16 days until 40: My 3D puzzle family

Ever write an email to the transportation coordinator at your kid’s school and suddenly realize that it was more appropriate as a blog post than an email?

Yeah, I’m not expecting a lot of head nods here. It’s a special level of oversharer that can manage to overshare in an email.

That’s right readers, I’m that special.

This whole process of blogging, social media—the whole thing is basically a big cry to the universe for validation.

So today, I would like the universe to validate my Big Queer Jewish Blended Family. Today I look at all the people I have loved in my life and I want more people to think—that is so beautiful. I wish I didn’t love my partner/spouse anymore so I could get divorced and my kids could have all those people loving them, too!

I used a whole white board this summer to explain how my kids were all related to each other and their birth families. I went on a bender because Sima had to do a family tree project. I got all worked up about this project and became obsessed with making sure that my son wouldn’t get negative messages about how his family tree didn’t look like a biblical lineage. And then Jacob begat Sima and...well, if we stay true to form it would be Nehama begat Sima, right? No, that’s not right. It would be #? (I don’t know how I forgot a number that used to be so important) begat Sima. Begats follow sperm lines.

Ironically, he ended up being away with Jacob at Eliyashu’s overnight camp, newly rebranded Camp Havaya (née JRF).

Next time anyone asks your kid to draw a family tree, feel free to respond with—yeah, ours is more like a 3D puzzle of people who love my kid and who love each other, and this assignment is a little too simplistic for us. How about we try to come up with a list of our special people, and tell you about each person and why they are special to us. Because reducing that narrative to a litany of begats is an incomplete picture.

And by the way, we will need a much bigger piece of paper.

—  —  —  —  —  —

Hi Jacob and Deb,

We clarified that Eliyashu gets to school before 8am when he takes the bus, so we will use school transportation.

Jacob, do you think it is fair to say at this point that Eliyashu’s dismissal schedule is the following:
Monday: carpool
Tuesday: carpool
Wednesday: bus
Thursday: bus
Friday: alternating carpool/bus

The bus driver passes our stop whether or not Eliyashu is there. Though we have always been sending the schedule as AM and PM, I’m not sure that information is as important as dismissal.

Can we all agree that the above is the default and that we will notify school of any changes on a case by case basis?

I don’t believe there are many weeks left to Fall sports. Eliyashu can go to all the remaining horseback riding sessions (we are rewarding him for some homework success) as well as soccer on the weekends that we have custody. On the Fridays of Jacob’s custody he will leave from the carpool lane and skip soccer.

Just to clarify custody, this Friday is my weekend. Deb, the alternating schedule is fixed. We don’t switch weekends and then reset the alternating schedule. So you can calendar Eliyashu to be with us this weekend and Jacob next weekend and set the calendar to every other week until Eliyashu’s graduation 👨🏾‍🎓from AIM in 2026.

I don’t want to discuss the fact that my baby will be driving himself to and from school from Fall 2023-Graduation 2026. For now, let’s just assume that he’ll be carpool Monday and Tuesday and bus on Wednesday and Thursday. 

😉 

Deb Santo, we should have coffee sometime! I’d like to be more than a horrid custody tangle to you. On second thought, let’s make it an expensive dinner. We OWE you!!

Thanks for always being gracious and generous with your email reminders. I worked at Eliyashu’s summer camp this past summer for the first time. He has been going to that camp for 7 summers alresdy! So, they know us...and the transportation coordinator casually said: I’m so glad you’re working at camp and driving the kids every day. You literally saved me from an hour of inputting to the system for just your 3 kids and their 3 houses! 

The moral of the story: I know that navigating our changing arrangements is challenging and frustrating sometimes as an institution and that it makes an already complicated jigsaw puzzle job even more complex. But let’s be honest. 3D puzzles with 2,000 are way more beautiful than you’re basic 100 piece one, right? 

That’s how I think of our family. And our kids homes. Instead of feeling fractured and complicated and hard to understand and a pain in the ass to input in a transportation rubric, I try to focus on how some unfortunate turn of events (divorces) has given our children a much more complex and rich matrix to call family.

I just realized that this email was a blog post and I didn’t need to make your job harder again by making you read my philosophical ramblings. 

Or maybe you like my philosophical rambling/ranting/writing.

If you do, click here for more:

www.benmosche.org

One the bright side, it looks like you won’t need to send us requests for schedules anymore, so you can take that off your perpetual to do list!

Hope to see you around this year.

Hugs,

Nehama 

55 days til 40: What Comes Next--Post Hamilton Road Trip

And the countdown gets real.

And the summer of dancing and my full time job comes to an end.

And my 2 week family Hamilton road trip is over.

And this weekend, I officiated the first of three weddings in a month--the third of which is in Barcelona. I know, not a bad job if you can get it, right?!?

And then my birthday. 4 decades of existence.

And then...?

For years I said that I never wanted a full time job.  I don't need to have one, thanks to my dad's hard work and luck through his career.  I have always thought that the work/life balance in American culture is awful.  I heard the title of this TED talk once--Work, Family, Exercise, Hobbies, Friends, Healthy Eating--pick two.  Or something like that.  The good ole fucked up American dream.

So this summer I fell into this crazy full time job of dancing outside in the heat of Philadelphia summers, which was pretty insane, and my family was in pretty good shape, I was getting a shit ton of exercise, I made some new friends and sometimes I even had some healthy eating habits.  But mostly I ate camp kid food--and even great camp kid food doesn't qualify for that last one there.  I lost some weight, but didn't get too obsessed about it and now I am staring into the abyss.

I mean, not the abyss.  More like the great open road of infinite possibilities--but no fucking clarity on which path to take because they all seem totally reasonably good for lots of different reasons.  And differently hard and enjoyable.

Do I launch into my Benmosche Project pile and start any one of the 10 different visions I have been imagining over the last two years?

Do I get another Jewish job because it is something I am good at and what I trained for all those years and tweak it to be a little more of what I want, but mostly just something someone else is looking for?

Do I get a totally simple job at a restaurant or a coffee shop, just to have a place to go and some cash in my pocket at the end of the day? Maybe I could go help at the middle eastern place up the street or the cafe in the woods down the hill.  Those both felt like options and stepping stones toward learning more about a business to decide if it's worth taking that route, even if there is a huge rate of failure in that direction.

What makes me want to get out of bed in the morning and feel like I am doing something? I know this much is definitely true.  The last few weeks weren't great.  I believe that depression is a real and debilitating illness that affects people regardless of economic ability.

But being a little rich girl who doesn't have to go to work is definitely a recipe for making my depression worse.  I had a much better 2 months while I was working than I have had in years.  I don't think I am strong enough for a start up.  It is my dream.  I am not kidding when I say I have at least 10 different really great ideas to start that could get transformed into solid and realistic business plans with real potential for success.

