to teach?”
I hemmed and hawed: I had no students. I had no way of getting any. I had no space. I had no energy.
“The Rebbe said you should teach!” His voice was now bellicose. He is asking me to buy into blind faith, I thought. The Rebbe communed with God. The Rebbe knew the antidote, whatever it was to be.
“What?? Where?? Whom??”
“The Rebbe said you should teach! Even if it’s one person in your bedroom! Go teach Talmud! You have a good kop (head)!”
“OK, I’ll try.”
“Don’t try! The Rebbe said you should teach!”
The conclusion to the story is eerily supernatural: At Sabbath’s end, my voicemail held a message from a rabbinical colleague from whom I hadn’t heard in ages. Just popped up out of the ether. “Please call me as soon as you can,” he said.
Anxious, I returned the call.
“My congregation is starting an adult education program, and the committee and I want to know if you’d like to teach. We’re thinking Talmud, since you have such a good kop.”
Ya gotta be kidding, I thought. This was not smoke-and-mirrors. This was the real thing. I’d had had the metaphysical encounter with a man connected by his holiness. He told me to teach, and poof, in spite of my self, I’m teaching!
Whether or not you believe in miracles, what happened in Brooklyn had at its core the message that most restores the human soul: To be healthy, we must turn our energies outward. Nothing is more uplifting to the mind, heart, and spirit than to give something precious of ourselves to others who need it – to reach out with wisdom, wherewithal, energy, compassion, empathy . . . in a word, to “teach.” And nothing is more devastating to the spirit than to implode our all our energies into ones self and preoccupations.
Good meds and psychotherapy have helped greatly. No more, thought, than the pivotal moment when I listened to Rebbe, threw depression to the wind for the quickest second, started to teach, and thereby began relearning the patterns of giving, not subsisting.
Now we celebrate a new year – a time we believe is the “Birthday of the World,” particularly the human species. For all of us, then, an occasion of rebirth, renewal. If only we could take our lives so far as to get out of bed, shut off Rhoda, and reach outward, our deadly, depressing isolation would heal, and this would become a truly blessed new year for all of creation. Now, go teach!
September 13, 2009
September 10, 2009
WACKY ON THE WATER
If you have nothing to write after a cruise, you know you have attained a new level of writer’s block. OK, the ports of call – Newport, Boston, Halifax – were memorable. The food, as always, defined conspicuous consumption. The service created a weeklong illusion of luxury the likes of which we rubes would never enjoy, were it not for a blitzkrieg infusion of cash.
What’s left to tell about my cruise? As a Boomer of the ‘60s, I dare not gloat too lavishly, lest I be perceived as bourgeois. But, as an almost-senior in 2009, I dare not be too critical, lest I be perceived as a cynic and a crank. So, let’s say that that it was neither an orgy of giddy abandon, nor an experience that would turn sweet cream sour.
After three cruises, I finally realized that the word that was missing from my vocabulary to describe the milieu was “wacky.” Everything you do on a cruise has a patina of “wack,” intended or not, perpetrated by crew, voyagers, or the basic ambiance.
A quick example: The after-dinner entertainment is notorious for its cheesiness. But when the show hopscotches instantaneously from a little-too-energetic medley of “Hair” to an unctuous tenor crooning a dewy-eyed rendition of “Danny Boy,” you know that we have wandered just a little too far into the Kingdom of Wack.
You know what else is wacky? The inability to divest ourselves of our cellphones when we’re upon the high seas. As we (and I mean “we,” as in “me”) draw nearer to the coast, we check our reception as frantically as a nicotine fiend grabs for his next cigarette. Why? To check our voicemail, of course. Or, to call Cousin Birdie about the food. (“Terrible . . . and such small portions!” as the Yiddish joke goes.) That, and call into the office to sweat some new crisis. And, not to be outstripped by lo-tech, checking our email is also irresistible, fetched from a place ominously called the “Internet Café.” I failed to resist for eight measly minutes, and it cost me $22.50. And, yes, the whole ship is rigged with wi-fi, so that you see folks constantly pecking away at their laptops poolside, balancing one of those frou-frou banana daiquiris in their free hand. Wacky? You tell me.
The reputed leisure of cruising is also fraught with wack. Yes, the food and portions are legendary. But, so is the pushing, shoving, and butting in the buffet line, the likes of which make Times Square feel like a croquet match. And the din? One day, a this was a mother to her daughter at 100 decibels above the madding crowd: “Did you remember to call your Cousin Sharon?? She’s having a cyst removed from her ovary.” Next day, another mother/daughter, same scenario: “I had a little headache, but at least I didn’t get diarrhea!!” And, where else can your otherwise well-behaved dinner partner get up the wack to run her finger through the majestic Baked Alaska and lick it off, just before you were going to do the same? Wacky, no?
