April 10, 2001

Yom tov! Happy Pesach!

Yes, again it is that time of year when Jewish folk around the world get to engage in the joys of Passover. "What are the joys of Passover?" I hear someone asking. They are:

1. The Passover seder. Yummy.
2. The second Passover seder. Yummy again.
3. Matzah.
4. Charoset.
5. Diet Coke.

I went to two seders this weekend, at Jenna's house. She decided that she wanted to use a certain haggadah that she had learned a lot about through school, and I have to say that I thought it was pretty cool, because it stressed that on Passover, it's not enough to re-read the story of the exodous from Egypt; we have to re-live it every year, in order to fully understand and appreciate it. And boy, did I connect with it this year. :) The first seder was really fantastic, and went on for hours and hours, because everyone was talking so much and having such great insights. The second seder was much bigger (20 vs 9 people), so we moved through the haggadah a little faster and spoke a lot less. Jenna's cousin, who sat next to me, made it clear that he wanted things to move along a little faster, and people ate when they felt like it, and many acted as if they'd never been to a seder before. I made a torte that I learned about from Martha Stewart Living, which was without a doubt the ugliest (but not bad tasting) thing ever... when I develop the pics of it that I took, I'll post them, so you can see how it looks much like a person would w/o skin. (It's a skinless torte!)

I had this one little "lesson" that I talked about at both seders which I was excited about, even though the wine made me a little flustered and unable to recount it as well as I would have liked to. Jenna mentioned to all of us that we should try to prepare something that related to the Passover theme of slavery, which caused me to do a lot of reading, since I haven't been to that many seders in my time. I thought about how weird it was that of all the major events that have happened to the Jewish people, slavery is the one that is concentrated on so fully during Passover; why wouldn't the Jews think about other things G-d has done for them, like save them from the torture that they endured in Egypt, etc? In thinking about this I found and article which talks about the two words for "work" in Hebrew: malacha and avodah. Malacha is the kind of work that has a finished product as it's climax; it's the sort of work that one is forbidden to do on shabbat, like building or creating. On the other hand, avodah, from which the word for slave (eved) is derived, is a mindless sort of work; it's a work for which there is no finished product, no climax, the sort of work a slave does for a master. The worker takes no pride in and feels no connection to the work that is being done, and is, in essence, sort of a mindless body doing the tasks that he is commanded to. That is the sort of slavery that the Jews were freed from when they left Egypt; G-d gave them back the ability to do work that had meaning, and again to have meaningful lives.

Of course, what's the first thing that happens to the Jews once they get to leave Egypt? They are slammed with 613 commandments (yeah, I know that most of you have only heard of 10, but that's because the first tablets given to Moses were broken so when he returned to the mountain to talk to G-d, G-d made a WHOLE LOT MORE LAWS in their stead) telling them how to live their lives, down to the most minute detail of diet, mannerisms, etc. It doesn't seem like G-d left them free for long; it would seem that by giving them these laws, he is forcing them to continue to live a life which is dictated to them and mindless.

Then, I found an analogy that made me realize how untrue that is. Consider a violinst at Julliard. This violinist is a prodigy, but in Julliard, she is told how to sit, stand, hold her instrument, breathe, read music, how much rest to get prior to a performance, what sort of presence to have on stage -- she is told how to do most everything. After a while, though, those things which she was dictated to do become second nature, and only serve to make it easier for her to create beautiful music on her instrument. The end result of this is a person who feels so natural doing all these other things that the only thing left for her to do is create awesome music, to improvise, to do all the other things which might have been inhibited by a weaker framework. The commandments are the same thing for people. They are a framework created to help us grow to our potential as good, kind, loving human beings. Once we become accustomed to them, they do not serve to enslave us, but rather to give us a greater freedom to accomplish the things that we are meant to. "Genuis is a gift, but greatness is an acheivement."

Anyway, enough religious lessons for today. While I was at Jenna's, I read By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept by Paulo Coelho, which I think totally fell in line with the Passover theme. It's an awesome book... each word is like poetry. The only problem is that it is very heavy-handed on the religious side, but I think that if you look past it's concentration on Christianity, then there are some pretty powerful messages within. The book made me feel that I really should just up and move to Madison until M can be here. The only reason that I don't is because of a seemingly misplaced sense of duty and responsiblity which is silly, when you think about all the good stuff to gain.

Finally, to top off Passover weekend (and start Passover week), I went to see Henry Rollins in San Francisco last night. The show had sold out months beforehand, but M wrote Henry and email and he said that I and three friends would be on the list. Guess what? I wasn't. And then, the stage manager said she had no idea who I or M was, and they wouldn't let us in. I called M in a panic, and through a bunch of pain, finally the manager went and asked Henry if he knew who M was, and he said that he did and that they should let us in. Phew. I was worried for a second. :)

The show was pretty damn funny. Initially, I was somewhat scared that my boyfriend might possibly have been influenced by someone like this, but as the show went on and Henry got more and more comfortable with the audience, I think that his true colors began to show more. I liked him, a lot. I was frightened (or is it saddened?) by the very very bland, laugh-track-esque reactions of the massive "punk" contingent in the audience... I know that as Henry started to show that he was against dumb violence, and that he really felt a strong connection with the mass of truly unfortunate people he's met during his travels, that the punk audience was thinking "huh?". Actually, maybe I am just being hard on them because of the way they laughed to EVERYTHING he said, even the un-funny stuff, at the beginning, making it obvious that they sort of worship the guy, which I pity. I don't think we should hold ANYONE in that high of a regard. These people obviously only relate to one part of a person who is much more multi-faceted than they could ever imagine from having heard a couple Black Flag albums. When he went into his tirade about how he was going to be president for a week, the little punky heads suddenly were back on board, but I was still thinking about how neat it was that this guy had so much going on in his head. I think I see why M is friends with him.

At the end of the show, Henry went into his "Don't wait for the President to fix shit for ya, 'cause he ain't, 'cause he's a dickless idiot who can't read" spiel. That, again, made me think about freedom and the things we can do to effect it.

I dunno, overall I think that this Passover is really affecting me. I am starting to feel a subtle change in my outlook take over. I'm excited to see where it goes.

Oh yeah, btw, the reason diet coke is in that list is because it has no corn syrup in it. Yay!