And I know that me and this keyboard at my desk in my bedroom is the worst choice I can make right now.

So, I have no fucking clue what comes next.

But, I know how to set myself up to succeed and that means needing to work for someone else while I build the dream on the side, for now.

On that note, I have a wedding to finish writing.  Thanks for listening.  Some people must read this and think--what a fucking millennial.  Why do you publish your journal on the internet?  You'll regret this one day.

Fuck that.  Life's too short.  And every once in a while, I say something that someone else can relate to and it makes them feel a little less alone when I have the courage to share my truth.

80 days til 40: Dancing your ass off

Picture it. Chestnut Hill Coffee ☕️, upstairs at a little table. It's March, maybe April 2017. I sit down with Elana Rivel, the director of Ramah Day Camp in Philly to talk about the possibility of working with/at camp. I was really excited about this new program--Hebrew immersion at camp and Ezra was the right age for their pilot. Elana mentions to me that she's hoping the staff will be an American with strong Hebrew skills and and an Israeli.

I'm pretty sure I fell in love with her a little bit in that moment. You know what I mean...starstruck by a leadership move that aligns with the vision you always wished was out there. Finally someone who acknowledged that spending pretty much my whole academic career and a few years living in Israel, all working on learning Hebrew wasn't a total waste of fucking time. (Ok, truth, she's also pretty adorably dykey looking with that shaved head that makes you wonder ;)

For those of you who don't live or work in the Jewish world, a quick background note. You can basically only get good jobs working in the Jewish community if you are Israeli, frum (Orthodox) or a rabbi. It took me a while to figure that out--hence the graduation from ran school at the ripe old age of 33...instead of 25, like some of my savvier colleagues (Isabel, Shayna) I know you were 26...blah dblah ;)

But I digress (Every fucking time...Mazel tov to those who are still reading. Email me at benmoscheproject at gmail dot com if you made it this far. Validate that insecurity of mine. Go ahead. You'll feel good about yourself, too. Plus it will get you an invitation to our parties 🎉!!)

So back to dancing my ass off. Today's topic. After talking about all the consulty rabbi crap I could do for camp, she tells me that the staff week is pretty planned out already. And I remember the other reason I'm here.

I need to get a small part-time job somewhere. Something I can do for a few hours a day, on a regular basis, out of my house. The kind of thing that I would feel bad about bailing on to stay in bed. i.e. planning to go for a walk in the park after bringing Ezra to the bus stop every morning didn't fucking cut it.  My marching orders came from Taliba--my life saver/psychiatrist. I was starting some new meds which would hopefully help break up the two week long depression cycles I descended into every 4-7 weeks. I would happily keep most of my hypomania--I can seriously catch up on some Netflix and blogging on the nights when my body only sleeps for a couple of hours.  At a recent session, I got a whole lot of "yes"es on her Adult ADHD screen and I became the proud owner of an actual legal Adderall script. I would not sell one single pill for all the money in the world.  Probably helps that I don't need the money...but I have learned that I definitely need this medication.  

So I say to Elana--well, do you have any open positions? I can't be a counselor. I'm definitely too old for that. And I am pretty sure that being a counselor in your own kid's bunk is a disaster for anyone.

So she says, well, we need someone for the office. Really the most important thing is that you're the smiling face and happy voice that our families encounter. Would you want to do that?

Yeah, so I don't tell her at this point that I've only had a full-time job for one year of my life. 2000-2001. The Davis Academy in Atlanta, Georgia.  For the middle school's Jewish studies department. For those of you confused about the seeming contradiction with statements made above about how I need to be Israeli, Orthodox or a rabbi to get a teaching job I should let you know that Davis is a Reform day school (reformim...chuckle all my frum friends) and I was hired in August. This is the "desperate for a warm body/any port in a storm/Hail Mary/Oh shit" move made by many people who hire staff, close their eyes and hope for the best.

And P.S.--teaching 6th, 7th and 8th graders is the opposite of a desk job. There was no fucking way I could sit at a desk all day.

Oops, did I say that out loud? (I would learn later that Elana walked away from that meeting hoping I would somehow say fuck less/NEVER in front of children...and most parents ;)

We also have an opening in the bishul (cooking) staff, she says optimistically.

I think they heard that guffaw all the way in NYC. I can hear my mom's favorite story in my head. Nehama, I told you how to make the matzah balls, but do you know how to make soup, honey?

Seriously Mom? Boil some water and throw some bouillon cubes in. How hard is that?

Umm, anything else Elana? I'm cringing...literally, at this point.

We need a Rosh Rikud, she says. I mean, who says that job should always go to one of the Israelis? I'd rather use one of the Israeli staff somewhere more useful, honestly.

And that's when it happened. This light turned on inside of me. I'm pretty sure I said--now that sounds like an awesome fucking job, but sadly I don't actually know any of the dances. But I love the idea. So she says, 20 year old Israelis don't know them either. I'll set you up with RakDan and we will send you the videos from the last few years.

I haven't blogged all summer because I have been so busy. Dancing my ass off. I loved it so much. It just kept getting better.

I blew my Fitbit and Apple Watch out of the water. I sweat several gallons a day. I was outside. I was listening to fun music and dancing with these awesome kids who were totally learning and loving dances. I met all of these amazing staff members and even came away with a couple of folks who I would now consider friends.

Reality check. And sometimes the kids didn't listen. And sometimes I was so tired I couldn't move. And one day I got so annoyed at the kids who wouldn't stop messing with and sitting on a broken picnic table that I had my little inner Hercules moment and flipped the whole thing over so they couldn't sit at it. And a few minutes later one of the kids walked off to look at the ants and worms from under the place the legs of the table had been.  That day was really special.

It was real life.

I haven't been able to participate in real life for a long time. That's for a different post. This one is just about appreciating and honoring that I found something to love. It connected me back to the Jewish work that I burned out from after 2 decades.

And now I understand Eliyashu better than before. Ramah is my favorite part of my year now, too. And I can't wait til kayitz (summer) comes again.

I drank the kool-aid, and it turned out to be the nectar of the gods that I don't believe in.

127 days til 40: Learning to say goodbye

Yesterday my journey toward healthier took me to a goodbye event at my community, Machar: The Washington Congregation for Secular Humanistic Judaism. It was a lovely event. One of my b'nei mitzvah students put together a video for me of images from my years at Machar. Members came up and publicly thanked me and shared ways that I made a difference in their lives. They also gave me a beautiful Miriam's cup, a symbol of the creativity, innovation and outside of the box thinking that I brought to them.

Here are the words I shared with them.

