winter soldier

These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will in this crisis shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it now deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.
-Thomas Paine, December, 1776, from Valley Forge, Pennsylvania

Yesterday afternoon, during my day off from work and yet another winter storm that wasn't, I took in a matinee at the E Street Cinema (I love that this indie theatre is so close, within walking distance!); I chose Winter Soldier. Milliarium Zero is releasing the 1972 documentary--examining official sanction of atrocities in the Vietnam War--to theatres for the first time, and it seems that the timing could not be more apropos. The footage was filmed on January 31 and February 1 and 2, 1971, shortly after the revelations of the My Lai Massacre. Organized by Vietnam Veterans Against the War and dubbed "The Winter Soldier Investigations," the public inquiry took place in Detroit and included more than 125 veterans.

The accounts of horrors perpetrated or witnessed by the soldiers were barely speakable, let alone repeatable, so I won't try to detail them here. The young men--bearded, mustachioed, and long-haired all--were plain spoken but amazingly eloquent in their denunciation of themselves and their units. It is important to note that every one of the acts described had, in some way or another, official sanction, and this is what disturbed these soldiers the most about their experience. "I didn't like being an animal," says one. The film has no voice-over commentary or other narrative glue holding the different testimonies together, a lack which lies at the heart of the film's power. The soldiers were simply impanelled in front of an audience of members of the media and other civilians and spoke about their experiences; all were still contending with their own humanity after ill-treating so many Vietnamese at the behest of their superiors.

Pre-deployment training at boot camp was in most cases not enough to prepare these young men for the challenges they faced upon arrival in Vietnam. One experience came the closest: called "the rabbit lesson," it was the last bit of information that soldiers ingested before being sent to Southest Asia. The unit leader would bring out a fluffy white rabbit and give his men just enough time to develop some affection for the animal before gutting and skinning it in front of them. The next morning, they would fly to Saigon.

The Washington Post's review

the film's official website

the rabbi of 84th street

One Friday night, a moth was flitting about the window of the Besser dining room during Shabbos dinner. The candles were glowing, warm smells of dinner wafted through the room, and the rabbi got up to open the window to let the confused insect outside.

"It looks like the butterfly would rather be out than in," he said.

A guest corrected him: "It isn't a butterfly, it's a moth."

"I know," the rabbi responded with that smile, "but it's Shabbos and I wanted the moth to feel a little better about itself. Everyone should feel better on Shabbos."

Warren Kozak, a self-described "Conservative Jew who forgot most of what he learned in Hebrew school," is an unusual choice for a biographer of a Hasidic rabbi. But as Kozak readily admits in The Rabbi of 84th Street, "It says more about Rabbi Besser than it does about me." Although in many ways a traditional Orthodox Jew, Rabbi Besser has always been, quite uniquely, very engaged in the secular world. He didn't even plan to be a rabbi originally; he wanted to be an orchestra conductor. His son Naftali explains the game he and his father used to play in the car. Listening to the classical radio station, and with Naftali timing him, Rabbi Besser had to name the composer and piece within six seconds. "He rarely lost," reports Kozak. "Often, he knew the conductor and the orchestra as well."

Haskel Besser was born in Katowice, Poland, on February 14, 1923, in the golden age of Hasidic Judaism. The young Besser gained his modern sensibility from his parents, who read newspapers and contemporary literature and followed world events closely (the latter habit would later save the family during the war), and in particular from his mother, who loved classical music, theatre, and opera and attended performances regularly. Throughout his life, Rabbi Besser has striven to straddle two worlds, one of intense study and pastoral care that his rabbinate required and the other of outreach that allowed him to be "part of larger, richer, and more complex world." It was the ease with which America afforded him this duel participation that led him to choose New York as his home in the early 1950's.

