Time change, change time

Today I’ve been thinking about different kinds of change and transformation. There are the changes that happen in the natural world: blossoms turning to seeds or fruits, plants dropping their leaves and sprouting new ones. In our human bodies, too, these time-related changes take place — we grow up, we grow older, we grow old. Year after year our holidays return, part of the cycle of the seasons and part of the spiral of time that is our lives.

The Elul cycle of holidays — which takes us from welcoming the New Year to experiencing teshuva at Yom Kippur, then to the joy of dwelling in our sukkah, and at last to the ecstatic rejoicing of Simchat Torah — is intended to transform us. But we may, like one friend of mine, wonder if anything is really happening. She says, “I sit there in services and I think: am I changing? Is this changing me? When is the change going to happen? How is this going to change me? Hurry up, let me be changed!”

Sunday night in Israel we put out clocks back — we changed time, or rather, we changed our perception of time. In reality, everything is the same — the sun rises, the sun sets, ein chadash tachat hashemesh, there is nothing new under the sun, as Kohelet said. But because we rearranged our clocks, for us the sun rises “earlier” and the dark comes on “earlier”.

On the morning of Simchat Torah I attended services at Nava Tehilah, the Renewal minyan. We danced and danced, sang and sang — all kinds of songs and dances, including a moment when we broke out into groups of four and did square dancing, singing “Or zarua, zarua letzaddik, ulyishrei lev, ulyishrei lev, ulyishrei lev simcha” — “Light is sown for the righteous and for the straight-hearted, joy” — to the tune of “Oh, Susanna”. Under the chuppah (marriage canopy), the Chatan Torah (Bridegroom of Torah) was honored with the reading of the last of Davarim (the end of the Torah). Then they unrolled the whole Torah around the room, and each of us, our hands protects by tallitot and silk scarves, held up the edge of the scroll, while designated readers performed a ritual a la Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, going to each of us and asking us to point out a random verse, which they then read and converted into a blessing for our year. Then the torah was rerolled, and the Kallat Torah (bride of Torah) was invited to come under the chuppah while the opening chapters of Genesis were read. “VaYar Elohim ki tov…And God saw that it was good…”

Something shifted in me then. Or maybe because the fall weather is coming on, the cooler nights and days, the soft rain, the darkness falling early. Or perhaps just enough time has passed, and I feel more confident that I will make it through this year without disaster, that the daily necessities will be accomplished, that the tasks that seem overwhelming will be completed, that every mountain and hill will be made, if not low, then at least surmountable. I opened a bank account last week. I seem to have nearly conquered the fleas. A few days ago, two people stopped me for directions on the street, and I was actually able to tell them where to go in Hebrew — such a small thing, a few words and gestures, but it felt like such a huge accomplishment.

We change, and we are changed. And yet, we are still ourselves — perhaps more than we want to be! I am still an anxious person, a shy person, a controlling and bossy person. I am still a grieving person, a sad person, a mourning person. One of the most striking things I am experiencing here, too, is how much being in a foreign environment brings to the fore characteristics, tendencies, and preferences that I don’t notice much in my home environment. I like to tell people I am a “post-denominational” Jew, but here, especially at Pardes, I am an ardent Reform Jew. I chafe against the strictures of Orthodoxy. And yet, I am living a more religious life than I ever have, without thinking much about it — keeping kosher as a matter of course, keeping Shabbat for the most part, going to services every Friday or Saturday and davenning mincha (afternoon service) five days a week.

And who will I be when my time here ends? Mi yodea — who knows? I will be in some ways changed and in some ways the same as I always was. Will I have ripened, born fruit in some metaphorical way? It remains to be seen…