The people heard from me one last time ;) (Hamilton reference)

June 4th 2017

As I thought about what to do or say leading up to today, I started thinking about this as the “so long, farewell, aufwiederzehen, goodbye” event.

Just like the children saying goodbye in The Sound of Music, my process of saying goodbye here at Machar has been multifaceted.

In rabbinical school, we used to talk about the “rabbi/congregational relationship” so I regularly use relationship metaphors to talk about the experience of being a rabbi. Thus here I am, ending this relationship and wishing you well as you forge a relationship with your new rabbi.

I’ve realized a flaw in this idea. This isn't a single relationship. What I’ve actually learned in the last few months is that I have over 300 relationships here. Starting in December, when I first announced my decision not to renew my contract with Machar, I have slowly said goodbye to many of you. Today is the formal moment of goodbye, but I haven't yet had the opportunity to have an individual goodbye with many of you. Each goodbye is a chance to remember our relationship. And the memories of the experiences we have shared together will stay with me, as I hope they will also stay with you.

What's nice about having multiple ways of saying goodbye and multiple opportunities to say goodbye is that it gives us the chance to say auf wiedersehen, or in Hebrew, l’hitraot. Until we see each other again.

There is a saying from Pirkei Avot, which is one of the central places to go if you're looking for a good Jewish aphorism.

עשה לך רב וקנה לך חבר
והוי דן את כל האדם על כף זכות
Make yourself a rabbi, acquire yourself a friend and judge each person meritoriously.

There have been many interpretations of this text. Some of the traditional commentators seem to separate this into three distinct pieces of advice.
Make someone your rabbi by choosing to let someone be your teacher.
Acquire a friend by investing in the relationship and making it valuable to you.
Judge each person on their merits and give them the benefit of the doubt by assuming they have the best intentions.

I had always learned the first two together--make yourself a rabbi and acquire yourself a friend. The liberal interpretation and experience of a rabbi opens up the possibility of a causative link between the two halves.

When you make someone your rabbi, you're investing and trusting in a relationship. What you end up with, when you invest in that relationship, is a lifelong friend.

The most heartbreaking part of leaving Machar has been the reality that I won't be the lifelong rabbinic companion for all of you. Through my years here I have been there for much of the regular life of our community--JCS, adult ed programs, holiday celebrations--at especially the high holidays. And of course who can forget our infamous board meetings.

But the chances to really get to know families better have been around lifecycle events, particularly the b’nei mitzvah ceremonies and also the baby namings, weddings, and funerals of the last three and a half years. As we have gotten to know each other better, those lifecycle events have been even more moving and meaningful for me.

So, as I move into new adventure, which has changed form from synagogue, to family foundation work, to food truck and plenty of fantasy pipe dream visions in between, I hope to weave what I have learned here into my next chapter.

My mussar teacher, Rabbi Ira Stone, taught us about character development and spiritual practice. One of the character traits we worked on throughout our studies was humility. He defined humility as approaching each person you meet as a teacher. The word rav, or rabbi, in Hebrew is most simply translated as teacher. In that way, you have each been my teachers, as I hope to have been yours.

עשה לך רב וקנה לך חבר
והוי דן את כל האדם על כף זכות
Make yourself a rabbi, acquire yourself a friend and judge each person meritoriously.

I made many teachers here at Machar, and acquired many friendships, and I have always seen each of you for your merits and the ways you can each bring so much value to this community.

I hope that each of you will engage in this same process with your new rabbi, Jeremy Kridel. I have been lucky enough to have already made him one of my rabbis and one of my friends at our Association for Humanistic Rabbis meetings and at the teen conclaves and I look forward to the ways he will share his teaching, his friendship and his merits with the Machar community.

I printed these cards to give out today so that each of you can have a link to your old rabbi in your pocket. I hope that we stay in touch with each other's lives and that our paths cross often. Maybe by the next Machar field trip to Philadelphia I can invite you all to lunch. And if I don't have a food truck, we can just meet at my home.

Thank you.

Israeli Independence Day?

I saw an article yesterday.  The title was Israel lost its independence in 1967.  Ironically, when I tried to open it, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz's app closed on me.  And since I have the attention span of a goldfish, that's all I can tell you about that article.  If I was a diligent writer, I would go back and read it before I wrote this.  But then I wouldn't write the post.

Welcome once again to the inside of my brain.

Let me digress for a second to answer your burning question.  Why are you blogging about Israeli Indepence Day, aka Yom Ha'atzmaut, on your blog that we have all labelled in our brains in the category of fat positive, self-help, wellness blogs?  You're kinda fucking up our whole filing system by getting into the political stuff here.  You did it with that #taxmarch post on April 15th and now you're doing it again.

Let me address the question that I am assuming--rather, let me address the judgement from my readership that my brain has concocted in an attempt to sabotage me from writing this post.  I am not going to fit neatly in any boxes.

Ever.

It's also why this blog is posted on my website www.benmosche.org. Right now it's the only thing up there, but I am hoping to get some information about my work as a rabbi for wedding couples and other life celebrations and then the blog will just be a page.  My writing  about my personal journey toward healthy IS relevant to the organization I am developing--The Benmosche Project: inspired by Jewish traditions, open to the mosaic of humanity.

There is no boundary between my personal self and my professional self.  And I get shit for that all the time from professionals who have tried to teach me to be more professional.  There's nothing that I want to hide in a closet or be protected about.  Just the other day my old friend,
Aviva, said--you know, you might want to edit out the word "fuck" from your posts because (I don't remember exactly what she said, but improvise the rest, end with some hysterical laughter and you'll get the point). No, I don't want to, I answered.  This is me--take it or leave it.  Fuckity fuck fuck.  If you don't want your rabbi to say fuck--don't hire me for the rabbi job. I can live with missing out of a job for people who would want me to be smaller, quieter, more polished.

But I digress.  Always.

And now you kind of understand why this post is completely perfect for today.  It's Israel's independence day.  Palestinians call this day al Nakba, which literally means "the disaster."  I usually equate Nakba in my mind with Holocaust.  Yes, the word has a technical literal definition, but now it primarily refers to an historical moment.


I got a text from my friend Susan who said she would try to call me later because she was running in and out of meetings today, "interspersed with Yom Ha'atzmaut parties, interspersed with actively avoiding yeshiva boys holding flags and chanting." Her text made me so homesick.  It also made me realize why I had a deep craving for a burger last night (the hallmark of secular Israeli celebrations of today is grilling--sound like 4th of July anyone?).