The slim volume is subtitled The Extraordinary Life of Haskel Besser, and a more apt name couldn't have been given. Rabbi Besser's life seemes to have been one fortuitous happenstance after another. I had to catch my breath at the end of the chapter detailing his escape from Poland at the last possible safe moment: he boarded a boat bound for Palestine on September 1, 1939. In Tel Aviv, where the Bessers settled during the war (in contrast to most religious Jews at the time, who generally made Jerusalem their home), they began to grapple with the enormity of what was happening in Eastern Europe. In particular, young Haskel "struggled with a different, more personal issue . . .: the greatest crime in the history of the Jews was committed by the people he most revered." As a child, he spent a great deal of time in Berlin, and Germany exerted a palpable influence on much of Poland, including Katowice (so much so that a local law required all children to have German names--Haskel's mother made the unfortunate choice of "Oswald" for him). Recalling the Deutschesland of his youth, Besser says, "I enjoyed meeting people, and the people I met in those years were good people. I think I'm still affected by these memories, because I cannot believe the way some people have painted all Germans as anti-Semites. Not the people I knew."

The story of Rabbi Besser's marriage to Liba Ludmir--a desicion he calls "the smartest thing I ever did in my life"--amidst his near death from encephalitis and meningitis and the Germans' push through Egypt toward Palestine in 1942 is a strange, complicated mix of religious mysticism and pure serendipity. The rabbi's role in almost single-handedly, it would seem, preciptating the fall of communism in the Soviet Union--a story that involves Nikita Khrushchev's downing twenty-seven shots of vodka in one sitting--pushes the limits of credulity in its hilarity. As one critic noted, "Many anecdotes are preceded with so much in the way of prefatory disclaimers that they may as well have begun, 'You may not believe this, but . . . '" It is fitting, then, that this novel concludes with tales of the quasi-mystical powers of various rebbes (Hasidic holy men), as told by Rabbi Besser to the author. In fact, these stories, as well as the biography itself, are part of a larger Hasidic tradition. Since the era of the Baal Shem Tov and the first Hasidic leaders, one of the primary attractions of Hasidism as a movement has been the Hasidic story: part declaration of faith, part celebration of the rebbe's unique spiritual powers, and part acknowledgement of the world's sheer oddity. While these stories often had a moral lesson to impart to their listeners, they were also simply great fun. So, too, is this wonderful narrative of this exceptional man.

from (the lexus world longitudes of) beirut to (the olive tree flat attitudes of) jerusalem

If you don't visit the bad neighborhoods, the bad neighborhoods are going to visit you.
-Thomas Friedman, The World is Flat

On Monday night I had the privilege of hearing New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman speak at the National Press Club as part of George Washington University's The Kalb Report. Friedman was shorter than I would have thought for such an intellectual giant; he was, however, just as articulate, erudite, and thoughtful as I would have expected. He was also, in my opinion, a very classy guy: when asked to comment on NYT's treatment of Judy Miller, he wisely said that he would share any concerns about his supervisors directly with them. And lest you cynics think that he was just trying to shy away from controversy, he later stated in a straightforward, matter-of-fact manner, "[Donald] Rumsfeld is a really bad guy."

Friedman began the evening talking about his education and his foray into journalism. The three-time Pulitzer prize winner has only ever taken one journalism class, in high school as a tenth grader. However, the course made "a huge impact,"”he explained, recalling also the teacher's name and classroom number. (This was extremely heartening to me as a former corruptor of young minds.) That year he also made his first trip out of Minnesota (save for the occasional venture into Wisconsin) when his parents took him to Israel, then basking in its post-1967 glory. He would return for the next three of his high school summers to live on kibbutzim. He later attended SOAS on a Marshall Scholarship and went on to earn a master's degree in Arabic and Middle Eastern history at Oxford. One evening, as he walked down a London street, the evening newspaper's headline caught his eye: "Carter to Jews: 'if elected, I will fire Vance.'" The headline mystified him, so he went home and wrote a response to the article. His then-girlfriend (and now wife) knew someone at the Des Moines Register, and the paper eventually published his reaction as an op-ed and paid him $50 for it. The process opened up a whole new world for him, he explained: he was simply amazed that he could read something, think about it, research it, write an opinion about it, and then get paid for it. For his first job as a journalist, he joined UPI's London bureau, on the night shift, but he soon became the organization's second reporter in Beirut, where he was based during the late 1970's. In 1981, he started work at the Times as its Beirut bureau chief, at a time when the paper had never sent a Jew to Israel, let alone Lebanon. In 1989, he served as the Times' chief diplomatic correspondent and traveled with Secretary of State James Baker through the one or two momentous occurrences that year, such as the fall of communism in Eastern Europe and Tiananmen Square in China. He wrote during Clinton's first year in office as a White House correspondent before beginning his role as Foreign Affairs columnist in 1995.

