September 18, 2026 | 7 Tishri 5787
My favorite Kol Nidre is in the 300-year-old Portuguese shul Beth Jehoeda, with a mostly Ashkenazi congregation, in my hometown of The Hague. With its inner courtyard, hidden between buildings, corridors and walls, it is sandwiched between the Turkish Embassy on one side and the more-than 300-year-old building of the first Order of Freemasons in […]
This year, I choose… To make a stronger effort to stay connected to Milwaukee’s Jewish community. As someone who grew up almost exclusively within the Jewish community, I haven’t been as intentional in adulthood about engaging with the Milwaukee Jewish community on a regular basis. I am involved as the treasurer on the board of […]
This year, I choose to remember the why. Life can be challenging. There are days when the things in front of me feel overwhelming, and even the next step can seem insurmountable. In those moments, I’ve learned that I need to stop and remember why I’m taking that step in the first place. For me, […]
My wife and I are fortunate to be healthy early retirees. And as the calendar flips to 5787, we’re also becoming empty nesters with a commitment to break the inertia of middle age. I haven’t truly wandered since I studied abroad in college. Remember the Eurail Pass, the precious ticket that provided unlimited train travel […]
I’m a cautious person and have sometimes tended to meet new ideas with a quick ‘No!’ As with most choices in our lives, what I choose this year is strongly influenced by previous decisions and events in my life. Last year I left Vermont, my home for most of my life, to take a job […]
My father was a Holocaust survivor and a rabbi, who taught me to count my blessings, which I do every day. This coming year, I choose to continue to count my blessings and work towards a just world. The Jewish value of tikkun olam is central to who I am as a Jew. We are […]
This year, I choose “joy.” That’s the first word that came to mind when I paused to consider this prompt. I could have chosen “grief.” Every day, my heart aches for my mom as she faces the increasing challenges of Parkinson’s disease. I miss my dad, who died from lung cancer 13 years ago, and I continue to grieve […]
Since I turned 80, I have become more reflective. As this year’s holiday season approaches, I think back to my pre-bar mitzvah days as a member of the Junior Congregation at the Jackson Heights Jewish Center in Queens, New York. Each of us had defined roles in the High Holiday services. Mine was to act as the chazan, the cantor. Since I […]
This past year started out with the kind of news and phone calls we all hope will never come. When you hear that your husband has been diagnosed with stage 4 cancer, you never really know how you’re going to react. For me, because I’ve lived through it once before when my late husband was diagnosed with stage 4 […]
This year, I choose… menuchas hanefesh. This concept is a bit hard to translate. Literally, it means the resting or settling of the soul. It can be explained as tranquility of the soul, or a deep, centered calm within the self. The “Chovos HaLevavos,“and other sources I have been learning from, describe menuchas hanefesh not as a luxury, but as foundational to avodas Hashem (service of G-d). When I do a mitzvah, learn Torah, and interact with others from a […]
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