A little poetic justice for those of you who have been following my ditherings on birthdays, bodies and beauty.... The four beautiful little creatures who I love calling my children got together and gave me a birthday present that they thought I could really use: a pedicure and a massage! I'm really going to enjoy my pampering! Thanks guys.... Read the rest of this entry →
I’m turning forty next week, and I want to celebrate. I’m not talking about a Madonna-style birthday celebration of pretending I’m still 22, or an Oprah-style event involving giving away cars (although perhaps if I could actually do either, I might consider it). I’m thinking more along the lines of a celebration of life, of joy, of the freedom that comes with a certain stage of adulthood.
Forty is a big deal. Every major biblical transition was represented by forty – forty years in the desert, forty days on the mountain, forty days of the flood, forty years of peace when Deborah became judge (after Yael took out Sisera). In short, forty is birth, transition, or transformation. Forty weeks of gestation. According to the Kabala, forty steps in the creation of the world – ten utterances of God, and four steps of creation each time. Forty. According to the late Aryeh Kaplan, forty is the “mem”, the letter of “mayim”, waters, which represents the fluidity of life. Forty, or “mayim”, is about my own rebirth. I can’t wait.
Forty is freedom. It’s about relinquishing all kinds of anxieties and fears and a nagging need to please. It’s about letting myself dance and sing and run and leap, about allowing myself to be who I am, to speak freely and write freely and not be too afraid that someone won’t like what I have to say. I’ve learned that someone will always disagree or disapprove, so I might as well be true to myself, so at least one person will always be satisfied.
Forty is about owning myself. Like the way the amazing George Michael defines it: “I don’t belong to you and you don’t belong to me. Yeah, yeah!” It’s about letting go of other people’s voices in my head and listening closely to my own. I believe that quiet inner voice that we all have to be the voice of God that we were all granted as part of our tzelem elokim. It’s so often encumbered by external prattle, the way the poet Mary Oliver writes in her glorious poem, “The Journey”: “’ "Mend my life!"/ each voice cried/ But you didn't stop/ You knew what you had to do.”.....
So, to mark my newfound freedom of forty and all its accompanying Zen-Torah wisdom, I invite you to help me celebrate my birthday by helping other women who have not yet achieved freedom. I am talking of course about agunot and mesoravot get, women inextricably chained in unwanted marriages who want nothing else than the freedom I described here. If you want to help me celebrate, please give a gift of $40 to Mavoi Satum helping agunot and mesoravot get. Together, we’ll spread the joy, and strive to bring about freedom for all.
And thanks for celebrating with me!
Read the rest on the Forward Sisterhood
Read the rest of this entry →In Japan, it seems, there are some women-only buses. They were established, according to journalist Chani Luz, to protect women from “groping men.” Luz, who writes for the Orthodox publications Makor Rishon and Hatzofe, supports women-only buses in Israel because, as she recalled in a recent Ynet column, she was once molested on a bus when she was in 12th grade. “An older man sat next to me on the bus from Rehovot to Ramle and did not stop putting his hand on me and making indecent proposals,” she wrote. “I wanted to get up but I froze in my seat until the end of the ride.” Luz thus concludes that feminists should be in favor of separate buses. Gender-segregated buses, with men in the front and women in the back, are currently a burning issue in Israel, as Transport Minister Israel Katz has until December 27 to rule on whether or not gender-segregated buses in Israel are, in his opinion, legal. READ THE REST AT THE FORWARD SISTERHOOD BLOG -- AND DON'T FORGET TO CLICK ON THE LINK TO SIGN THE PETITION Read the rest of this entry →
I was so excited to see a woman on the cover of Friday’s financial section of Yediot Ahronot that I nearly spilled my nail polish all over the newspaper. The full-page headshot of Sharon Chen-Konofny — gorgeous, fully made up, and biting on a nail-polish bottle — seemed like such a welcome change from the usual face of business in Israel. Monday’s issue of Mamon (“money”) is much more typical: There are three photos of men on the cover, 11 photos of men inside and not a single photo of a woman anywhere. Of course, of the 19 families in Israel who own the equivalent of 88% of the national budget, only one is a woman: Shari Arinson. Moreover, according to a Knesset survey, men are four times more likely to be a CEO than are women, and a significant number of businesses in Israel don’t have any women on their boards or in their top leadership. So the absence of women in newspapers’ financial sections reflects a very sobering reality. I therefore read with great earnestness the story about Chen-Konofny, entrepreneurial founder of “Laka”, a chain of inexpensive manicure stands in malls that enable women to get their nails done even in an economic downturn. “Women will always want a manicure,” she said. “We have a basic need to do this. Whether we have money or not, we like to feel that we invested in ourselves.” Hmm … When it comes to “investing in myself,” a manicure is not at the top of my list. Read the rest at the Forward Sisterhood Read the rest of this entry →
The fact that a woman was arrested for wearing a tallit at the kotel should give us all pause. We should be ashamed that a woman can be so humiliated for her ritual practice, horrified that this takes place in the State of Israel in the very spot where the shechina is supposed to rest,and absolutely aghast that it is the Jewish police in the Jewish state making tallit-wearing a crime.
Nofrat Frenkel, the fifth year medical student whose prayer practice is at the root of these events, told her story in the Hebrew press and then in the Forward. Her sincerity and candor in her spiritual quest are admirable. I would like to say she was courageous, but my sense is that she had no idea that her actions would require courage. She was simply trying to reach God.
The atmosphere at the Kotel, the feeling that all those women praying around me were also turning to God and pouring out their hearts to Him, inspires me with the joy of Jewish fraternity. Here is one place in which, shoulder to shoulder, all the hearts are calling to God. Prayer at the Kotel is so different from private prayer at home, or from communal prayer at the synagogue. It is a mixed creation: I am in a communal place, with many worshippers, but not even one voice can be heard. Just soft murmurings, choked crying, mute requests.Poignant, earnest, and spiritual. That's how I see Nofrat Frenkel's quest. But the responses of some the talkbackers at the Forward see it differently. Verna M. Black wrote, "What a pity that this woman does not truly comprehend the mitzvot that women have in Judaism, and the mitzvot that men have. There are laws, better known as Halacha which overides the ego of women acting like men." Paulette takes a similar attack and says, "I would love to understand what Miss Frenkel's great insecurities are that she feels the need to wear a tallis so 'she can be like a man'. Grow up!" Read the rest of this entry →
My dear friend Jennifer Brody Martin is not likely to tell you what a trailblazer she is. But in fact she is the first Orthodox Jewish woman funeral director in America. Most people don't appreciate the importance of the funeral home in their lives, because it is a topic that only becomes important at certain painful moments which we tend not to think about too much. But the fact is, the funeral and the cemetery are the location of some of our most emotional and dramatic life events. Yet in the religious Jewish world, these sites often remain off limits to women -- emotionally and physically. (See entry from earlier this year on the subject.) Below is an article by Chana Pinchasi about her vision of women and funerals. It appeared in last week's Ynet. I dedicate this column to Jennifer, with love and admiration for doing God's work. The Last Act of Kindness By Chana Pinchasi Read the rest of this entry →