Describing his position at the Times as "a translator from English to English," Friedman then discussed his profession in general. He views his job as an explainer, and his column as a method of managing the complexity of the modern world. He strives for a clear, concise writing style, and, as moderator Marvin Kalb pointed out, doesn't shy away from the pronoun "I." For Friedman, its use is a way of maintaining a personal relationship with his readers, and he makes every effort to have the same with his subjects. To be a good journalist, he claims, "you have to like people, and you have to like listening to the crazy things people say." He took exception to the description of his writing as purely analytical, because he believes the best columnists are first great reporters. It is only after a few days--or even weeks--of reporting that one is able to discern a pattern to analyze.

Inevitably, Kalb asked Friedman about the war in Iraq. As mentioned, he had only scathing things to say about the Secretary of Defense. In particular, his criticism concentrated on the Bush administration's implementation of the war: it ignored the Powell doctrine of overwhelming force, Friedman leveled, and thus "prosecuted the war with just enough troops to lose." However, Friedman did not disagree with the decision to go to war in Iraq; he took exception only to the Bush administration claim that it would be easy. It was a hard call for him to support to the war, he explained, but he believes there was a reason for war and it was not WMD. In the past, Friedman believes, the U.S. has required only three conditions of its Arab allies: "keep the pump open, keep the price of oil low, and be nice to Israel." As a country we haven't been concerned about human rights violations, or how women are treated, what is taught in madrasas, etc.; Friedman called all of this--everything not included in the conditions--"what goes on out back." He explained the terrorist attacks of 9/11 as the "distilled essence" of the same. And--in an analytical blend of finance and foreign policy, a niche Friedman has carved out for himself--he predicted that the windfall oil profits distributed by autocratic regimes on the population explosions in the Middle East will only worsen the situation. The area needs alternatives for its people, and Friedman believes in "a moral and strategic imperative" upon the U.S. to find these alternatives. He cites as an example India, the world's second largest Muslim country, which maintains no members of Al Qaeda and claims no detainees in Guantanamo Bay. Making an inverse connection between how progressive a country is and the militancy of its population, Friedman made the argument that the context in which people live matters. And there lies the casus belli.

About Iraq itself, Friedman averred that it is the most dangerous place he has ever been as a journalist (including Beirut). He characterized it as a place with no moral boundaries and cited as an example the Sunni Muslim who, on the first day of Ramadan, blew himself up in a Shiite mosque. With the devastating existence of this kind of disregard for even holy places and holy days, the best we can hope for in Iraq is "a decent outcome." His benchmark for a success in Iraq? "When Salman Rushdie can lecture in Baghdad."

ignorance is bliss

Sports are too much with us. Late and soon, sitting and watching--mostly watching on television--we lay waste our powers of identification and enthusiasm and, in time, attention, as more and more closing rallies and crucial putts and late field goals and final playoffs and sudden deaths and world records and world championships unreel themselves ceaselessly before our half-lidded eyes.
-Roger Angell

Living in D.C. but cheering for Texas sports teams and the Red Sox (and thus spending entirely too much time and money at sports bars), I dream of a television world in which I can see any game I wish and, while watching my game, hear any commentary I wish. Too often, because of presumed lack of area interest, I end up struggling to discern--through scratchy computer speakers--Craig Way and Keith Moreland detail the Longhorn's exploits on the gridiron or Jim Deshaies and Larry Dierker describe the Astros' feats on the field.

This year I decided to buy MLB TV's monthly package, which for $14.95 allowed me to view via high-speed internet connection almost any major league game, with the notable exception of the Red Sox-Cubs first meeting at Wrigley Field since the Sox won the World Series in 1918! (Yes, I called to complain about the blackout; yes, it was fruitless; and yes, I am still bitter.) Using my work computer (a PC with a huge monitor), I could almost convince myself that my dream had been realized, except for the occasional freeze of the broadcast feed. Meggiefreshh and I took to clapping at the damn machine in fruitless attempts to get the game going again; inevitably we would miss a Tek double or a Wake strikeout. The other problem with MLB TV? The medium provides no choice of commentary for games, and there is no greater injustice than a Red Sox fan having to listen to YES. (I will, however, admit to much amusement at the Blue Jays' announcers, mostly because I get a kick out of hearing Canadians say "strikeout.")

