GRATEFUL FOR AN OLD VINYL RECORD

I stumbled on a record I have not listened to for almost forty years. The recording was sandwiched between many other old records,all of which were packed away. After all, we are living in the age of the CD- vinyl recordings are relics of the past to be relegated to the dust bin of history.
I retrieved the recording and played it-it was almost an ineffable experience. I was transported by the beauty of the music, especially the voice of the cantor, lyrical and sweet, straightforward in its recitation of the prayer without resorting to the excesses of flourishes and repetitions often heard from Ashkenazic interpreters of cantorial music today.
The recording was a Collector's Guild item containing the music of the French Synagogue.
It had been recorded before World War II; the heavenly voices of both cantor and choir were brutally silenced in the German death camps.
The style of the music is a blending of Ahkenazic-European and Sephardic-Spanish(Middle Eastern) traditions. The music is pure without "extraneous layers and parasitic adornments."
As I listened, I responded differently from how I was able to appreciate this music in my twenties. I was always fond of the music. This time however, the music touched a place in my heart that was both magical, majestic and miraculous. I could not help but feel grateful for the moments of listening that escorted me spiritually into the current season of the Days of Awe. The music was, if anything, awesome.
I can only refer to the jacket of the record to convey the sacredness of these sounds.When commenting on the arrangement of the music, the author states:"the compositions,arrangements and choral direction are notable for their exquisite, subtle harmonies and tonal balance."
I intend to listen to this selection of the High Holyday liturgy as often as I can; I am confident and grateful that it will lend special depth to this season of renewed thankfulness and awareness of life's beauty and wonder.

GRATEFUL FOR LIFE'S SURPRISES

One of the fun things about eating Chinese (kosher, of course) is the fortune cookie. Not the cookie which usually fails to meet even the most elementary standard of a desirable dessert; but the fortune inscribed on a tiny slip of paper is the source of anticipation and excitement.
Our minds know that these words are mass produced in a mechanical way and have no bearing whatsoever on the outcomes of our lives. Yet, a tiny part of a deeply embedded feeling, primitive, irrational but hopeful, titillates our thinking into believing that perhaps the words of the fortune cookie will contain prospects of something new and improved in our lives. So, we outwardly engage in a playful game with others as we share these magical portents.
Recently my fortune cookie read- "You will soon be given a wonderful surprise!"
I thought-this is general enough to cover all sorts of possibilities. And as I found myself wondering what the surprise could be-I was anticipating a series of results to several efforts I had undertaken, especially in my writing- I realized that this fortune had a very profound lesson regarding the concept of gratefulness.
After all, is not every moment of every day a surprise, and a wonderful one at that?
Our thinking is often mistaken when we look forward to one-time special surprises, all of which may indeed be wonderful, but neglect to recognize the wonder inherent in the gift of living itself.
In fact I am given wonderful surprises every moment that I am blessed with life. Each surprise awaits my awareness and gratefulness, and my thanksgiving.

GRATEFUL FOR AN ORDINARY “MENSCH"

The mailroom of an apartment building housing five hundred families, many of which are elderly, is much more than a place where you get your mail. Residents emerge from behind tightly locked doors into a common space where renewed encounters create a community of family members. At the very least, formal greetings are exchanged and individuals are recognized by their neighbors, bestowing upon even the most socially isolated a feeling of togetherness and the reassurance of not being totally alone.
One elderly woman, walking ever so slowly and deliberately to collect her mail, bent over and mumbling to herself, looked up and recognized a familiar face.
She has been living in this apartment building since its inception in the 1970’s. Without family, the residents are her spouses and siblings, children and grandchildren, the hub of her emotional life.
Holding several pieces of mail in her hand she was heard saying, in a squeaky, enfeebled voice:” Whenever I get a request from a charity, I always send them at least eighteen dollars. Sometimes I’ll send them thirty six-you know why-its two times eighteen which is life in Jewish. I can’t afford to send more, but how can I refuse to send anything? It’s the right thing to do.” The man she was talking to replied: “God bless you-you are a real mensch.”

How inspiring can the act of a weakened old woman be! I realized how grateful we should be knowing that there are countless such “menschen”-kind, simple and generous people, who innately understand the ordinary meaning of kindness. These simple acts of goodness are the lifeline of their lives and those of so many others. God bless them all, indeed.

