It started early this year. Not just in the way it bumped up against Labor day, or spun into Shabbat, making for 3 major dinners in a single week at the Kibbutz. Not just that the days are still long enough to take post-shul naps and wake up long before the sun goes down. This year, it started with the Machzor.
A Machzor is the specific prayerbook used for High Holy Days - Rosh Hashanna and Yom Kippur. That's it. A whole book for two holidays. Because they're used so seldomly, they sit on the high shelves, keeping watch as we keep the rest of the lower shelf books from gathering dust. They're hardly ever updated or rewritten - who wants to spend so much on a book we use twice a year?
Luckily, someone in the Conservative movement decided it was time - about twelve years ago. And true to form, they've been working on producing this book ever since, complete with halting starts and funding crises. I first caught wind of the project a few years ago, back in Massachusetts, when a congregation I was davening (praying) with was chosen to test-drive a chunk of the new Machzor.
I loved it so much I sneaked it home in my tallis bag, and kept using it every year. The translations are beautiful. The commentary is diverse, relevant, and well-written. Someone finally decided to stop referring to G!d as "Father" and "King" and "He" - instead we have "G!d" and "Sovereign" "G!d of our Ancestors" - and to stop translating the word Adonai (my lord - nothing wrong with the translation, except that it's awkward and more Christian than anything. Besides, anyone who davens knows what Adonai means.)
This year, as soon as I found out it was finally published, and available, I ordered a copy. I even wrote poems about how excited I was about this book.
Then I got a call from the booksellers.
"We're so sorry," he said, "but there are just too many orders. Yours won't arrive until after Rosh Hashanna."
I was sad, but not distraught. But lo and behold, what should arrive in my mailbox the following day, but a carefully wrapped copy of the new Machzor!
At first, I thought it was the man who called me, taking pity on the young woman with the slight quaver in her voice. But then I noticed: this book was from a different bookseller. When I checked the invoice, I saw that my dear friend Esther had ordered a copy for me weeks ago, and it had arrived just in time for me to use on Rosh Hashanna.
There were other wonderful things about RH this year - I did blow shofar in a synagogue, by the way - but this is what I will remember. The gift of a book. A door into the new year.
Ode to Lev Shalem
You are a door.
Your name means
"full heart," and you
are actually not a door; you are a book,
which also makes you a door,
if you are good at what you do.
I regret being unable
to buy you in a shop,
to choose you from a shelf,
cradle your spine and covers
as I smile at strangers on the street.
The last Jewish bookstore
has disappeared from my neighborhood.
I have bought you sight unseen,
and I am still convinced
that it is one of the most important
purchases I will ever make.
How often does one find
a guide to an overspilling heart?
Who expects to find delight
between the pages of a prayerbook?
I remember the privilege
of proofreading your first pages,
in shul, in prayer, beating my heart,
which had suddenly gone still.
It was like meeting my bashert
in a cafe, and then losing them
to a journey of unspecified length.
When I heard of your arrival,
I felt the same heartquickening
of a lover, returned and ready
to take my hand.
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