Whatever the Weather
The rain falls in sheets in Tel Aviv in January. The skies can be blue for hours so that the suddenness of the rain is as surprising as its force. Other times, the entire atmosphere, from the sky above to the ground under my feet seems to be rain-filled so that I am walking inside of clouds.
The sunshine in January here is equally curious. I leave the apartment, expecting to feel the warmth of the sun, and all I feel is bone-deep cold. The temperatures are certainly not at the freezing level of back home in New Jersey, and yet I feel the wind as a raw, biting thing. I am walking inside of a melting iceberg.
As my grandmother, and probably your grandmother, used to say: “There is no bad weather, only the wrong clothing”. And so I pile on layers, put on a hat, and even wear gloves when it appears that no one in Tel Aviv even owns them. I wear wool socks and carry an umbrella everywhere.
For his part, Carmel seems oblivious to the weather that concerns his Bubbe. He kicks off the blanket I tuck in all around his legs, toddles around the playground in just his tread-bottomed socks, and sits behind the rain protector over his stroller like a king.
The weather, like life itself, is all about one’s perspective. When I called my cousin to see if she expected me at the Hertzliya Train Station at 12 or 12:30 to meet for our lunch, she told me she thought I was calling to cancel because it was raining. I laughed.
I am so deeply grateful to have been able to fly to Israel during my sabbatical, nothing will keep me inside. Except when I want to stay inside!
Both the pandemic and this sabbatical have taught me not to feel pressure to achieve some maximum amount in a given timeframe. I am relishing the freedom of focusing on one thing at a time. I pray quietly and with intense intentions. I practice yoga on my own, on a mat rolled out in Sarah and Sagi‘s living room, taking whatever shapes come into my mind. I take classes virtually, write in my journal, and take long walks through my beloved Tel Aviv. And I pick up Carmel from gan (childcare) every day at 4:00 and have wonderful adventures with him until we return home for dinner, bath, and bed.
I have always thought of time as a container to fill to the top with meaningful activity and accomplishment. Filling that container each day has kept me motivated, passionate, and fulfilled. It has also, however, kept me stressed, on edge, running from one thing to the next. My next appointment would begin before my last even finished. I never felt my To Do list was done.
I am finally learning that time is something that simply unfolds, much like the weather, and my task is to move along with it. I cannot control it. Why not just live inside of it?
So most days, I button up and go out into the world of Tel Aviv, to walk along Dizengoff Street or to stop at one of the outdoor cafés for a latte. Neither the weather nor the time of day matters. But on other days, like today, I just stay indoors, start the cooking for Shabbat, and write a blog post to let you all know that I am thinking of you.
In this week’s Torah portion, Yitro watches his son-in-law Moshe exhaust himself by counseling and judging the Israelites from morning to night all alone. He offers Moshe a reframe: “What you are doing is not good. You need to delegate responsibilities. You need to take a break.”
Rabbi Scheff and I were blessed many years ago with a loving relationship with Bernie Schiffmiller z”l, a congregant and Yitro of our own, who used to say to us, “You’ll be no good to anyone if you don’t take care of yourselves.”
And today, we have all of you, our OJC family, who grant your rabbis sabbaticals with the same loving generosity.
As for me, I am learning about the weather and about time. And this week, I am getting ready to receive Torah once again.
May your days all be sunny or rainy and may you relish whichever they are!
Rabbi Paula Mack Drill
Learning in Isolation – Part Two
Note: Both Rabbi Drill and Rabbi Scheff tested positive for Covid, one week apart, during this uptick due to the Omicron variant. Thankfully, both rabbis have had fairly mild symptoms. Last week in Part One of this blog, Rabbi Drill shared her thoughts on her experience in isolation. This week, in Part Two, Rabbi Scheff shares his perspective.
CAVEAT 1: I offer this perspective with complete awareness that there are those whose physical symptoms resulting from Covid-19 have been far more debilitating than my stuffiness or loss of my senses of taste and smell.
CAVEAT 2: I offer this perspective with total appreciation that I am neither alone in my home nor responsible for the care of children.
CAVEAT 3: I offer this perspective with the humble acknowledgement that my colleague, teacher and friend Rabbi Paula Drill is a very different person than I am, despite the fact there are those who say that we are one and the same person.
Day 9 of isolation. I’d love to say I have gained some new insight about myself, or experienced some spiritual renewal. But the truth is that it has been a challenge not to turn on HBO Max and spend every waking hour watching “Succession” (though I have nearly caught up). I have finished 3 books, which is an accomplishment for me, and managed to stay current on my emails.
What is it, I wonder, that makes me feel like I can’t just stay in bed? Who is relying on my productivity such that I can’t power down? Why should I feel guilty finishing the entire chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream container if it is the only thing I can actually taste?
While out on a walk listening to one of my favorite podcasts (“On Being,” with Krista Tippet), I learned about English author Katherine May’s concept of “wintering.” Despite Tippet’s attempts to push the author in the direction of discussing the reflective, spiritual aspect of going inside oneself, May stubbornly sticks to her counter-cultural notion of simply remaining safe and in place: Animals don’t fight the winter. They don’t pretend it is not happening. They prepare and adapt; they hibernate and migrate. “Wintering…,” according to May, “…is a time of withdrawing from the world, maximizing scant resources, carrying out acts of brutal efficiency and vanishing from sight.” And “out of sight” is where transformation occurs as a product of recuperation and replenishment.
Slowing down, expanding spare time, and getting sleep are, in May’s words, “deeply unfashionable” today. Resting is considered by too many in our society to be a radical act, but it is essential to our being. WInter’s place in the life cycle of nature teaches us this lesson, as does the Jewish concept of shmita (the year of release that occurs every seven years): Life demands that we make time to lie fallow, to be unproductive, and to sleep. Especially when we experience personal physical illness, we must be as generous to ourselves as we are to others; we must be prepared to give to ourselves the gift of rest.
We have learned so many valuable lessons from our experiences of the pandemic in the last two years. If I’ve learned anything new or different in these past days from my own isolation, it is that I must model and practice what I preach. Managing self-imposed expectations, exercising patience, practicing tzimtzum (withdrawal into oneself) and even forgiveness – these are also crucial elements of self-care as we experience our personal wintering.
On this Rosh Chodesh Shevat, the first day of the Hebrew month in which we celebrate the New Year of the Trees, perhaps it behooves us to remember Amanda McBroom’s lyrics sung by Bette Midler:
Just remember in the winter
Far beneath the bitter snows
Lies the seed that with the sun’s love
In the spring becomes the rose.
Dormancy is merely an organism’s temporary cessation of growth and development in a time of environmental stress. It is nature’s coping mechanism, allowing the seed to conserve the energy that will assist it to burst forth when the time is right.
So go ahead and indulge yourself. Give yourself a break. Sleep late. Binge watch. Power down. Hang in there, spring is almost here.
Rabbi Craig Scheff
Two Rabbis, One Voice, Three Opinions 
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