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September 26, 2003
Teshuvah on the road
Many of us waste the gift of time by procrastinating.
OZZIE NOGG SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH BULLETIN
The Jewish New Year offers us a chance to do significant spiritual
housecleaning and, if we're willing to look at our dirty linen and
then toss it out, we're given a clean start and the opportunity
to head in the right direction.
In the weeks that precede the Days of Awe, we're told to examine
our souls and take stock of our deeds. We're exhorted to review
the way we've lived our lives in the past year. Faced with our shortcomings,
we naturally berate ourselves for things we left unsaid or undone.
And so, before the New Year arrives, we try to settle past wrongs,
repair family feuds and bury hatchets. On Rosh Hashanah and Yom
Kipper, we rush to our synagogues, beat our breasts, repent and
ask forgiveness. We promise to practice teshuvah – to
return to the right path – in the hope that we will be inscribed
in the Book of Life for another year.
And yet, when we're lucky enough to be granted another year, it's
ironic that so many of us waste this precious gift of more time
by procrastinating. We delay our teshuvah until later. Our resolutions
gather dust. We put off saying, I'm sorry or I love you or thank
you. And often, by the time we do get around to saying those things,
it's too late.
My father was the anti-procrastination poster child. After the Russian
Revolution, he didn't wait around. Nope. He grabbed some forged
papers, tucked his tallit under his arm and hopped a ship for the
Promised Land. He landed in America with no English, no job and
the prayer that if he just put one foot in front of the other, he'd
wind up in the right spot. And when he did misstep, Poppa simply
made an immediate mid-course correction.
Like the time, years ago, when we took a family driving trip.
Poppa was at the wheel, Momma sat beside him and my little brother
Michael and I were in the back. We'd been on the road for some time
when Michael said, "Does everybody go through Missouri on their
way from Omaha to Minneapolis?"
Momma, in a panic, said to Poppa, "Oy, Gottenyu. We're going
the wrong way! We must have taken a wrong turn in Des Moines. So,
when we come to the next exit you'll just get off and turn around."
But that form of teshuvah wasn't Poppa's style. Instead – right
there on the interstate – Poppa made a perfect U-ee, up and
over the median, and headed back in the right direction.
We were flabbergasted, but Poppa explained his actions, calmly and
with logic.
"Where is it written that you have to wait for an exit to turn
around?" he said. "Besides that, the exit could be very
far away. It could take a long time to get there. And furthermore,
how would you feel if – when you finally did get to the exit
- it was closed."
Ozzie Nogg is a freelance writer in Omaha, Neb. Her self-syndicated
features take a slightly off-beat look at the history and observance
of Jewish holidays, festivals and lifecycle events. Check out her
Web site, www.rabbisdaughter.com.
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