the countdown to vegas/nkotb weekend has begun (and by countdown i mean realizing that although i had signed up for the frequent flyer program on virigin america a couple of weeks ago, i hadn’t actually purchased my ticket! oops. anyway, ticket now purchased and ready to roll). i still have to pack (which creates all its own kind of stress) but rather than get ahead of myself i spent most of the afternoon taking care of RUACH preparations. all in all, a productive day of atonement (now if ABN would only get home those damn burritos).

have you ever been somewhere, totally part of the moment you are in, for example, temple on kol nidre, and you hear something that you completely don’t expect and it takes you to a very different time and place?

bear with me…i’m not sure if this is going to translate…

in the middle of services MARSHA begins singing, “because of my brothers and friends, because of my sisters and friends” and instantaneously it is june 1993 and i’m sitting at a sticky round table in the chadar ohel. we’re learning two new songs for the summer, on this, our first day. my friends and i can’t believe how much has changed since the summer before (after all, it wouldn’t be the first day if we didn’t have this reaction). and there are these random counselors from canada who can’t pronounce the word house…as the song continues, “this is house, the house of the one, i wish the best for you”