When Life Hands You A Compass

I don't know what it is about Thanksgiving, but people keep dying. I know there's that thing about people dying around holidays, but this is becoming one very tough time of year for me.

Dad died on Thanksgiving night 2015, and a few days later, our beloved Aunty Lil passed away unexpectedly. Mom said she felt untethered the night we heard about Aunty Lil, like there was nothing left to hold on to, no way to right herself in this storm. Then, she turned on the national news about the GOP presidential hopefuls...and she went back to exercising her moral compass by yelling at the television.

A year later, Peri, my erstwhile canine companion of the transition from being us to being me, lost her fight with life the day after Thanksgiving. Suddenly, I was on my own for the first time. I felt unthethered.

This year, on Thanksgiving night, cousin Sammy slipped out of the Alzheimer's waiting room and into the Olam ha'Ba at about the same time Maria, his wife, learned that her own sister passed away in Mexico. And as if that is not enough, the incredible mother of my friend Sara Lynn also left us on Thanksgiving night. This has become a week of shiva calls.

Grandpa Ben Simon

Oh, yeah; my Grandpa Ben's 83 yahrzeit was observed Monday morning in shul. I wore a tallit, had an aliyah, and wondered if my grandfather would've been scandalized. I hope not. 

Jews don't do Gregorian death dates; the annual yahrzeit occurs on the Hebrew calendar date, so even though my Dad died Thanksgiving night, his yahrzeit is not for another week. Like Thanksgiving itself, the date moves around a bit. Still, Thanksgiving is getting to be more like Memorial Day around here. I don't know what it is about this time of year that makes losing people just a little bit harder. It could be the cold, the incipient grip of winter. It could also be the relentless canned soundtrack of "holiday cheer" that makes us members of the tribe a little bit extra stressed.  But no matter the root cause, I find it increasingly hard to be cheerful when between shiva calls I'm lighting yahrzeit candles. 

Yahrzeits are a pretty amazing tradition. Instead of remembering a birthday, we commemorate the death date. It's not a morbid kinda thing; it's asking us to remember the whole life, not just the arrival date. When we think about a yahrzeit, we are recalling the total person we knew, usually warts and all. It's nice to think about the good bits, but if we are honest, we also remember the not-so-good bits, too, and hopefully put some kind of perspective to the memories. I can't speak for anyone else, but sometimes I wonder how people will remember me after I've left. 

I am not thinking Tom Sawyer/Huck Finn funeral scene here. This is much less grandiose and infinitely more subtle. It's about owning one's own behavior and taking responsibility for one's own actions. Easy to say, very hard to do. I don't think I'm the only one who wonders what kind of legacy will be left behind. But here's the thing: we actually control it. 

This past week, the news had reports of a Jewish family being vilified on the tube in London, and a Muslim woman in a hajib coming to their defense against the harasser. At McGill University  a Jewish student leader has been bullied and harassed for accepting a trip to Israel that will visit both Israel and the Palestinian territories. The Sixth and I Synagogue in Washington, DC has been defaced with swastikas and anti-Semitic slurs sometime overnight on Sunday into Monday. 

All of this comes on the heels of Rick Perry announcing on Fox News that Feckless Leader is "the Chosen One:"

God uses imperfect people through history. King David wasn’t perfect. Saul wasn’t perfect. Solomon wasn’t perfect. And I actually gave the president a one-pager on those Old Testament kings about a month ago. And I shared it with him and I said, "Mr. President, I know there are people who say that you say you were the chosen one." And said, "You were." I said, "If you are a believing Christian, you understand God’s plan for the people who rule and judge over us on this planet in our government." 

The Washington Post, November 25th, 2019

Sure he is. 

Where is our society going, and what are we as individuals doing to correct the course? Acts of hate are increasingly common. Do we turn a blind eye and ignore it? Do we say something? Do we act to formally organize to protect ourselves? Is there a prescribed course of action?

Which brings me back to the idea of legacy. Say what you want about President Obama, but his presidency was 8 years without a personal scandal in the White House. His legacy, whether you liked him or not, is one of decency and statesmen-like demeanor. 

The contrast between the two administrations is not a function of Republicans v. Democrats; it's communal expectation v. personal gain. In 40 years...if we survive that long, we will look back at this period and shudder. If you think it's bad now....wait 10 more elections. The trajectory we are on is not one that fosters peaceful co-existence. 

The White House is little more than an ongoing joke at the moment, but one with horrific consequences. Insert environment/nursing home/banking industry regulation here. As the regulations are peeled back, the environmentally risky industries exponentially increase profits. See Keystone Pipeline; that oughta curl your hair. The motivation sure as hell isn't the good and welfare of We, the People. Like Andrew Lloyd Webber said in EVITA: When the money keeps rolling in, you don't ask how.

I can no more control the legacy of this administration than I can sprout wings and fly. I can encourage people to vote. I can continue to write this blog which, some weeks, seems to have a life all its own. I can continue to stand on my soapbox to preach personal responsibility. Or I can shut up and sit down. And don't think I haven't considered that option a lot lately. For right now, however, I cannot bring myself to do that. If I shut up, I am complicit; I become part of the problem. 

There are two little kids in my life right now. With no guarantees how long I'll last, I want them to remember their savta as their own personal Doña Quixote. I want Little Miss and Young Sir to know that they do not need to ever be silent in the face of bad behavior, bullying, or lack of ethics. I want them to call the king naked if the king wears no clothes. I want them to tilt at windmills if the windmills are just plain wrong. 

When I finally do leave the building, and if they remember me on my yahrzeit, I want them to remember a grandmother who believed the good fight could be fought. I want them to believe silence is not golden. But most of all, I want them to own strong moral and ethical compasses to follow on their own journeys.

The Wifely Person't Tip o'the Week

There is no joy in Mudville.

When it comes to Gophers and Vikings,

it's always best to keep your expectations low.