I'm not good at politics.  One of my best friends, Michal, lives in the West Bank.  She's an Orthodox Jew, and as she said at my first (actually second) wedding, our relationship is proof that parallel lines do meet.  We run in COMPLETELY different circles.  You would never know that we knew each other if you looked at the stereotype of us.  But we do. You can also find the beginnings of our blog at this site: http://www.therabbiandtheskirt.org

I miss being in Israel for Independence day the way I used to be proud of being out of the country for the 4th of July, but still went to watch the fireworks at the beach in Tel Aviv.  I grew up in America.  I hate the idea of white supremacist Trump America, and yet--even if I actually ex-patriated (is that a word?), every one would know I was an American. You can hear my accent in my Hebrew, even though I learned to speak Hebrew when I was 4.  You can hear it in my Spanish, even though I learned Spanish from my mother when I was a baby.  You can hear an American accent in my mother's Spanish too--because she spent her first 5 years in Yonkers before they moved to Venezuela and then she came back here for high school. Because her mother tongue is English (despite the fact that her mother's tongue was actually laced with a heavy German accent, and her father grew up in Poland speaking Yiddish).

Israel is my home. I leave you with the most inspiring speech I have heard in years--the keynote from this year's JStreet conference, Mika Almog, the granddaughter of the late former President and former Prime Minister of Israel, Shimon Perez.

She speaks the words of my soul more eloquently than I could ever say them. Please watch this. Michal--you, too ;)

https://youtu.be/I6EpId7w1kk

I love Israel because it is mine. Because I want to make love with my eyes open.  Because I love Israel the way I have loved the women in my life, and the men, of my life. I look at its roses even as they prick my fingers. Because we are ALL living such unlikely lives. Because the stuff I am made of is the future.



Thank you/not you #g!dnotGod for creating a homeland for the Jewish people.  Let us all work for tikkun olam. Somehow we have this beautiful mess of a Jewish homeland in the world.  I want to help make it better.  Today, I do that by writing this post.

And that passion makes me healthier today.

#lovematters #jstreet #g!dnotGod #69 #happybirthdayisrael #israelishome #yomhaatzmaut

My half birthday!: 182 days until I'm 40

As Jewish people are engaged in a ritual called counting the Omer--counting the days between  Passover and Shavuot (Pentecost), counting the days since I started my blog started to make a little less sense. I started 2 months ago, as I was mourning my dad, and here I am 2 months later and a little shaky about how much healthier I am.

Therein lies the trick of my mind. Because the truth is--I'm definitely healthier. I have started attending a queer fat support group and met 4 other people who have had a lifetime of American childhood and adulthood thrown at them. There are moments when our stories are all so painfully similar. Growing up fat left its mark on each of us and continues to be part of who we are becoming in beautiful and sometimes challenging ways. Learning about fat activism is amazing. I knew it existed but maybe shame or just plain being out of the loop left me in the dark all these years. (that may be a touch overly dramatic)

I have stopped many of the disordered eating behaviors that were running pretty intensely through my system 2 months ago. I am working with different doctors to be accountable for the levels of my cholesterol, Hemoglobin A1C, and taking some new medications to move me toward healthier.

And guess what? I had plenty of days when I didn't want to get out of bed. I had days when I didn't  even leave the house.

And I'm still healthier.

I ran in the Hot Chocolate 15K on April 1st with my friend Sarit. It hurt. I was exhausted. But it was also an exhilarating accomplishment. Sarit and I trained to do the Dublin Marathon together after my dad died in 2015. I didn't end up making the trip for a lot of reasons, but most importantly, I wasn't ready. A marathon is an intense physical endeavor. I knew from my first and only marathon in 2007 that I needed to be better trained than I was. I enjoy the challenge of distance running, but like I said when I started this blog:

Sometimes I'll write and sometimes I won't. Sometimes I'll exercise and sometimes I won't.

And today I know with greater certainty than I ever have before that sometimes is all I can expect from myself. It's all any of us can expect from ourselves.

Our society of 24 hours a day/ seven days a week/ always open/ always on is debilitating and we all need sometimes when we are off and not on. And it isn't going to be the same for all of us. Some of us will need more than others. One of my best friends is able to maintain a high level of functionality on 4 hours of sleep. Almost every day. When she splurges, she throws in an hour long nap putting her kid to bed. I can only pull that off a few days a month. And today, I'm ok with that fact.

I was flipping through Instagram and found my a new gift to by myself at www.tinytimemachines.com
Maybe when it arrives I'll try taking this new watch with me on a run or to the woods and I'll leave my Apple Watch at home for a change.

#NOWmaste

#g!dnotGod

Day 48: Taxes

Sometimes standing in front of thousands of people is the encouragement needed to take a stand, to get up and to speak my truth. It took a lot of courage and I wanted to share it here:

Tax March
April 15, 2007

Sh’ma Yisrael, im kol shonuteinu kol ha’adam echad.

Listen, you people who wrestle, in all of your diversity, all of humanity is one.

This week, the Jewish community is celebrating the holiday of Passover. It is the story of our liberation from slavery and oppression.

It is not just a story about supernatural intervention in history. It is the story of sending a message to the Pharoah through demonstrations of just how powerful people can be when they join together and demand change.

It is not just a story of how God intervenes in human history to redeem the enslaved Israelites. It is a story of people who stood up and made the change happen. The rabbis taught that it was an Israelite, Nachshon ben Aminadav, who stepped into the sea. That it was his faith in the possibility of redemption that caused the sea to part.

I stand here today as a representative of different facets of that story. My great grandfather was a rabbi and he immigrated to this country and changed his last name to Benmosche--son of Moses, literally his father’s name, but also implying he was of the people who struggle and travel to find freedom. I inherited both his last name and his passion for service in the Jewish community. A passion to seek out injustice and to work for those who need support.

There is a repeated mandate throughout the Bible to care for the widow, the orphan and the stranger. As American citizens, we fulfill that mandate through the social services that are available because of our taxes and philanthropic efforts to support non-profit organizations dedicated to this work. We want to know that our leaders support those efforts.

But I don't just stand here as a person who has taken on a legacy of service. I am also the daughter of the late, former CEO of AIG, Bob Benmosche. When my father passed away in 2015, I inherited the financial legacy of his work as a corporate executive. It feels especially important to share that fact because I am the “rich” who benefit from unfair tax systems and loopholes. And I am standing here and standing with you to say: it is wrong.

I also understand personally that taking on public roles in leadership takes away the right to privacy that other citizens enjoy. When you chose to make your life public, when you choose to represent the tax paying American citizens, you have a responsibility. Transparency in your business endeavors and in your personal life in multiple arenas IS the work of gaining the trust of the people you are leading.

We stand together today demanding that work be done. We stand here declaring that we care about creating fair systems of taxation that support our communities, especially those with the greatest need.