I think we'd all agree that the best way to experience a match-up is live. But I can't always be at Fenway or Minute Maid, at Royal Stadium or the Toyota Center. Next is watching a game on television, followed by watching on the internet. (See above for problems with those two scenarios.) Then comes listening on the radio. And last in preference would be following a game online, through ESPN's or SI's automatically updating gameday sections, or, even better, via a program like MLB's Gameday or NFL's Gamecenter.

These last options are extraordinary applications, especially in terms of information dissemination. Every statistic, every fact I could want is at a click of the mouse. Using them means that I am much, much more in the know than if I just watched TV, and in a different universe of informed than if I were attending the game. (All the beer I consume at live sporting events probably doesn't help either.) For instance, there is no way I could tell just by watching Morgan Ensberg bat--even over several games--whether he was hitting .275 or .300 during that time period. But on Gameday, a MicroMedia Flash application, I can see his season batting average, and his batting average against the current pitcher, and his batting average for the current month, and his fielding average, and the results of his last at-bats. You get the idea.

So, I find myself in the amusing position, through preferring to be in a stadium rather than in front of a computer, of actually choosing to know less. I don't know how to feel about that.

the kindness of strangers

Deeds of lovingkindness are equal in weight to all the commandments.
-Jerusalem Talmud, Peah 1:1

Maybe it's the season, or maybe I exude a Blanche DuBois-like vulnerability, but I have been truly touched the past couple of days by some very selfless acts.

On Monday, I was walking through Georgetown as snow began to fall, and it was a magical moment for me, my first D.C. snow. Since my appointment had just been pushed back, I decided to stop for lunch, and I chose Johnny Rockets, the silly Los Angeles chain. (It reminds me of the wonderful times I spent in California when absenceofwill lived in Pasadena.) I sat down at the counter and ordered my favorite, grilled cheese with tomato. A little while later, a man walked into the restaurant to place an order to go. He looked at the menu first, then at my food. He asked what I had, since "it looks good," then asked for the same. We talked while he waited, and it turns out that he had come into the diner because it made him think of San Francisco, where he used to live. It also turns out that he attended Duke University and has, on more than one occasion, been kicked off of the campus of the all-girls boarding school where I used to work (it was a college in his time). When I told him I was looking for a job in non-profit, apropos of nothing, he offered his assistance and left me with his card. (As a lobbyist for Quinn Gillespie, he knows leaders of advocacy groups from both sides of the political spectrum.)

Later that evening, I ran down in the snow to the small, local grocery store to pick up a few items for dinner, and I discovered at check-out that in my haste to leave the house, I had forgotten my wallet. I found a little bit of money in my jacket pocket, but I was still about a dollar short. Embarrassed, I asked the cashier to take off an item, but Dennis, the owner of the store, stepped in and insisted that I take home what I had chosen.

And on Tuesday evening, I woke up from a late nap craving a tuna sandwich from Potbelly (yes, I want the strangest things to eat after I nap, although it's usually a Coke or Starbuck's Java Chip ice cream). So I headed down to the 11th & F location on my way to the movies. As I left the apartment building, I scrolled through my iPod to find music to listen to on the walk. I had jammed out to The Killers earlier that morning, so "Larry Schooler" was not far down the "Artists" list. My dear friend had interviewed my family in late December of last year and from our stories had produced a twenty-seven-minute tribute to my grandfather. I had been writing a post about him for his Gregorian yahrzeit and had planned to offer a link to this remembrance, but I hadn't actually heard it again since Larry gave it to my family. So I began to listen and was seated with my food by the time the sad part came. I looked out onto 11th Street and just let the tears stream as I tried to keep eating. After a while, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I looked up to see a man standing beside me, cookie in hand. "I'm the manager here, and I saw you were crying. Is everything okay?" Although still choked up and having trouble talking, I assured him that I was fine. He moved the proffered treat toward me, shrugging as if at its inadequacy. "Well, have a cookie. And I am sure your grandfather knows that you miss him."

Thank you, all.

in memoriam: jack wilkes

"To An Athlete Dying Young"

The time you won your town the race
We chaired you through the market-place;
Man and boy stood cheering by,
And home we brought you shoulder-high.

