June is sitting on the floor of a van between two enormous speakers blaring Aerosmith. June's sister is sitting in a living room chair that is a replacement for a passenger seat in 1977. While June holds her ears on the floor of the van between the booming speakers, June's sister slides around in the living room chair as the driver, who is June's younger sister's short term boyfriend, drives around curves.
June is about to begin her first year at a state college and can't wait to get out of high school. Her sister is just beginning high school and usually dates older guys.
They are on their way to a Pete Seeger and Arlo Guthrie sunset concert at the base of a mountain near their home in Vermont. June holds her ears and thinks her sister's boyfriend is a stupid ignorant jerk to be blasting her eardrums with Aerosmith on the way to see Pete Seeger. She was sure he didn't know anything about folk music and was only going to the concert to impress her sister who continued to slide in his passenger chair.
As he drove around the concert parking area with the windows open, he turned up the volume until June was shouting for him to turn down the music. He casually leaned his elbow out the side window with his shining auburn shoulder length hair blowing in the wind, oblivious.
They set up their blanket at the base of the mountain just as the day light was beginning to change. June and her sister looked at Arlo Guthrie, who started out with a solo performance, and already seemed to be approaching middle age. The temporary boyfriend looked at June's sister who was beautiful. He was also beautiful although, June decided, much too empty headed for her sister.
In the middle of Arlo's performance, June needed to go to the bathroom. After relieving herself, she ran smack into two people from high school she did not particularly want to see: Her eleventh grade English teacher who was shaped like a mountain with lipstick, and her eleventh grade English teacher's son who was skinny, physically out of alignment, wore thick glasses and had fly away hair that extended wildly a few inches from his nerdy skull. There was no way to avoid them plus he said it was his birthday. His mother was the type of English teacher who assigned boring books like The Last of the Mohicans then discouraged any original thinking about the book. June discovered, with some relief, that the only thing to do is read and mimic the cliff notes. She missed her tenth grade English teacher who assigned deliciously romantic books like Jane Eyre and The Odyssey then encouraged June to keep a journal and write her own Odyssey. The eleventh grade mountain with lipstick did, June had to acknowledge, encourage her to write a short story that was printed on blue mimeographed paper and distributed as part of the school newspaper. June wondered if the lipstick was the last glimmer of romance in the life of an overweight single Mom.
“Mom brought me to this concert for my birthday,” In addition to his disarranged body twisting in different directions, June noticed his facial features also had an aberrant quality. She didn't know how to focus on him as he spoke.
“Are you eighteen?”
“Actually nineteen,” he looked down through thick glasses sliding to the tip of his nose.
June's English teacher explained that her son had to begin school one year late because, at the time he should have started kindergarten, they were traveling with her husband. He was a musician.
“I had to sit between two enormous speakers blaring Aerosmith on the way here.”
“Ugh, I hate Aerosmith,” every part of his body seemed to go in a different direction as he thought about the famous rock band.
“What type of musician was your father?”
“He played guitar and other string instruments as a folk musician. He knew Woody Guthrie, Arlo Guthrie and Pete Seeger. He knew everyone.”
I thought I saw my English teacher's eyes mist just a little behind her glasses.
“I don't really remember him. He died when I was four but we do have his albums. I could play them for you sometime.”
June then saw a group of some of the more adventurous popular girls hanging around with some scraggly stoner types. They were laughing and also had misty eyes. If she had seen them before they began partying enough to ignore everyone but themselves, June might not have felt safe standing with a weird boy who rarely sat with anyone at lunch and a hated English teacher.
Early evening sun rays announced Pete Seeger's arrival. He walked on stage and waved his long arm. Everyone, including the high school revelers, the Aerosmith loving short term boyfriend, the spastic son of the English teacher, June, June's beautiful younger sister, stood up in attention to the simple arm gesture and became quiet. He then began singing “Turn, Turn, Turn” and everyone sang. June knew she could not sing on key. Harmony was a foreign concept yet she could not stop herself from singing along.
“Pretty good tunes,” said the Aerosmith fan. “Pretty good tunes.”
It's my Bat Mitzvah and I've arranged the chairs so we're sitting in circles facing each other. This isn't a performance but a shared act of collective worship, a time of communion with that of God in each of us, a chance to ignite the divine sparks and become One. I am both thrilled and terrified that anyone has bothered to come. Here in the circle are friends I've known for decades as well as new friends I've met since joining this community plus members of the congregation that I know only by sight. All these people are on their own unique spiritual journeys. Today, our separate paths meet. We recite blessings and psalms together in Hebrew and English. We sing prayers and songs in Hebrew, and even if we're a little off-key, we sing with gusto and spirit. I leyn the Torah portion with an energetic if not exactly tuneful voice, amazing myself with my ability to sing in public. I have great fun translating and explaining my parasha. Everyone is with me. I am with friends. If they roll their eyes, I know it is done with affection. I lead a mini Compassionate Listening workshop using the story of Sodom to illustrate the Torah as a roadmap, leading us to alignment with our highest selves. In the centre of the circle are two bowls - one represents Sodom, the other the cave where Lot and his 2 daughters hide. We write on slips of paper those of our thoughts, beliefs, attitudes, and actions that don't serve our highest good - these go into Sodom - and those experiences where we've been fully connected, in the flow, awake and aware of the life-force flowing through us - these go into the cave. Then I cause brimstone and fire to rain upon Sodom destroying all that we have created which no longer serves us. And we read aloud from the cave a few of our most expansive, life-affirming moments, creating together our new present-moment beautiful reality. We finish the service with the Kaddish, the Aleynu and Adon Olam (sung to the tune of Mama Mia). I lead the blessings over the wine and the challah, feeling truly blessed as we raise our wine glasses to our highest selves. We all pitch in to set up the folding tables and load them with food, cooked with love by my friends. Judy plays the Klezmer CDs she's carefully chosen and teaches us some simple Klezmer dances. We dance joyfully, linked together body and soul. Working together in blissful harmony, we put away the tables, wash the dishes and pack all the uneaten food to be taken home by anyone who wants the leftovers. As usual we've made way too much food. As I lock the door of the synagogue behind me, I am overwhelmed with joy.
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