GRATEFUL FOR MY CUP (S) OF COFFEE

I love coffee. This makes my son unhappy who never lets up in his vehement claim that “coffee is a drug!” Many consider coffee unhealthy and habit forming. Some have substituted tea for their coffee due to health reasons. Yet, some evidence suggests that there are positive health benefits to coffee as well.
I am grateful that coffee is still legal, even quite universally popular. It delights me to sip coffee at work or relaxing.
My daughter brought to my attention a poignant article in Oprah magazine, entitled “Not Just a Cup but a Just Cup.” Knowing my love of coffee and my attachment to things Jewish, this article spoke volumes of the power of coffee in human affairs. It tells the story of a Ugandan man in a kippah who was almost killed in the World Trade center on the morning of 9/11. JJ Keki is the 48year old chairman of the Mirembe Kawomera Coffee Cooperative in eastern Uganda, an interfaith group of more than 700 coffee growers: Jews, Muslims and Christians.
JJ was tortured by the local police when he tried to build a synagogue under the cruel hand of Idi Amin. After 9/11, he went door to door urging people of all faiths to come together and grow coffee, and by growing coffee, to spread peace.
The coffee cooperative, with help from Kulanu, a nonprofit organization that works with Uganda’s Jewish community, has found a distributor for its coffee, a coffee company in Fort Bragg, California, called most appropriately, the Thanksgiving Coffee Company. The cooperative is guaranteed a minimum price of $2 a pound no matter what the market does, a big improvement over the 60 cents it had been getting. They sell the coffee online at deliciouspeace.com.
JJ is also a musician. One of his songs goes like this: I’ve traveled the world and seen nothing as good as coffee .Our only solution is to grow coffee. Brothers and sisters come, grow coffee.
He adds: We use what we have to make our enemies into friends. You don’t need PhD’s. We have coffee.”
Each morning, as the arousing aroma of brewing coffee titillates my nostrils I will remember with gratitude the magic of coffee not only to enrich my pleasure and to stimulate my mind but also to be the beverage that can broker good will and peace among strangers, even enemies.
Perhaps when the Messiah arrives, we will celebrate not only with a good wine or a glass of shnappes, but we will drink a “lechayim”-to life- with a cup of piping hot coffee from the Thanksgiving Coffee Company as well.

GRATEFUL FOR BEING HERE

We were sitting in a small booth having our usual tuna fish sandwich lunch.
My wife raised her head, a look of quiet pleasure which brought an almost imperceptible trace of wetness to her eyes and said: “ It’s so nice being here.”
We had made our annual trip to a bucolic town in northwestern Massachusetts, planning to visit the wonderful Clark Art Museum and of course explore some shopping possibilities in one particular women’s clothing boutique.
But this visit was somewhat different from others. The day before, as we were cruising along the New York throughway our car suddenly careened out of control. My wife valiantly tried to bring the car back onto the highway. In a matter of a few fleeting moments, she was able to steer the vehicle toward a marshy stretch of land closed off by a fence which thankfully halted our dizzying plunge off the road. Other than a bump on the head and aching backs and necks, we were unhurt.
As we climbed out of the car we were greeted with:”Are you alright? Should we call an ambulance? We’ve called 911!”
A family of three, father, mother and daughter on the way to Williams College to launch the daughter’s college career. Moments later, another car pulled over, words of concern emerging from inside. We were grateful for the caring attention of total strangers.
Highway patrol and tow truck arrived within minutes and after an hour or so of paper work and phone calls we were back on our way to the Berkshires.
“It is nice being here!” Here is not only a quaint little diner in a charming New England town. Here is being alive, unharmed, delivered from serious mishap, even death.
We had an accident; no one was to blame-no one was injured. The car had suddenly succumbed to mechanical failure, a machine unable to function any longer.
And we are blessed with the greatest gift of all, the gift of “ being here.”
My wife and I embraced and tearfully recited together the prayer of deliverance-“Blessed are You… who graciously bestowed Your favor upon us.”

