one more thing

[Helen Winkler <winklerh...>]

 At the risk of being overly sentimental, I'd like to finish the Rita story by 
posting my dvar torah that I gave on Sept 27.  I drew the inspiration largely 
from the Jewish Music list and continue to learn from  and be inspired by all 
of you.
Helen
It all began with a love of dance and the internet.  All my life I've been 
dancing Bulgarian wedding dances, Hungarian wedding dances, Romanian wedding 
dances, but never a Jewish wedding dance.  One day while surfing the web, I 
found out about something called the kosher dance.  Enthralled, I located and 
purchased an old out of print book about Eastern European Jewish dances.  From 
it, I learned that the kosher dance is really part of a larger dance family, 
the mitzvah dances; these are the dances for and with the bride and groom at 
the wedding which fulfill the mitzvah or commandment of bringing joy to the 
newly married couple on their wedding day.

 

Thus, I entered the world of the 19th century Eastern European Jewish wedding.  
I learned about the badkhn or wedding jester, whose job it was to bring the 
bride, the groom and guests to tears.  For although weddings were joyous, there 
was also the mood of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.  It symbolized the 
serious commitment being made and also the era of mourning after the 
destruction of the temple.  I learned about the klezmorim, both derided and 
cherished by the community for the music they provided.  In the virtual world I 
met modern day klezmorim who spend their days searching for traces of our music 
in the memories of elderly Jews and Gypsies.  I also met scholars of Jewish 
dance-people who traipse around Poland trying to coax out almost forgotten 
dances from the minds of octogenarians.

 

It seemed to me that it was Bahsert or pre-determined that our Haftorah portion 
today uses a wedding metaphor.  It is clear, after all my research, that 
weddings have always had a central role in the lives of the Jewish people. In 
today's Haftorah, we learn of the Joy of Hashem in the Jewish people "as the 
bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride."  It is also through the mitzvah and 
sanctity of the Jewish wedding that Jay and I are here celebrating with Rachel, 
Leora and Rita, this double bat mitzvah.

 

Thirteen years ago, when Rita was born, it was also a time of strong emotion, 
of laughter through the tears.  Was I up to the task of being Rita's mother? It 
says in our haftorah "the garden causeth the seeds that are in it to spring 
forth."  And so it has been.  Rita has grown and I have been the gardener; yet, 
in another sense I have grown through knowing her, and she has been the 
gardener.  So we stand before you today, mother and daughter; I am a different 
person today than I was 13 years ago, because of Rita.  She now is coming to 
adulthood and growing independence.  She is achieving things that 13 years ago, 
we may not have dreamed of.

 

It says in our Haftorah that "Thou shalt no more be Forsaken; neither shall thy 
land any more be desolate."  This is the truth.  We have a richness and joy in 
our lives because of Rita and we delight in her and her many achievements as 
the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride.

 

Rita is now a Jewish adult and I as her mother continue to grow.