Kulanu na’avod l’taken et ha’olam ha’zeh

Let us work together to repair this world.
Through truth.
Through transparency.
Through a fair system for all.

Day 31: #g!dnotGod

#g!dnotGod

Bear with me here for a few minutes. I'm going to explain that.

But if you have read any of my other blog posts, you know I have tended to start with a story.  This story is about a rabbi friend of mine who's name will not be mentioned here.  Because I don't really want to admit publicly that we aren't friends anymore. And because I don't want to give him the satisfaction of still mattering to me even though he continues to hurt me by throwing our friendship out with the chaff of the last decade.  I'm sure he hasn't thrown out many t-shirts, but he managed to get rid of me. But I digress (of course).

So, every once in a while something will happen and we will break the veil of silence between us.  The last two times he has thrown in, at some point, "Our friendship ended. #sorrynotsorry." The first time he said it was the first time I had actually heard the hashtag. I know, I have a teenage daughter. I should know better. But I'm getting old. Half of the time I have to go through and edit this blog because I still instinctively double space bar at the end of sentences. Blogger doesn't autocorrect me for that. So I have weird spacing. But I digress (again).

I haven't gone to the source and really researched, but here's my raw interpretation of #sorrynotsorry. It is basically the paradox of the thing, weighted a little heavier on the not sorry part (I think).  It's the empty sorry, but the truth comes in the second half--the not sorry isn't the kind of sorry of "I wish I hadn't done that.  It was a mistake." It's the sorry of empathy for the crappy feelings that you're having because I had to do this thing that made you hurt and cry.

A dear long term friend of mine (not a rabbi--shockingly!), Benjamin Blumenthal, sent me a Linkedin! request tonight. As a general rule, I tend to hold the "why does Linkedin! exist?!?" opinion.  But maybe that's because I'm not corporate.  I still get my news and my yichus (it's Yiddish for street cred mixed with whatever that word is for when you're in the mafia--protectzia is how it kind of got translated into Hebrew) from Facebook.  Like I said, I'm almost 40!

So of course I get that link to get my password and I start editing my profile because it's from 7 years ago.  It was time.  In my old little self-pitch blurb, I said something about an intersection of faith and G!d and bringing people peace.  The cliche was almost too painful to read.  So as I am thinking about what to write now, and what to do with the whole God thing, the idea of #g!dnotGod popped into my mind.  It's my new thing.  I'm ready for the bumper stickers folks.  Watch out.  I have a tendency to fall madly in love with the crap in the catalogs you start getting when you buy pens with your logo on them.  Merchandising is a little addiction for me ;)

Let me break it down.

g!d

That's already complicated.  In traditional Judaism, it's forbidden to write the name of God unless it's for a prayer book or in an actual Torah scroll.  It's also a Biblical commandment not to use the name of God in vain.  The way this manifests in American Judaism has been that we don't even write God.  Some Jews write G-d, distancing themselves from the possibility of using God's "real" name in vain.  Even the word used in Hebrew prayer and Torah reading is Adonai, which means Lord. Sounding out the Hebrew letters that are the "real name" of God would sound something like Yahveh or Yahovah--Jehovah? Sound familiar? 

Another dear rabbinical school friend (still in my life--I haven't lost all of my rabbi friends), Shulamit Izen, used to tell me that instead of the dash, she used an exclamation point--because her God image definitely had that kind of energy.  I have an ex-girlfriend who used to really overuse exclamation points.  Every text looked like this!  She seemed to not even know what a period was! And when she wanted to be exclamatory she used tons of them!!!!!

notGod

It is a popular liberal rabbi trick, when someone says "I don't believe in God," to respond--tell me about the God you don't believe in because I probably don't believe in that kind of a God either.  In my life, I've circled back to the solid agnosticism of my youth.  I waver between believing that there is definitely no kind of universal connectedness deity concept and we are guided by our internal moral compass and conscience to the kind of theology that calls the striving to be our higher purpose selves G!d.

It isn't the capital G God of the Old Testament who rains fire and brimstone on the gay sinners and the intermarried who are ruining the Jewish future.  It isn't an interpersonal relationship God who you can talk to, and who watches out for you when your life sucks and loves you through good times and bad.  It isn't the God that was destroyed by the Holocaust, the God who died in the gas chambers, the God who used to be all-knowing, all-powerful and all-good.  Because as theologian (I forget his name but I swear I read that book) said, after the Holocaust, we can no longer believe in a God who has all three of those attributes because that kind of a God would not have been able to allow the Holocaust to happen.

It's also not God at all for me most of the time.  I've become one of those people who can't say Hebrew prayers anymore because I ACTUALLY understand what I'm saying and I can't just say: Blessed are you God, King of the Universe who created the fruit of the vine--because I believe in the evolution of life on this planet, I don't think there is a "you" to talk and even if I did, I would not get sucked into the patriarchal bullshit of King of the Universe.  I may be an ego maniac, but unless we are talking about Martin Luther King, Jr. I can't imagine aspiring to put a king at the top of my totem pole.

I've spent the last two years working as a secular humanistic rabbi.  I basically wasn't allowed to publicly say the word God or use traditional prayers, lest I delegitimate the position of my congregation as a secular and Humanist institution.  So now, after years of saying alternative liturgies and really getting to publicly be the person I've always been, an agnostic leaning toward atheist rabbi, I can't really imagine going back.

#g!dnotGod

But I don't have it all figured out.  I still want to pass the traditions of Judaism to my kids.  My husband and I had a pretty intense conversation about that just the other night.  On the one hand, we both kvell when our kids belt out the Hanukkah or Shabbat blessings together.  We also really don't want to give them a packaged up version of God that we don't believe it.  At the same time, we do the tooth fairy.  Unabashedly. We make up crazy stories about how the tooth fairy must have been so busy last night and her fairy helpers must have been sick and that's why your tooth was still there and not money but we'll send her a text and remind her just in case she is feeling a little overwhelmed right now.  Why am I ok with the tooth fairy but I cringed when Eliyashu took a picture of Jacob and Sima and asked Jacob to text it to his dad in Heaven?

Maybe it's because we live in a society that isn't letting go of the tooth fairy when they grow up.  I don't have to worry that one day Eliyashu and Ezra and Sima will still believe in the tooth fairy bringing money to children.  They will have to know that it was all a story.  Otherwise their kids will be super bummed out if they keep waiting for the tooth fairy to bring the money.

