Y 1 K

And so this is Yom Kippur...and what have you done? It's funny -- the John Lennon song about Christmas is far more appropriate for the Day of Atonement... I usually go to services in the shul the night before --Kol Nidre -- when we Jews declare all vows we made in vain to the Big Man, or will make next year, to be null and void. I always dug the melody of the chanting that night. Comedian Lewis Black says it's the creepiest music ever written. And I like the solemnity. Last night, I skipped. I was in shul July for my father's death's 30th anniversary, and I felt, well, nothing, except a strong desire to leave. I'm friends with the rabbi, and like many of the guys who go well enough, but it just doesn't feel right to me deep down. Maybe it's the language problem. I don't speak or understand Hebrew. So last night I found a live streaming Kol Nidre service from a humanistic Jewish synagogue in Cincinnatti -- Temple Beth Adam. I liked it well enough. The messages were poetic and poignant -- how we wish we could capture time like we capture images in photos -- keep our children young -- keep our aging parents from dying -- but we can't. There was beautiful music -- a violinist and guitarist played -- but the camera panned the crowd, and there was not a single yarmulke. The female rabbi avoided the word "God" in all her prayers and sermons, saying crap like when we sin, we "go against LIFE." In the end, I might as well have been watching a bunch of Unitarians at a Save the Forests rally. There was nothing Jewish about it. On the one hand, my birthright from my father causes me to be agnostic. But something deep down pulls me the other way, too. On the other hand -- something compels me to stay home today, and even plan to visit a body of water to symbolically toss my sins. I guess, like Tevye, there are a lot of "other hands." So I'll fast today. I can sure miss plenty of more meals anyway -- it would do me good. I envy my friends who are people of belief. It's easy to scoff and adopt a George Carlin approach -- "It's all bullshit," but I'm not comfortable with that either. What's the higher meaning -- if that's the case? Family? Ha. As if. I'm blessed to be close to my kids, but the majority of families I know have so much pathology -- with members truly hating each other -- then if that's the basis of your existence, you're pretty well screwed. I still hope there's a path I'll find. But for this year, at least, when it comes to the organized side of the Jewish thing -- I'm sitting on the sidelines. Cheering for the team, yes, but still on the sidelines.