Get by with a little help from my friends

Free falling down a staircase weeks ago has opened my eyes to the subtleties of life.  Being on bed rest has forced me to stop and smell the cliche roses.  Things that have typically whizzed by in a succession of blurs have slowed to a merry go round pace.  The beauty realized is in the subtle sweetness of my family and good friends. This morning, as I watched my friend Chedva make challah dough in my kitchen; I got a rush of what is a Jewish Community.  There is nothing to compare to all the people that come together in simcha/ joy and in sorrow.  As a b'l tchuvah, I watch with alien perspective and awe of the simple acts of chessed (kindness) ingrained in each person I've come to know and love.  It is the framework of our Torah.  It is the heart and soul of our people. It's the one thing, if i was asked by the outside world, "What does it mean to be a Jew?"... I'd easily answer an eternal love of Torah and chessed that has been ingrained in even the most annoying, moody, or downright annoying of us since birth. Last year my step grandmother was in hospice, on her death bed, literally laying in wait for her time.  My mom relayed to me how well the nurses treated her.  To quote, "it was like being around family".  That statement didn't sit well with me.  " Like family", what?  These people are hired to comfort and care, yet their devotion to a stranger could never be that of a family member.  It's a facade to the untrained eye that has never known what being in a community is like.  Even the people looking from outer rungs and questioning their Jewish self are still part of this communal inner circle.  It, the community, is larger than life and why Hashem created us to live together amongst scattered nations.   My husbands explanation of our journey back to Jewish roots sums it up best.  People are always intrigued by the two juvenile delinquents (David and myself) they meet for the first time....often staring at us from across a Shabbas table unable to play Jewish geography with the only 2 people in the room that know more people knick named Sully rather than Chaim.   The question always comes from the most observant to the most unobservant Jews..."why have you chosen this life, what made you both become b'l tchuvah?". The answer is simple, yet beautifully uttered by David.   Years back we attended an orthodox wedding in the heart of Syrian Brooklyn.  We could hardly know what to expect...from the mechitzah separating the women and men to the old and young Jews with a menagerie of kippot, streimels, and black hats.  We had left 2000 and stepped into  an 1800 shtettle.  The only Jewish thing we could associate the scene with was Fiddler on the Roof...the closet identity to Jewish custom in both our houses.  A reform Jew for some reason always knew the lyrics to Sunrise Sunset.   David marveled at a chassidic Rabbi, with a beard longer and older than our combined age, take center stage before the groom and the hoards of his friends to put on his "show" of wiggling fingers.  Everyone screamed in joy, dancing, laughing, celebrating like it was their very own wedding...their very own joy in life.  David asked a man in the crowd, "I've never seen so many people alive with celebration. Is this all close family?".   And the man, who happened to be the average Jewish community member attending the wedding, not the inner circle of the bride/grooms family, said, "We have known this boy from birth, as a community we have watched him grow from his Brit Milah, to his Bar Mitzvah, to today on his joyous wedding day." That was our first baby steps back to a path carved out by our Bubbies and Zaidies many generations ago.  To have that deep connection with another person, many people, all entrenched in the same faith and devotion to Gd  is what inspired us.  These past few weeks of visitors,  filled freezers and fridges, babysitting, play-dates, emails and inquiries to our families well being have all been the subtle beautiful reminders of what a Jewish Community can and should be.  Too many times we focus on the faults of the community, the bubble I've heard many refer to it as...but more importantly we should focus on all the community so naturally does right. Shabbat Shalom!  38 weeks and still making challah.