I believe in #g!dnotGod. I believe in a not capital G, exclamation point, inspirational tradition that reminds us to get out of our self-absorbed world and do something for someone else--because God is not going to reach down from Heaven and help the widow, the orphan and the stranger--that's why the Bible says YOU have to do it.  There's an Ani DiFranco lyric that I've always loved: "God's work, isn't done by God, it's done by people." It's notGod, but it's also g!d.  Maybe I need to go back to a world where God's name can't be pronounced.  I need to go back to a world where no one would wage war in the name of God because they wouldn't be able to say the name in the first place.  And hopefully they also would not be able to fathom that the God that inspires them would want so many hurtful, negative things to exist in "His" world. Maybe I need to go back to a world were I focus on the micro. Helping one person at a time. Using the energy and resources I have to work for the good. And when someone says, "God bless you sweetheart. Thank you so much!" when I give them $40 for blankets and food when they are living on the streets, I can just say, "You're welcome, but I'm inspired by #g!dnotGod and I'd love to share my thoughts about the world.  Perhaps we can go get a cup of coffee together."

Day 28: The humanity in all human beings

I have a friend named Antoinette. She was my inspiration for my purple, brown and silver box braids a few months ago. We were talking today and I told her about a girl from my doctor's office who had these amazing "coils" in her hair. Antoinette had no idea what I was talking about but said they sounded great and she'd love a pic if I went for it and got them.

I decided to try to figure out what the hair style is actually called. Thank you google and image searches. Apparently the look is called curly faux locs. They are so gorgeous...and controversial.

Shockingly, I chose something controversial!! A little more reading and I ended up finding out that some people, with real locs, hard earned through years of growth, care and sometimes as a spiritual practice, are mad at the faux locs people for getting in a few hours what they spent years developing. I have always loved the dreadlock look. I also always loved hair wraps. I wonder if it was some of the spiritual reasons, on an unconscious level.

One article cited a rejection of physicality and focus on beauty and grooming. The goal of leaving these vain pursuits behind was to bring the person closer to God.

Ok, before you get carried away, no--hair wraps don't make me feel closer to God. I don't even believe in God 97% of the time. (The other 3% I'm faking it til I make it and I rarely make it).

But there is a defiance and rejection of beauty standards in favor of my own definition of beautiful.

My mom raised me to care about social conventions of beauty. I was always a reluctant student. I never really got interested in make up, high heels, fancy clothes and I've always wondered when that day was when I was neither too fat or too thin and why the people who care about that shit never bothered to stop me on that day and say--this. This is it. This is the size and shape you should be.

I thought about an experiment today, as I noticed an African American man checking me out at Union Station. I thought about wearing a shirt that said, press the button on my sleeve if you think I'm beautiful. I wonder how many people would press the button. I wonder if I could tolerate people walking by and choosing not to press it.

It's a crazy paradox, you see, caring and not caring what people think. Putting yourself out there, being confident and vulnerable. Believing that you're totally fuckable, and more importantly, being totally lovable.

I'm on my way home from an inspiring day at the Humanist Clergy Collaboratory. At one workshop, we were looking at the definition of Humanism. It referred to seeing the humanity in all human beings. That's really what I strive for. It's at the core of almost everything I care about.

Today, I want to see myself as completely lovable. Exactly as I am.  With all of my faults and with all of my humanity.  I believe that part of what makes connecting with other human beings so amazing is that we recognize pieces of ourselves in each other (namaste) and because every person in this life teaches us something new. Each of us is beautiful and unique.  Even identical twins are different.

Today I had moments of feeling so beautiful and so unique and so human.  I also had moments of worry, filled with middle schooler insecurities that people didn't like me or that I was being "too..." you fill in the blank there.

But I'm going to end the night believing that everyone--given enough time and able to step out and really see me--everyone would push the button.

Beautiful me.

Day Twelve: I'm not 40 yet

 So far the best part of starting this blog is that a bunch of people I am friends with on Facebook and only acquaintances with in real life, have been wishing me a happy birthday.  No, I'm not 40 yet.  And it's a good thing I'm not, because I'd be feeling pretty crappy about my progress. But I promised myself this was a journey toward healthier and not a gimmick.

This week I:
-went on a 5 mile run
-drank 4 healthy smoothies
-hit my Apple watch move goal 5 out of 7 days
-completed my exercise goal 4 out of 7 days
-watched my weight go up 5 lbs and then down 3 lbs
-officiated at a beautiful wedding in Central Park for my cousin from Israel
-had lunch with an old friend
-worked on another wedding for the fall
And this morning I'm on a train headed to a b'nei mitzvah ceremony in DC that I would have been officiating if I hadn't had some health problems back in January.

This is what the journey toward healthier looks like.  Mundane and lacking the excitement that the beginning of the journey had.  It's the one step forward and two steps back, and then two steps forward again. It's knowing that I have a long road ahead and it's finding the willingness to keep walking on the path.

Half Full

Day Three: Sometimes I write and sometimes I don't and other tales of shameful inconsistency

This time it is 12:35 AM.  Terry woke me up cuddling against me while we were sleeping and I had fierce heartburn.  I made him grab me some Tums (they live on his bed stand) and I got up to go to the bathroom. I heard him start snoring again as I was sitting on the toilet and reading my favorite bathroom book, How to be Interesting by Jessica Hagy.  I bought it at Kinkos (or whatever that's called these days-FedEx Office maybe?).  I remember being there, waiting for some last minute stuff to print off for a program at Machar (my job at the time was at a secular humanistic synagogue in Washington DC--yes, I lived in Philadelphia and worked as a rabbi in DC for three years...that's a topic for another post).  I remember the sunrise was the most amazing reds and oranges.  The book has little pages of encouragement and advice for how to be interesting.  This is one of my favorite pages:

This is the page that our children completely reject from ages 7-15.  I have two children who do NOT believe that this is a REMOTELY good piece of advice right now.  They are pretty sure that magic only happens in your comfort zone, with your friends, and in the familiar vistas.  They are into wild ideas, though.  My daughter thinks we should join a club that would give us access to a private jet. Oh Elie, honey, I wish you could have been in our family during the private jet days...but sadly, they are over sweetheart.

The book is filled with all kinds of things that I believe in but tend to forget.  When I was in rabbinical school, I studied a spiritual practice called, Mussar.  Mussar is a word from Proverbs 1:2 meaning moral conduct, instruction or discipline (Wikipedia).  It is essentially Jewish ethics.  The Mussar movement was developed by Rabbi Israel Salanter in the 19th century.  Basically, he asked the question: Why are all these pious learned Yeshiva boys such jackasses?  How can people who sit around learning Torah all day still manage to be crappy people? So he had the boys begin learning a text on moral development, including one called Mesilat Yesharim (The Path of the Upright, 1740), written by Ramchal (Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzato). 

