Last week, when I called my Nana for our weekly chat, she asked if I had plans for Rosh Hashanah this year.
I responded, “No, not yet, but I will definitely watch services online.”
Although I do not consider myself super religious, I really do love services, especially on the High Holy Days. On these occasions, the synagogue is filled to the back—every seat taken. Each individual holds the same prayer book, inscribed with the same words, repeated by Jews around the world on this day. When services begin, the room is filled with hundreds of voices singing together. I always sit shoulder-to-shoulder between my two brothers as we repeat the Hebrew we have memorized from over the years. When instructed, we all stand. When given the cue, we all sit. At temple, I am not texting or doing work—I am present, along with everyone else.
However, the answer I gave on the phone, while well-intentioned, was mostly to appease my religiously conservative grandmother.
Nana joked, “You know how each year we proclaim, ‘Next year in Jerusalem?’ This year, I will be saying, ‘Next year in person.’”
This pandemic knows no bounds—including the Jewish holidays. A time which usually marks the beginning of ten days of reflection and repentance is overshadowed by a stubborn virus. On a day I usually congregate with my community and ask for forgiveness, my only option will be to stare at a computer screen.
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Like clockwork, I wake up at nine twenty-seven, three minutes before my alarm. At some point during the night, my eye mask fell off my face, now lost in the tangle of sheets. The black-out shades, which are designed to keep my room dark, fail to hide the bright Fall day which now illuminates my small room. Yet, I ignore this natural alarm, pull the covers higher over my face, and roll back onto my right side.
At nine thirty, I mournfully pull myself out of bed, put on the same clothes as the day before, and transition to the bathroom. Looking into the mirror, I wonder if my eye bags are really that severe or just darkened by the mascara I failed to remove from the night before. Gently, I use my middle finger to remove the sleep from the corners of my heavy, swollen eyes.
When I make my way downstairs, I turn the lights on in the kitchen—a sign that I am the first awake. As I do each morning, I prepare my mug of Keurig coffee and fill my bowl with overnight oats. I presumptively add a splash of almond milk to the coffee, which tasted burnt yesterday and will probably taste burnt again today.
Back in my room, I log into my ten am Zoom class.
It ends; I watch a different recorded lecture; I do work. Time continues to pass as I sit in the same room, at the same desk, each day. Luckily, my setup is nice this year. The desk is situated in a corner—sandwiched between the closet and back wall, like a makeshift cubicle.
As I swivel back and forth in my chair, contemplating whether to start my next physiology reading, I realize it is 6:00pm. Not only have I missed the services I intended to live-stream, I need to finish preparing for the Shabbat dinner my house is hosting to commence the start of Rosh Hashanah.
Back downstairs, the lights in the kitchen are now on, and I am instantly embraced by the warmth of the oven which has spread throughout the room. The ten chicken breasts we prepped the night before are baking, giving off a thick, familiar aroma. Standing at the stove, Bailey is at work. I watch as she expertly scoops the matzah meal mix from a large bowl with a spoon. She rounds each portion of mush into a plump ball before gently placing them into a pot of boiling water.
Knowing I need to help in some way, but unsure with what, I sit down at our rectangular green glass table. Bits of crumbs and dirty silverware contaminate the tabletop, but I know we will clean everything later.
“Is there anything I can do right now?” I ask Bailey, our head chef, as she continues with the soup.
She responds, “No, the matzah balls just need to cook for thirty minutes.”
Bailey sits down beside me as I scroll through my Instagram.
No picture is really different. Every once in a while, I stumble upon a post that has meaning or makes me think, but for the most part, my feed is filled with smiling, seemingly carefree faces.
A notification pops up at the top of my screen, disrupting my mindless scrolling. In all capital letters, the text reads, “HOLY FUCK. RBG DIED. WHAT THE FUCK.”
My eyes widen. My bottom lip drops. I am immediately overwhelmed with a heavy sense of helplessness and grief.
“Where did she see this?” is all I can frantically mumble.
I quickly go to google to confirm the news. Our lacking Wi-Fi cannot load fast enough. I feel my heart rate intensify with each passing second. Then, I see the headline, written in thick black font, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg dead at 87.
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The day before Rosh Hashanah my sophomore year of high school, I drove my younger brother, Justin, home from school. Like any Fall day in St. Louis, we had the windows down, listening to the pop radio station, thinking about the food we would be consuming for dinner before services that night. As we pulled into the garage, my dad opened the back door for us. He was never home from work this early, but I reasoned his presence must have to do with the impending holiday.
