Lifestyles

San Francisco Bay by Sea and Air

After I had completed active duty, the law required that for the next four years I attend monthly weekend duty and two weeks annual active duty at a base in my home environs. I lived in New York City and worked for American Airlines, so I had free air transportation and I was able to get assigned to the Captain of the Port office on Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco Bay. This was an important and busy command center that controlled all the ship and shore activity in and around the Bay, assuring that everything flowed smoothly and legally. [Ira Spector]

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Lifestyles, USA

Covid19, Jewish divisions: somber prospects for 5781

We are about to celebrate the Jewish New Year, a Rosh Hashanah like no other. Synagogues across America and the world are adjusting their services to the Covid-19 restrictions limiting physical gatherings. Besides the loss of lives, individual members and entire congregations have been deeply affected by the pandemic’s economic blows, wreaking havoc in rippling waves, which have fueled anti-Semites to blame Jews for the creation and spread of the virus. A somber future looks like the most realistic scenario, but this can definitely be changed if only we will see our fate as a single, seamlessly-shared project. [Michael Laitman, Ph.D]

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Jewish Religion, Lifestyles

Clearly no love in this tennis match

We were greeted at the door by our neatly attired host whose every stitch of tennis clothing he wore from his cap down to his sneakers and socks had a company logo emblazoned on them. He was a man about my age and height but considerably slender with no unusual features to distinguish him. We sat down for a respectful minute or two by the poolside patio, met his blonde attractive wife, and in very short order I detected the ”Holier than thou” waves emitting from the aura surrounding him. [Ira Spector]

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Lifestyles, Sports & Competitions

Gaining self-confidence in a synagogue’s embrace

We need to work together to make a better world, advancing the Jewish value of Tikkun Olam. It is through us and our allies advocating for marginalized communities that we can begin to reshape how people think about us. Disability has long been stigmatized and the fight to remove those stigmas has been an arduous journey. If we remember that all people no matter their disability, race, religion, or sexual orientation are capable of achieving anything, and that we are all made in the image of God, it should strengthen and motivate us to be better and to do better. [Joshua Steinberg, RespectAbility]

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Jewish Religion, Lifestyles, USA

Rainbow – What Will We Take out of Our Arks?

I also took into the sealed room a siddur that had been my mother’s, and one of my father’s, 1941 U.S. Army issue, so I could tell them I prayed from their prayer books. I ended the column, “We took into our sealed rooms fears, and uncertainty, and prayers. We must now ask ourselves what we brought out.” [Toby Klein Greenwald]

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Jewish Religion, Lifestyles, Middle East, Music, Dance, and Visual Arts, Theatre, Film & Broadcast, Toby Klein Greenwald, USA

A Word of Torah: Rosh Hashanah 5781

This week we are not only celebrating Shabbos, but we are also ushering in a New Year, 5781. Many of us are uttering a sigh of relief as we close the door on 5780. In Hebrew we write out 5780 as Tav Shin Pay, which some have read as Tihay Shnas Pandemic (It will be the year of pandemic). According to that reading we are entering Tav Shin Pay Alef – Tihay Shnas AIN Pandemic – It will be the year WITHOUT pandemic. [Rabbi Yeruchem Eilfort]

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Jewish Religion, Lifestyles, Yeruchem Eilfort-Rabbi

Prospective and veteran clergy members contrast in style

Mark Dolson (Timothy Benson) is a seminarian ready to change the world, or at least the Catholic Church. He’d like to see women admitted to the priesthood. And he believes the church’s attitude opposed to homosexuality is outdated and archaic. Most of all, he believes that it is the job of the clergy to shake their parishioners from their materialism and complacency in order for them to truly follow the teachings of Jesus. [Play review by Donald H. Harrison]

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Bernhard H. Rosenberg-Rabbi, Donald H. Harrison, Lifestyles, Theatre, Film & Broadcast

Being Grateful for Gratitude

Those who awaken daily to a mind filled with gratitude find grace and graciousness throughout life. The word gratitude is anchored in the Latin word gratia, meaning these gifts for, and of a positive life. And the good news is you can train yourself to open your eyes, your heart, at the start of every day, to grateful thoughts – especially valuable during these emotionally trying times of COVID19 when building wellbeing is particularly essential to living healthily. [Michael R. Mantell, Ph.D]

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Lifestyles, Michael Mantell

With theaters dark, all the world must now be a stage

Growing up, Judaism always took center stage, but when I moved to Pittsburgh to study directing at the School of Drama at Carnegie Mellon University, suddenly theater was in the spotlight. For the first couple of years, it felt like I had to give up practicing Judaism in order to pursue theater full time. Choosing rehearsals over Shabbat or having to miss High Holiday services for class felt like I had opted to practice the religion of theater over Judaism. [Adira Rosen]

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Eileen Wingard, Jewish Religion, Lifestyles, Science, Medicine, & Education, Theatre, Film & Broadcast, USA

Some 70 years of love for tennis

The first time I ever saw or stepped on a tennis court was in 1949 when I was sixteen and got a job at Camp Watitoh near Tanglewood in the Berkshires as a maintenance worker. One of my first jobs was to brush and roll the tomato-colored clay tennis courts smooth early every morning. That was boring but tolerable in the cool early morning air. So now I was the tennis court maven, and was assigned to build two new courts in the lower unshaded unused part of the camp property. [Ira Spector]

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International, Lifestyles, San Diego County, Sports & Competitions, Travel and Food, USA

Just another day of flight training

From March through December 1956 I went through the Naval Flight School, Pensacola, Florida, as a student pilot. We were transferred to different airfields in the area for each phase of training. At any one time, day and night, there were a couple hundred SNJ, T-34 and T-28 training planes in the skies overhead, practicing different types of maneuvers. Saufley Field is where we were taught formation flying. This story is about an incident that happened when I was stationed there. [Ira Spector]

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Lifestyles

Avoiding the Clonal Effect

What is the clonal effect? It is the tendency of individuals, groups, and organizations to replicate themselves or others that are familiar to them wherever they have an opportunity to do so. The dictionary defines a clone as “a person or thing that duplicates, imitates, or closely resembles another in appearance.” [Natasha Josefowitz, ACSW; Ph.D]

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Lifestyles, Natasha Josefowitz