Momentary tangent--I love that famous rabbis became known by these acronyms of their names: Rambam, Ramban, Ramchal etc.  One of my friends from rabbi school said that if she made an acronym of her Hebrew name Rav Aliza Shira, her acronym would be Ra'ash--which means noise in Hebrew.  I cracked up. Maybe one day people will call me Ranabmo--Rabba (rabbi for women used in Hebrew) Nehama Benmosche, the Rabbi Rambo Combo. I feel a Purim costume idea and a design for new business cards percolating ;)

Back to Mussar.  I'll never forget the introduction to the text that I learned from my rabbi, Ira Stone, the founder of the Mussar Leadership Institute. https://mussarleadership.org/ (BTW, Mussar as a contemporary spiritual practice in the non-Orthodox world has gathered followings around two rabbis--Rabbi Ira Stone and Rabbi Alan Morinis.  There was even an article in Hadassah magazine about Mussar that caught my eye a month or so ago!)

http://www.hadassahmagazine.org/2017/01/12/mussar-jewish-spirituality-modern-world/

(I'm pretty sure that person with their back toward the camera is Molly, my teacher/friend/crush from high school, but I haven't written her to ask. Though dopplegangers from behind, even with purple kippot, are a definite possibility)

Ramchal basically says: There is nothing in this book that you don't already know.  This book is not meant to be read and put back on the shelf.  It is meant to be studied.  You must read it over and over again. Because despite everything we know, this book is about the things that you want to forget. Studying reminds you.

Mussar is about character education. It is about learning how to be a consistently decent human being. It is about fighting your selfish ego-maniac self (your yetzer ha-ra) and spending more time being your altruistic self (your yetzer ha-tov).  Those Hebrew words are technically translated as the inclination for evil and the inclination for good, respectively, but Stone teaches that they are better translated as the instinct for self-preservation and the instinct to help the next closest Other.  

Wait a minute. Where is this going? Weren't you going to be writing about shameful inconsistencies? Do you NOT realize that I am siting here filled with shame because I'm up writing a blog at 12:55 AM when I'm "supposed" to be sleeping? 

I have been listening to Brene Brown's book Daring Greatly on Audible.  I hate NPR and I hate books on tape, but ever since I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 2010 and went on a series of psych meds, I have lost my ability to read nonfiction books.  (INSERT SHAME IN BIG LETTERS HERE) 

I'm just getting into the book and haven't read the whole thing. I learned about Brene Brown from one of the first adult ed talks I attended when I was hired at Machar.  My congregant Danielle told me I HAD to watch the video that I missed and she was right.  I watched it.  I made Terry watch it.  (You can watch it too if you click below)

https://youtu.be/psN1DORYYV0

So that's the thing that I'm struggling with today.  My bipolar disorder (that word sure helps the Gremlins, as Brown calls the demons that tell us awful things about ourselves) makes me feel shame about my inconsistencies. Instead of feeling guilty about missing meetings, or not being able to wake up with the kids, or about giving twenty dollars bills out to homeless people because I wanted to see them smile--I feel shame.  As Brown explains, guilt is feeling badly that you did something wrong. Shame is feeling that YOU ARE something wrong.

I started seeing a new shrink a few months ago. She has been pretty amazing so far. Yesterday I was crying in her office about how I can't live like this anymore. About how I was hoping that she would be able to help me find some stability. About how I just wished I could be a normal person who got up when the alarm went off. Who felt tired if they didn't get all 8 hours of sleep, but who could drink a cup of coffee and go to work. I want to be consistent and predictable and reliable. It's not fair.

"Why?" she said. "I would rather be able to start a new blog, be a rabbi, write music and be you than be a Mainline soccer mom who always wakes up and gets the damn kids to school. You're a creative. You produce something amazing and then you crash. And then you build it back up and do it again. Most people who can wake up at 6 am and go to bed at 10 pm--that's all they can do. Why would you trade that in? Don't wish for normal. Accept your schedule and let's try to make it a little better, but don't wish you could soccer mom. Really.!."  The attitude of her really could only be conveyed by a little more description. Taliba is a strong, brilliant, African American woman who got her assistant to pull up the Cash me ousside, How bah dah video when she made a reference to it and I didn't know what she was talking about (I'm not putting that link in here. You can google that one yourself). She is the first psychiatrist I have ever called when I am in a crisis who actually stayed on the phone and picked up again at 3 am and helped me work out everything that I was going through. Not the first therapist to do that for me (I love you Karen) but she's the first shrink I haven't hated in the 7 years since my original diagnosis. If any of my former shrinks are reading this, I am sorry but IIWII--It is what it is. At least I didn't put your names in here. She's the first shrink who invited me to show up with my kids to session and who met two of them so far and actually talked to them about me and with me. And now when I complain about how I'm a shitty mom she can say, "What the fuck? Did you not listen to Eliyashu? The worst thing he could think of about you was that you signed him up for snowboarding lessons when he wanted ski lessons--and you even ended up changing it and getting him ski lessons!! Your kids love you and they don't feel bad about who you are as a mom--why are you doing this to yourself?"

Because I am not a fucking soccer mom.  I never will be.  I have the minivan and the fancy house and the parties and the play dates and I can still bury myself in a hole of shame about how much I suck at being the consistent parent who shows up and keeps her promises. I feel ashamed that I wasn't sick when I adopted Eliyashu and sometimes I think if I knew then what I know now, maybe I wouldn't have done it...and that makes me even sadder than not being a soccer mom. I can't bear thinking I could have lost the chance to do the only thing in life I REALLY wanted to do.

When I was 18, I was on a business trip of my dad's. I look back on this trip as one of the more fucked up trips of my life because both of my parents' future lovers were on that trip. In less than a year their marriage would completely implode. I was sitting with some people--possibly my dad's girlfriend Lisa was there because she knows this story like she was there--and I said that I felt this deep and intense compulsion to get pregnant. I told them that I felt certain that if I didn't get pregnant right away, that would never be able to. Lisa retells that story sometimes and says that she remembers talking to my dad and saying--Holy shit. We have a problem, Bob.  

But I was right. A year later I was diagnosed with PCOS (polycystic ovary syndrome) and ten years later when I talked to a doctor about getting pregnant he told me that I should brace myself for the fact that I was likely to have a very difficult road trying to get pregnant because of my PCOS. It's even harder to get pregnant when you don't usually sleep with men. I asked few of my guy friends to have unprotected sex with me for a year or so.  A few said no. Some said yes.  And even though I had my first pregnancy scare when I was 15 (that was a fun week in the Benmosche household, right Joel?), I never got pregnant and stopped trying and started learning about adoption--since my dream as a baby dyke was to make an adoption plan, just like my father did and my mother's father and mother did, and the biblical Moses' biological mother did...and last year I sealed that fate with an emergency hysterectomy. The Gremlins just told me that the world is a better place because I never procreated.