GRATEFUL FOR THE GIFT OF THE NATURAL WORLD

I am returning from a lovely Caribbean island, one that its inhabitants refer to as a paradise As a matter of fact, one of the religious groups on this island, the Rastafarians, consider the island to be the Garden of Eden.
Putting national pride aside, I have to agree that there indeed was a quality of paradise that embraced us while we were there.
We encountered not monuments of man- ruins of ancient temples, art museums, skyscrapers, opera houses or towers touching the sky. The island could only boast of a few new structures barely six or seven stories high, the ruins of an eighteenth century fort, several beautiful resorts and a few bourgeoning shopping malls. What overwhelmed us were the monuments of nature-an island carved out of the tumultuous eruptions of volcanoes, mountains lush with greenery, their tips climbing into the clouds, bay after bay beckoning the open sea to seek refuge from its vastness and find shelter in the arch of its coves and shores. From atop elevated forests, blue-green waters shimmered in the island sun, cliffs and bluffs dotted with a blinding array of colors, houses hanging along the sloping ranges of trees that encircle the land with an abundance of flowers and fruits.
Not stone, concrete or brick but banana plants as far as the eye could see, fruit bearing trees-oranges, mangoes, papaya, guava, apples, coconut, bread fruit: vegetation redolent with spices-cinnamon, mint, basil and nutmeg. And the flowers, like jewels on the diadem of its landscape –yellows and reds, purples and whites, pinks and lavenders.
This cornucopia of nature’s gifts –freely given, contains the treasures not only of nutrition, succulence and beauty, but is also the sources of medicinal miracles.
The explanation of the multi-dimensional uses of each and every component of the flora and fauna of this paradise fascinated me and filled me with a grateful awareness of how rich and generous our world is to us. Observing the banana plant for example, how it ripens each nine months, after which the trunk is cut allowing baby shoots to grow to their full height again, an unending cycle of earth’s uninterrupted gifts to those who dwell in her embrace.
On this island, twenty seven miles in length and fourteen miles wide, it seemed as if there was sufficient produce to feed many more multitudes than the one hundred and sixty inhabitants dwelling in its tiny fishing villages, its small cities and scattering of miniscule rural communities.
Not only the land but also the Atlantic on its east shore and the Caribbean on the west pour forth their bounty of sea life to the island and beyond. While snorkeling I was given the gift of underwater beauty, radiant fish of royal blue wriggling gracefully along colorful coral reefs.
The island resonated with its special sounds, the songs of its birds, the warm night air saturated with the humming of those who flit from branch to branch in an endless dance of life’s melodic miracle.

Is St. Lucia the Garden of Eden? Symbolically, perhaps. In my mind however, this island reminds me that paradise is not parochial but rather a reality that embraces the totality of the natural world. Our visit to this particular island was a pilgrimage to one shrine of nature’s magnificence, and inspired us to recite the Psalmist’s words: “ How wondrous are your works.”

GRATEFUL FOR A SHABBAT ON ST. LUCIA

To the best of my knowledge, there are no Jews in St. Lucia. My wife spotted a man wearing a large, rather ostentatious gold necklace with a Star of David embedded in the middle; but we learned later that the Magen David is the emblem of Freemasons on the island. As we were leaving our hotel one day, looking out the window I caught sight of something most peculiar; a native St. Lucian, bareheaded yet hanging from his waist were fringes at each corner with a blue thread running along each fringe. Were these “ztitzit?” Did this man wear the fringes enjoined by the Torah to each Jew? Had I stumbled upon a “landsman,”
A fellow Jew in this remote corner of the Caribbean? The opportunity to investigate slipped away as quickly as our bus moved along the road with increased speed.
Our vacation was designed to provide us with an opportunity to, in my wife’s terminology, “empty our heads!” And we succeeded.
Shabbat arrived. We ushered in the day into our hotel room privately and quietly. The next morning I recited the Shabbat prayers privately, chanting the Torah reading and Haftarah quietly from a Tanach-Bible.
While others boarded buses to make excursions into the island, we remained behind to celebrate Shabbat. We found ourselves floating on rubber rafts in the beautiful hotel swimming pool. As we aimlessly drifted in the water, my wife and I discussed the Torah reading of that Shabbat. Our “heads” were indeed emptying, as they should on the Sabbath. Our hearts however were full. Our thoughts and feelings about the Torah’s wisdom flowed over our minds. We had achieved a wonderful sense of relaxation and serenity, without synagogue or formal community prayer.
My wife returned to our deck chairs while I remained afloat on my back. I was buoyed by the calm waters of the pool, waters that rocked me gently as a baby in a crib. Aside from the feeling of utter restfulness I was struck by the more spiritual symbolism of this experience as Sabbath’s essence and core meaning. For those fleeting yet fantastic few moments I was assured of being borne by nature’s gift of water as I allowed my self to surrender to the embrace of Shabbat’s holiness. I did nothing- “You shall do no work whatever!” I simply lay on my back and felt the subtle yet real support of God’s hand in the flowing ripples of the bed of water under my body. The Shabbat took on the realization of ultimate spiritual reality as I declared to myself in unspoken words that we are all held in the gentle, loving yet firm grasp of life’s divinity and wonder.
I am utterly grateful for that moment and the recognition that the magic of Shabbat can be recognized anywhere in the glorious world created by God, a creation that we are most mindful of on the Sabbath day- “For in six days He created the heavens and the earth and on the seventh He rested.”