Forbidden Ink (Part 3)

Above images are of some of Ben’s tattoos. Photos provided by Ben, 2013.

Here we are again. I’m in the final stretch leading up to my conversion (just a few days to go now). I spent all of last weekend finishing my “spiritual autobiography” and conversion project, which were due to Rabbi C this week. All this research and writing has left me feeling a little like I’m back in college again. (OK, to be fair, I spent a good amount of time moving into and cleaning our new apartment over the weekend too, but what can you do).

Today I will be sharing the third (and final) piece in my series on tattoos and Judaism. As with Forbidden Ink (Part 2), please bear with the academic tone of this post once more. Please read on…

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Jewish Chicken Soup

I spent several hours last week mourning the loss of someone I’ve never met, will never meet.

But let’s not start there.

Steve and I spent most of last Saturday and Sunday at his parent’s house in Cape Cod. The unofficial start of summer, the Cape was cold and rainy, and we spent both days observing a kind of Shabbat–reading, napping, talking, eating. We managed to walk to town, buying penny candy at Candy Manor. We walked the bike path. We dined at Ocean House with his parents (and danced to one song played by the live band). We saw community theater.

That the weekend was laid back was perfect for us. Steve wasn’t feeling well (he’d come down with the same bad cold I’d recently had). We needed rest. We needed a break. We needed nothingness and a little summer.

Last summer we’d seen a Cape Cod production of Wait Until Dark, the play Steve and I were in when we met in 1999. We were excited to see a local production again. Days before our quick trip to the Cape, Steve’s parents bought us all tickets to see the play, Utility Monster, at Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater for Sunday night. Steve’s dad emailed us this article about the playwright, Marina Keegan.

On Making New (Jewish) Friends and The Mitzvah of Hospitality

One of the great things about moving back to the East Coast is that Steve and I have more friends here. In San Francisco we knew a few people to begin with–friends from college and high school–but the twenty something population in the City by the Bay is mostly transient. In truth, we met approximately three people who were actually from SF, and the others wound up there for a year, or two, or ten.

We made new friends, of course, through the people we already knew and through work and grad school. The majority of new people we met, though, remained merely acquaintances.

It’s possible that the phenomenon of which I speak is limited to the Bay Area, (I have not done a scientific experiment on the subject) but the blog-turned-book, MWF seeking BFF, suggests this is not uncommon.  Indeed, of all the friends and colleagues Steve and I have, I can think of exactly one person who seems to, and would probably admit to having, an easy time of making new and real, lasting friendships these days.

He works for Facebook.