It's 1:33 AM.  My tears have dried. I have poured my heart into a blog post so I can publish it on the Internet and have my friends and acquaintances validate me by viewing the page and reading my story and texting and commenting on my Facebook feed. When I woke Terry up a few nights ago, after my first post, and read him what I had written he said, "Oh baby.  You miss talking to your dad so much and he knew you and understood you so well that you need the whole world to listen to your story to try to make up for the fact that you can't call him anymore." I started crying and said, "Yeah. I do. Because he really listened. Even when he said--calm down, what are you getting so upset about?" I will always have a hole in my heart where his love for me used to live. Whoops, guess the tears aren't all dry just yet.

And you called it Carly Simon. I will follow the likes on Facebook and look at the views on the blogger analytics.  Because I'm vain. 

But honestly, the catharsis is in the writing. And the vulnerability is in the publishing. And the hope is for more connection, the salve for my aching heart.

Day One: Wonder of Wonders, Miracle of Miracles

Day One

So here's some open access to the last half hour in my brain:

It's 2:30 am.  You should go back to sleep.

But I'm not tired.  And half the fucking time I can barely get out of bed all day so why waste a good mood?

My mouth feels gross. I need to brush my teeth.  Once I brush my teeth I can't go back to bed.

You should just get up and start your blog or your vlog or your whatever your good idea was yesterday.

I should weigh myself.  I was away all weekend.  Anything could have happened.

Fuck.  I don't even have my glasses on by I can tell that middle number is a 7 not a 6 like it was the last time I was on.  Guess those 8 lbs. I was so glad I finally lost again is back to 2 lbs. since the highest recorded in 2017.

Now you definitely have to go start the thing.  Just start something.

So 20 minutes later I have a new blog (this is probably only the fourth I've started in my lifetime).  I have a new domain name that I am paying an annual fee for (probably the 5th or 6th domain I own--none of which I have ever managed to turn into full websites) and if you are reading this, that means I actually finished writing, managed to publish it and managed to share it on some social media or text or some way that it got out into the world.

And that will be, as Motl the Tailor said, Wonder of Wonders, Miracle of Miracles.

So, since I am about to lose my attention span (which probably means I'm losing yours too) I am going to give you an idea of what this is about.  If we have met--ever--you would know that I am big, loud, funny, loving, and definitely maybe everyone's definition of crazy.  If you like me, you think that those are some of my best qualities.  If you don't like me, you have wanted me to change just about everything on that list.  For those of you who don't like me and are actually stupid enough to be spending time reading my blog, it's true.  Stop saying, "No Nehama.  I never wanted to change you." When you shame me for singing too loudly at a synagogue you've never even been to before, or watch me eat with a look of horror, dread or pity, OR try to get me to be MORE of LESS of myself, that's what you are doing.  If you don't understand that sentence then fuck you. Just stop reading. You won't understand most of this.

Now that my hurt inner child has scared off the potential boogie wo/men reading this, I can tell you what I hope this is about for me. Yesterday was the 2 year anniversary of my dad's death.  If you never met or heard about him, google Bob Benmosche.  Yeah.  That was an intense person to have as a dad--and the greatest gift this fucked up version of trips around the sun has ever given me.  Being Bob's daughter made me who I am today--the best and worst parts of my personality.  I am Big Daddy generous with the people I love and I can lose my temper with a call-center employee like every proper Benmosche should.  Needless to say, losing him has consumed my psyche.  Sometimes it's just sadness. Sometimes it's staring at the size 12 wide New Balance sneakers of his that I saved and wondering how I could ever fill those shoes.  If we are the second generation after our immigrant grandparents who are mostly destined NOT to do "better" than our parents, I'm pretty sure my dad guaranteed that for my brother and me.  I like to think I tricked myself out of that box by stepping sideways a long time ago.  I talk about how my dad's legacy of wealth has been an opportunity for me to pursue a career based on helping people.  I say that my work as a rabbi gets to be fulfilling of my soul because I don't have to worry about bringing home a paycheck to feed my family.  But I still think I should be the rabbi that saves Judaism, just like my dad was the AIG CEO who saved America.  

Ahh...sweet delusions of grandeur (wow, I needed spell check to help me with that one).

So here I sit.  February 28th. Memories of my dad swirling around me.  Little pieces of the Hamilton soundtrack swirling in my head.  Delusions of grandeur, stories of legacies, and the reality that the best piece of wisdom for these kinds of moments was from The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (oh, and I'm sure the line is somewhere in every Eastern tradition, too).

Everything will be ok in the end.  So if it is not OK, then it is not the end!

Instead of committing myself to be something I'm not, I'm embarking on 7 months toward my 40th birthday and trying to make it more meaningful by writing about it.  I am trying to build a network of support people by sharing the writing.  I am trying to be healthier without needing to obsess about the number on the scale, or my move goal streak, or whether or not I ever win the Fitbit challenge again. The passage of time is inevitable.  I can either go with it or against it.  I can either journey toward healthier, or kill myself slowly with the diseases I have and the ones I only have hints of getting one day.

My dad used to do this whole bit about trying to pick up a spoon.  My best friend from college remembers us all being out to dinner one night (my dad and his Big Daddy tendencies would blow into town and take all of my friends to a fancy Italian restaurant which was a welcome relief from Dominos pizza and diet cokes) and somebody make the MISTAKE of saying they were going to try to do something.  Let's blame Nicky for that (because I don't remember who did it, but she's a likely candidate).  So my dad moves his spoon in front of Nicky and says, "Try to pick up the spoon."  So she takes the spoon and he says, "No, Nicky, that's picking up the spoon. TRY to pick up the spoon." So she tries again and he says, "No.  That time you didn't pick it up.  Try again."  My brother, at some point, chimes in with his best Yoda imitation and says, "Do or do not do. There is no try."

The week after my dad died, I got a fortune cookie that said--You are not a failure because you don't make it, you are a success because you tried.

I burst into tears.  It was what I always argued back to him when he did the spoon thing.  Trying is the act of staring into the unknown and attempting something even though you might fail.  For able-bodied people, trying to pick up a spoon would always be a success.  Of course Nicky couldn't try to pick up the spoon.  But I can try to be healthier.  In a way, I am already succeeding--just because you're reading this.  And because writing it makes me feel better.  I called this a journey toward healthier because journeys (in all their beautiful cliché-ness) have high points and low points.  They have successes and they have failures.  It is a miracle to try.  It is a miracle to lose all hope for a better past.  It is a miracle to sit in my library at 3:45 am, at 273 lbs, staring all of my obstacles in the face and say:

Today, I'm gonna try again.