Five years ago, after my first cruise, I wrote a piece that dripped with cynicism. Could there be that much difference in aging from 55 to 60? This time you will not hear a snide word. The voyage was just what my therapist ordered: Asian waiters dressed like Venetian gondoliers, who actually called you “Signore.” Fluffy drinks with teeny umbrellas. Bumbling magicians. The black-out Baked Alaska sparkler-lit caravan. Table talk about surgeries and scars. The Internet Café. The Brobdignian buffet, somehow always served on the “Lido Deck.” Elderly women with their wheelchairs pulled up tight to the slot machines. Having your picture taken hugging a lobster.
The profound moments of a cruise will more than identify themselves – a magnificent view, historic site, a lover’s kiss. But, whenever the profundity subsides, the real way to enjoy a cruise is to savor it through the glasses of wacky. You will be neither disappointed, nor cynical, nor bored.
So call me neither bourgeoisie nor misanthrope. I’ll stand now and forever for the appellation of “wacky.” I had this confirmed thousand-fold the moment we disembarked in New York and I was greeted by a stevedore who told me in no uncertain terms to “f*** off,” because I had chosen someone other than him.
Ah, back to terra firma and its unvarnished realities, pining for just one more frou-frou daiquiri and another day of wacky.
If you have nothing to write after a cruise, you know you have attained a new level of writer’s block. OK, the ports of call – Newport, Boston, Halifax – were memorable. The food, as always, defined conspicuous consumption. The service created a weeklong illusion of luxury the likes of which we rubes would never enjoy, were it not for a blitzkrieg infusion of cash.
What’s left to tell about my cruise? As a Boomer of the ‘60s, I dare not gloat too lavishly, lest I be perceived as bourgeois. But, as an almost-senior in 2009, I dare not be too critical, lest I be perceived as a cynic and a crank. So, let’s say that that it was neither an orgy of giddy abandon, nor an experience that would turn sweet cream sour.
After three cruises, I finally realized that the word that was missing from my vocabulary to describe the milieu was “wacky.” Everything you do on a cruise has a patina of “wack,” intended or not, perpetrated by crew, voyagers, or the basic ambiance.
A quick example: The after-dinner entertainment is notorious for its cheesiness. But when the show hopscotches instantaneously from a little-too-energetic medley of “Hair” to an unctuous tenor crooning a dewy-eyed rendition of “Danny Boy,” you know that we have wandered just a little too far into the Kingdom of Wack.
You know what else is wacky? The inability to divest ourselves of our cellphones when we’re upon the high seas. As we (and I mean “we,” as in “me”) draw nearer to the coast, we check our reception as frantically as a nicotine fiend grabs for his next cigarette. Why? To check our voicemail, of course. Or, to call Cousin Birdie about the food. (“Terrible . . . and such small portions!” as the Yiddish joke goes.) That, and call into the office to sweat some new crisis. And, not to be outstripped by lo-tech, checking our email is also irresistible, fetched from a place ominously called the “Internet Café.” I failed to resist for eight measly minutes, and it cost me $22.50. And, yes, the whole ship is rigged with wi-fi, so that you see folks constantly pecking away at their laptops poolside, balancing one of those frou-frou banana daiquiris in their free hand. Wacky? You tell me.
The reputed leisure of cruising is also fraught with wack. Yes, the food and portions are legendary. But, so is the pushing, shoving, and butting in the buffet line, the likes of which make Times Square feel like a croquet match. And the din? One day, a this was a mother to her daughter at 100 decibels above the madding crowd: “Did you remember to call your Cousin Sharon?? She’s having a cyst removed from her ovary.” Next day, another mother/daughter, same scenario: “I had a little headache, but at least I didn’t get diarrhea!!” And, where else can your otherwise well-behaved dinner partner get up the wack to run her finger through the majestic Baked Alaska and lick it off, just before you were going to do the same? Wacky, no?
Five years ago, after my first cruise, I wrote a piece that dripped with cynicism. Could there be that much difference in aging from 55 to 60? This time you will not hear a snide word. The voyage was just what my therapist ordered: Asian waiters dressed like Venetian gondoliers, who actually called you “Signore.” Fluffy drinks with teeny umbrellas. Bumbling magicians. The black-out Baked Alaska sparkler-lit caravan. Table talk about surgeries and scars. The Internet Café. The Brobdignian buffet, somehow always served on the “Lido Deck.” Elderly women with their wheelchairs pulled up tight to the slot machines. Having your picture taken hugging a lobster.
The profound moments of a cruise will more than identify themselves – a magnificent view, historic site, a lover’s kiss. But, whenever the profundity subsides, the real way to enjoy a cruise is to savor it through the glasses of wacky. You will be neither disappointed, nor cynical, nor bored.
So call me neither bourgeoisie nor misanthrope. I’ll stand now and forever for the appellation of “wacky.” I had this confirmed thousand-fold the moment we disembarked in New York and I was greeted by a stevedore who told me in no uncertain terms to “f*** off,” because I had chosen someone other than him.
Ah, back to terra firma and its unvarnished realities, pining for just one more frou-frou daiquiri and another day of wacky.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)