To-day, the road all runners come,
Shoulder-high we bring you home,
And set you at your threshold down,
Townsman of a stiller town.

Smart lad, to slip betimes away
From fields where glory does not stay
And early though the laurel grows
It withers quicker than the rose.

Eyes the shady night has shut
Cannot see the record cut,
And silence sounds no worse than cheers
After earth has stopped the ears:

Now you will not swell the rout
Of lads that wore their honours out,
Runners whom renown outran
And the name died before the man.

So set, before its echoes fade,
The fleet foot on the sill of shade,
And hold to the low lintel up
The still-defended challenge-cup.

And round that early-laurelled head
Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead,
And find unwithered on its curls
The garland briefer than a girl's.

-A.E. Housman

My grandfather died a year ago today, very early in the morning on Pearl Harbor Day. My phone rang at 2:00 am, and I knew. As we cried, my mom also laughed as she mentioned that one of the last things he had eaten was one of her chocolate chip cookies, his absolute favorite. She wasn't sure whether this was a good or bad thing.

Papa Chief (as all his grand- and great-grandchildren knew him) had developed a cancer in his lungs two years earlier, and he made the decision to refuse further chemotherapy treatment after one round almost killed him. And he wanted to live out what remained of his life at home, with his family. His hair fell out, then grew back, white, thick, and curly. He declined pretty rapidly in his last few months, having trouble breathing when he walked even the smallest distance. Over Labor Day weekend last year I remember seeing him--at our family's regular Tex-Mex eatery in Austin, Tres Amigos--completely winded because of the trip from the car to the restaurant. He made it to my brother's wedding at the end of October, although at that point he knew it was just a matter of weeks. He looked handsome as always in his suit, but he could speak only just above a whisper, so we all encircled him at the reception to hear stories.

But he wouldn't have liked me to dwell on the end. As he said, he wanted us to remember him as he once was. And the man he became in his last six months certainly bore little resemblance to the engaged, active, mirthful "gentle giant" (he was 6'2") that I experienced my whole life. In my lifetime he enjoyed semi- or full retirement, and he made good use of his leisure: he played golf several times a week, mowed the lawn and tended to the yard, read voraciously, completed two crossword puzzles a day, and watched all the Astros games and Texas sporting events that aired on television. I was lucky enough to spend my five years of college in Austin, so I got see him and my grandmother at least once a week. Sometimes we ate together at Tres Amigos, and other times I would just use their house as a quiet place for homework and laundry. Once, after dinner there, Papa turned to me and said, "I'm so glad that you came over this evening." I smiled and thanked him, thinking that he was referring to my company or conversation. He continued, "Your grandmother makes the best food when you're here."

Walter Jackson Wilkes was born literally in the center of Texas (in Brownwood), on December 25, 1918. As a child, I found his birthday unenviable because he often received dual birthday/Christmas presents, thereby lessening his take for the year; he, however, liked to celebrate his day on the holiday because "I am always surrounded by my family." He wasn't totally angelic, though: in a story that has become the backbone of the Jack Wilkes legacy, he was once placed in charge of the family's Christmas present name drawing. Before passing around the hat, he gave the standard caveat that everyone was to keep secret his/her recipient, but a few days later, the calls started coming in to my grandmother. "Gay, I've got Jack. What does he want?" "Gay, I chose Jack's name from the hat. Can you suggest something?" When confronted about his subterfuge, though, he admitted to having filled the drawing with only his name, but about his deed he felt no shame, just vindication, that his wife's family--as he suspected--was in fact incapable of keeping a secret.

My cousin Seth best summed up Papa's legacy in a speech at the funeral, when he identified Papa's traits in each of his grandchildren. Seth ascribed Papa's impishness to Josh; his kind and gentle nature to Gabriel; his love of learning to me; his love of family to Sara; his engineer's skill and precision to Jordan; and his know-how in raising daughters to Theo. As the speaker, Seth left himself out, but I think we would all agree that Seth has Papa's great sense of humor and ability to tell a great story.

