Sick of It

Recently, my husband and I visited my family, as a family member of mine was getting married.

Not that I was expecting anything less, but our families had us stay in separate houses and continued to refer to us as "boyfriend" and "girlfriend." In fact, one of my cousins even referred to my husband as my "friend" at one point. We didn't want to make a scene out of it (especially as it was someone else's celebration), but I am honestly getting sick of it.

When we visit our families, we constantly tiptoe around their feelings. We are very respectful and do everything their way -- Shabbos, kashrut, going to shul, etc.. I get that this is part of their worldview and that their belief system is really strong, but so is ours and I don't see why we don't even get a modicum of respect back.

Jewish Star Interviews Author of "Hush"

I thought I'd share this since I am a huge fan of this book. Really. It must have taken so much courage to write a book like this, even under a pseudonym. And I know that even in more modern, non-Chassidic circles there is a propensity to brush very serious problems "under the rug."

For some reason, there seems to be a sentiment that the outside world (and perhaps even members of the community, as well) should believe that "such problems don't happen here." Of course such problems - and all problems - happen within Orthodox, Chassidic, every circle. Anything problem that rears its head within the fabric of human society is likely to show up in every community at some point.

In any case, read the interview here.

Festival of Lights

I've been having a rough few days for personal reasons which I won't go into here, but to say that I found myself all alone in my apartment when it was getting dark tonight and I thought... Chanukah.

So I got my menorah and one of the millions of boxes of Chanukah candles (why is it I seem to collect more of these than anything else in life?) in the closet and lit my menorah.

Then, recalling what my teachers had taught back in the days of day school, I decided not to do any work for half an hour after lighting the candles. Work, this time, I defined as any of the tasks that have had me stressed or even the little things like cleaning.

And I took out a photo album with pictures of my childhood and I sat on the couch with the menorah flickering on the table, and I had what must've been the most relaxing half an hour I've had in weeks.

Happy Chanukah, everyone!