Staring at the ground, he gently asked us to sit down at our kitchen table. I had never seen him like this. Justin and I sat in adjacent chairs, looking up at him confused. He stared back, struggling with what words to say. Tears glossed over his eyes as he told us our cousin Michael never returned home the night before. He went out to get ice-cream and never came back.
My shaking hands covered my numb face. I was helplessly at a loss of for any words. I had so many questions but wanted no answers.
We later learned his timing with Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year, was intentional. Michael did not want to live another year. He wanted our family to start the next year of the Jewish calendar without him in it.
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As my roommates and I carried over the food we had prepared to the other unit of our house, I took baby steps to prevent spilling the soup. The yellow broth was filled to the brim of my pot, and the liquid threateningly swirled with each step. I stared down at the ground, concentrating solely on the task at hand.
My short bicep workout was complete when I finally made it up the steps and joined the rest of my friends. I noticed the three tables we share were pushed together, creating a large, makeshift square. They had lined the perimeter with mismatched chairs—three or four on each side. My challahs, which had been warming in their oven, were placed in the center, and I had already been poured a large glass of red wine.
When the chaos of food organization finally subsided, and we had each taken a seat, Hannah proclaimed, “Let’s make a toast. To RBG, to the new year; La Shana Tova.”
“To RBG” we all solemnly repeated, and then the feast proceeded.
The array was almost overwhelming—with vegetables, apple sauce, chicken, and potatoes. I took a whopping scoop of mashed potatoes onto my plate and seasoned them with more salt.
“We are so fucked,” Aliya said before taking a long sip of white wine. She reached out her phone to show me a post on Instagram.
Social media was rightfully blowing up from the news of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s passing. Tributes and quotes and praise had been converted into images that were reposted on Instagram stories, Facebook and Twitter.
The picture Aliya presented was a black and white photograph of RBG. She bared her iconic thick glasses and large earrings. Justice Ginsburg was not smiling in the photo, but her gaze pierced through the Aliya’s phone screen. The words laid on top of the image read, “If one dies on any Shabbat, they are considered a Tzadik … more so when it’s on the new year.”
A Tzadik is a title given to someone who is righteous—someone with no self-consciousness or ego. To be called a Tzadik is both an honor and a blessing.
“There’s no way that is true,” I instantly countered. “I have never heard that before.”
Aliya’s eyebrows scrunched. She tilted her head and retreated her phone, evidently confused by the interaction.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
But what I meant could not be explained. How could everyone who died on this day be categorized with the same title? Someone who died from cancer or from suicide? Someone who lived a long life and one whose life was cut way too short? Both who stayed alive as long as they could, not even for themselves. Where was the line drawn? Or is there no line?
Can I find comfort knowing a distinction does not need to be defined?
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The next morning, I brought my coffee out to the porch of my house. This Saturday was the type of morning when the sky is so blue that the trees appear more vibrant than usual. The cool breeze was just strong enough to make the individual green leaves jiggle.
I sat on my bright red folding chair and observed the quiet street. The sidewalks were empty, free from students traveling to class or meeting up with friends. Right then, I was alone, just me and the laptop sitting on my lap.
I checked my watch and took a sip of coffee, feeling the hot liquid travel down my throat. The time was nine fifty-nine, so I pulled up my temple’s website to begin live-streaming the ten a.m. Rosh Hashanah service.
I was promptly greeted with the kind and familiar face of Rabbi Andrea Goldstein—a woman who I have known my whole life.
“Shabbat Shalom and Shana Tova; good morning and happy New Year,” Rabbi Andrea said while addressing her virtual audience.
While I could not see their faces, I knew my family members must be in their own homes, watching these same words be spoken on their screens.
“I cannot start today without noting the legacy of Justice Ginsberg,” Rabbi Andrea goes on to say. “She understood the value of taking the long view of life—of knowing what seems dark and potentially hopeless today, can change tomorrow.”
When Michael died, I felt helpless. As I internalized the isolation, repetition and loss of these past few months, I experienced further powerlessness. However, Rabbi Andrea’s words reminded me that Justice Ginsberg always believed change is possible, even in times that feel the most dark and hopeless. Regaining control does not mean I need to have the answers, but it does mean I need to find comfort in something else. In that moment, I was a part of a community greater than myself—a community that shares rituals which never disappeared during the pandemic and values which my friends also appreciate.
I tilted the angle of my computer screen to hide the glare of the morning sun. As I continued to drink my now cooled coffee, I placed my phone face-down on the wooden porch. Although I was not shoulder-to-shoulder between my two brothers or synchronously standing on the Rabbi’s cue, I still was not texting or doing work—I was just present, along with everyone else.
Carlye Goldenberg | September 18-20, 2020 | Ann Arbor