My Papa's passing has been hard for me to process. I didn't feel his absence right away, partly because I was living far away from him and my grandmother when he finally succumbed to the cancer. But even in Austin for the funeral and for my spring break a few months later, I kept expecting to walk into the den and find him sitting in his favorite chair. He was such a quiet, unassuming person in a family known for its cacophony that it was not unreasonable to think that Papa might simply be in another room, engaged in his daily ritual of reading every article in USA Today. I'll be walking along the streets of this city--where he and my grandmother spent the war years while he served the Federal Highway Administration as Bridge Division Chief (the job that inspired his nickname)--and all of a sudden it will hit me, like a rush of cold air that stops my heart: Papa's not around anymore. At his funeral, in the hotel room I shared with Sara, I glanced at her open planner to see written in the December 7 box, in blue ink, in her familiar handwriting, "Papa died." Period. My heart stops again. In Breckenridge this summer, Papa's brother Jeff had me doing double takes, my heart rising up in hope and stopping in disappointment each time I caught a glimpse of the sweet smile, soft eyes, tall frame, or deliberative step that he shared with his younger brother. Even being around my mom is bittersweet, since she looks so much like her father and in her soft-spoken, supportive demeanor is the true heir to Papa's spirit.

On a road trip several years ago, his youngest great-grandson, in a child's understanding of his profession, would proclaim that each bridge passed was built by Papa Chief, but even as an adult, I still feel that way. Every bridge I see reminds me of my grandfather. When I don't know that he didn't built a certain one, I assume that he might have (especially if it is beautiful) because I know that even if he didn't, he would know all about it, and he would tell me all about it. Because of the breadth of his knowledge, many a bridge is conflated in my mind that way. This summer, for instance, I stood on the Brooklyn Bridge and cried, thinking of Papa. The structure was one of his favorites; I read David McCullough's book about its construction, The Great Bridge, at Papa's recommendation, and afterwards we talked about the book and the bridge. For me, he was Washington Roebling.

I don't pretend that what I am saying now, a year after his death, could begin to encompass everything he was, for he was a truly great man. I want to be more like my grandfather, and I frequently think about how to be worthy of him. I think about how he would certainly know the answer to the tough clue in the crossword that I have taken to completing each day. I think about visiting the Panama Canal someday because he wanted to (especially after reading McCullough's The Path Between the Seas) but never did. I think about him when, eating, I glance down at my plate to see that I have exactly one bite left of everything, his fastidious habit of "making it come out even." Mostly I think about getting from him just one more hug. He wasn't exactly an "athlete dying young," but he certainly left before I was ready to give him up.

Austin-American Statesman obituary

Email me for "Jack Wilkes: A Remembrance," by NPR reporter Larry Schooler (Blogger doesn't allow mp3 file hosting!)

sixth & i

There was a monarch who prepared a special wedding canopy. It was intricately carved and adorned; the only thing missing was the bride. So, too the world was created intricately and majestically, but the only thing missing was Shabbat.
-Midrash Genesis Rabba, Chapter 10

On Friday night I attended Shabbat services at the historic Sixth & I synagogue. As I walked in from the freezing cold, Rabbi Edelstein of mesorahDC greeted me by name. Since I met him only briefly on Rosh Hashanah, I was quite impressed, and pleased. I found a siddur and moved towards the sanctuary. The rabbi called after me, "Remember, women sit on the left."

Sigh. I had forgotten this feature of the orthodox service. So I bid dogooderlawyer goodbye for the next hour or so and took a seat in the one-third of the pews cordoned off for the "gentler sex." As I glanced through the mechitzah (partition) of tall ficuses and watched the men file into their far more spacious worship area, I thought to myself, "Why am I here again?" In October I had attended first-day Rosh Hashanah services hosted by this same group in the temple's basement. Unprepared for the separate seating, I found it that morning simply a new experience that required adjustment, but in the afternoon, during Musaf service, when the chazzan was mumbling on the men's side (precluding my following along from the other side), my tolerance for an old-fashioned custom quickly turned into anger at a sexist institution. My lament at returning was finally interrupted by the beginning of the service, and it was then that I remembered why I came.

Rabbi Tzvi Teitelbaum began to speak.

