Nearly 60 years ago, out of the ashes of the Holocaust, thousands of Jews came with not much more than the shirts on their backs to a land recognizable only as a collective and distant memory.
Jennifer Rosen\’s height felt all the freakier because Jews are generally more vertically challenged than, say, Swedes.
At a time when the world shunned them, an estimated 20,000 Jewish refugees from Russia, Germany, Austria and elsewhere made their way to Shanghai before World War II.
Once upon a time, Joel ben Izzy worked as a mime — until he injured his hip in a car crash.\n\nThen he became a storyteller who lost his voice.\n\n\”If I could market irony, I\’d be rich,\” said the wry, rueful performer.\n\nBen Izzy — who eventually regained his speech — recounts the journey in a moving new book, \”The Beggar King and the Secret of Happiness\” (Algonquin, $22.95). Woven into the memoir are 15 multicultural folk tales, including the Talmudic legend of how King Solomon achieved wisdom after temporarily losing his empire.
This month, as I started my work with the American Jewish Committee (AJC), my wife\’s father, Sol, celebrated his 90th birthday with his friends at Leisure World of Laguna Woods. Like many of us, Sol is a transplant to Orange County from Brooklyn, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles and finally reaching this day at Leisure World.
We are a people that move as life changes. For Sol, this has been a fortunate journey, and he has his community to support him. For the rest of us, finding our place in a community of transplants can be a challenge.
Lately, more people than ever have been staring at my chest. But it\’s not what you think.
\”I knew this could be a good story because so many different things had happened to people,\” said Dan Klores, sounding more like an introvert than a schmoozer. \”You have a group of guys, and one is homeless, one wins a $45 million lottery, two lose their children and one lives without electricity or running water in Woodstock, N.Y.\”
The question is not if we are we safe, but what can each of us do to be safer? The idea is to find the balance between alert and alarmed, between giving in to our fears (and to fear mongers) and giving up.
Through many years of rabbinic traveling and teaching, I\’ve been blessed to serve congregations from Long Island to Maui and from Canada to Australia. I\’ve prayed in shuls from Transylvania to Argentina, and I\’ve discovered that in all the world Juneau\’s community is unique. The fusion of Alaskan life and Jewish tradition never ceases to amaze me.
When rabbi and author Jan Goldstein was suddenly faced with the news that his 12-year marriage was ending — leaving him with primary custody of his three children — he felt his life was ruined, until he learned to make sense of his pain.
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