Perhaps my admiration for this gifted, learned, charismatic teacher/scholar is unwarranted. But my Rosh Hashanah was so memorable this year in large part because of his teaching (excerpted in my post on The Chosen). And he didn't disappoint this Friday night, either. At the Carlebach Service, he mentioned before "Yedid Nefesh" (listen here!), that the word yedid, translated as "beloved," comes from the Hebrew word for "hands." So your beloved is literally the one you go hand in hand with! Later in the service, Rabbi Teitelbaum posed a question about why Shabbat evening involves a meal. His answer was an illustration of the reconciliation of mind-body duality that is one of my favorite features of Judaism: the soul naturally wants to celebrate on Shabbat, but the body is at times unwilling. So feeding the body--taking care of its needs--makes it want to celebrate with the soul.

My body definitely enjoyed dinner, but not just because of the food, which happened to be excellent. The company was also outstanding--our table comprised great conversation and the best singing in the room. After dinner, we discussed a portion of the week's Torah portion (Toldot), in which Yakov obtains Eisov's birthright. Dogooderlawyer asked if the text suggested that we ought to admire Yakov, a trickster figure. Rabbi Teitelbaum responded with two stories: the first involved a family who owns a Torah scroll from the war and allows its children to play, jump, and color on it. Do you have the right to steal that Torah? He polled the table: most said no, but I said yes. The second imagined that a friend is drowning in the ocean, and the only life preserver in the area is in a closed store. Do you have the right to steal that preserver? He polled the table again: everyone said yes. His point was that there are times when it is acceptable to commit an otherwise immoral act in the service of a greater good; Eisov has sufficiently de-valued his birthright (by his willingness to sell it to Yakov for a bowl of beans) to make the apparent extortion more understandable.

As I walked home, I thought about how beautiful the synagogue is (take the virtual tour!) and how grateful I am to be within walking distance of shul. Gut Shabbos, everyone! There are only four more days until Shabbat comes again!

mmmm, cake

Man is only truly great when he acts from the passions; never irresistible but when he appeals to the imagination.
-Benjamin Disraeli

About a month ago, leaving Adams Morgan one Saturday night, a sign on U street caught my eye. I was immediately intrigued by the unusual name and unique design; I even told my companion that I wanted to return during business hours to find out more about the apparent bakery.

Then two weeks ago, the Washington City Paper put the owner of the patisserie, Warren Brown, on its cover and ran a 5200+ word story on his local business, CakeLove.

And then earlier this week, I interviewed at LoveCafé, the coffee and pastry shop associated with the bakery. I actually talked with Warren, and was a little overwhelmed, truth be told. (This is why I love Us magazine so much: I am really just a star-struck teenager at heart.) Nevertheless, I was hired, and I start my new job tomorrow!

From all I can see, CakeLove's star is on the rise right now (which is slightly strange to me because I am not usually on the cusp of these things). Warren hosts his own show on the Food Network, Sugar Rush, and--as the Federal Diarist said with dawning recognition as I told him about my new job--"the Post's Style section writes about him all the time." There are several new CakeLove locations slated to be opened in the area next year, and, as Warren mentioned in the interview, his brand is rolling out a new product, a high-quality candy bar, in the near future. He was even on Oprah!

Warren's unique story as a goverment lawyer turned professional baker is overly well documented here, in the links I've provided, and elsewhere, so I won't spill any more ink (or consume any more bandwidth?) in relating my own version. His manifesto on "passion"--a watchword, it seems, at the bakery and café--is quite the philosophical read. I haven't even sampled the wares yet, because it honestly seems in this case that the story is equally appealling as the sweets. (Family, rest assured: I imagine that with my 50% discount I will be bringing home some treats for the holidays!)

i ♥ will

What? You kissed Will Tippin? Are you kidding me? . . . I don't believe it. You must have been really drunk.
-Francie Calfo

So, Alias has been cancelled and will soon join Will, Francie, Weiss, Irina, and Vaughn (basically all the good characters) in that big top-secret-CIA-headquarters in the sky. My friend mrsjackbristow is crying into her pillow each night, but I cannot say that I am sad to see it go, at least in its present incarnation. Pregnant Sydney? No, no, no. (However, I will cop to loving last week's scene of Jack and Syd assembling a crib.)

I first began watching the spy drama earlier this year, when I visited scoutfinch in Madison over MLK weekend. On Sunday morning, the skies saw fit to blanket the state in over a foot of snow in what is now listed as one of the worst storms in Wisconsin history, so we settled in with the Season One DVD's. Neither of us had ever watched the show while it aired, but we both had close friends who were addicted to it. (In fact, one of my first encounters with mrsjackbristow gave me a taste for how fanatical Alias fans can be. One night a few years ago, when my right foot inexplicably started paining me to the point of limping, I stopped by her apartment [she has a degree in sports medicine] to have her take a look at it. She answered the door with, "Alias is on. I'll talk to you during the commercial," and turned away to head back to the television. I faltered after her and sat down to wait while Jack and Katya got their sexual tension on.) Of course, scoutfinch and I loved the show from the very first episode, and within a month I had watched the entire first two seasons.

And then, the third season was released on DVD. And then, I didn't want to watch Alias anymore.

And it's not because I'm a Sydney/Vaughn shipper, because I'm not. I actually think that he's a bit of a dolt (albeit a really, really hot one) and that Syd should have shacked up with Weiss a long time ago (and not just because he's Jewish!), especially after Vaughn threw her over and got married to someone else (and an EVIL someone else, at that) within two years of Syd's "death." Rather, I mourn the loss of Sydney's support system. Will and Francie are gone after Season Two, and they took with them Sydney's lifeline to normalcy and humanity. Season Three was just a big ol' depressive bout of friendless Syd moping after Vaughn (with the notable exception of the cute if still maudlin scene in which Syd and Weiss get drunk on tequila shots). Or maybe my beef with post-Season-Two Alias is just based on the fact that I lurve Bradley Cooper.

Bradley Cooper interview, Part the First (in which he expounds for some time on Wet Hot American Summer)

Bradley Cooper interview, Part the Second

"sightless spectre of the macabre"

Ere the bat hath flown
His cloistered flight, ere to black Hecate's summons
The shard-borne beetle with his drowsy hums
Hath rung night's yawning peal, there shall be done
A deed of dreadful note.
-William Shakespeare, Macbeth

Flipping through the Times early this morning in the wake of a nightmare, I came across this article about the ebola virus in African fruit bats, and I was sad to discover these nocturnal mammals once again smeared as carriers of disease. Yes, I am a defender of the bat. I am just nuts about them. Why, you ask? The short answer is that I have lived in both Monteverde, Costa Rica, and Austin, Texas.


In northwest Costa Rica, four hours from the capital of San Jose, the rural mountain town boasts the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve, which is home to dozens of species of fruit bat. Local and visiting scholars have studied these creatures in their natural habitat since the town's beginnings in the early 1950's. Now, there is even a BatCam! One of the foremost experts is a man called Richard Laval, whom I would often see walking around the roads of the town in the standard gear of all residents--rubber boots, microfiber pants, lightweight cotton shirt, booney hat. We all dubbed him "Batman," less because of his choice of subject than because of his rather unfortunate resemblance to his subject. Plus, the word for "bat" in Spanish is just lovely, and a sight better than its English counterpart: murciélago. Say it with me now: moor-see-a-lah-go!

Each April, the Texas state capital welcomes back the 1.5 million Mexican free-tail bats that make their home under the Congress Avenue bridge. These travellers (they breed in the winter in a set of known caves in northern Mexico) have summered in Austin since the reconstruction of the downtown bridge in 1980. The redesign created a series of crevasses in the bridge's underbelly which, it turned out, were perfect roosting spots for bats, and they took up residence in droves. At first there was a huge outcry from Austinites fearful of rabies: they signed petitions and called for eradication of the bats. Enter Bat Conservation International (BCI)--and its head, Dr. Merlin Tuttle--which ran a successful PR campaign on behalf of the beleaguered animals, and the bats were granted permenant asylum. There has not been a single case of bat-related rabies in Austin since, and the winged creatures provide a valuable service to other area residents by consuming 10 to 15 tons of insects each night. In addition, many transportation departments around the country have copied the Congress Avenue bridges design: the structure can help to reestablish wildlife in urban areas with no additional cost to the taxpayer. Now, in the summer, the emergence of the bats at dusk is a huge tourist attraction for the city.

Send a bat e-card to a loved one today!

There is a prize on the line for the reader who can identify the pop culture source of the quotation excerpt that forms the title of this post. (Hint: Think janitor in a zoo.) Scoutfinch, I'm counting on you!