A letter unread
The Talmud says a dream that isn't interpreted is like a letter that isn't read. Which is a lovely line until you have a nervous one at 4am and your study partner is asleep.
I dreamt the challah wouldn't rise. Over and over, every Shabbat, flat dough. Very subtle, my subconscious.
So on Sunday I did a small, informal version of hatavat chalom, 'making the dream good': I told it to three friends from study group over bagels, and they answered me that it was a good dream. One of them added, 'and also you need new yeast.' Both were true. The new yeast worked. So did the friends.
Havdalah and the smell of cloves
My favorite prayer of the week takes about four minutes. Saturday night, three stars out, the braided candle lit, a cup of wine, the spice box passed around.
My study group taught me the old idea that we're given an extra soul on Shabbat, the neshamah yeteirah, and that it leaves us at Havdalah. The spices are there to comfort the soul that stays behind. I think about that every week now, breathing in the cloves like it's a hug.
Then we hold our fingers up to the flame to see the light on our nails, douse the candle in the wine with a little hiss, and say shavua tov. A separation between holy and ordinary, and somehow the ordinary week feels holier for it.
Cheshvan, the month that smells like wet leaves
Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan today. Cheshvan has no holidays at all; after the whirlwind of Tishrei it's just... weeks. Some people call it Mar-Cheshvan, the bitter month.
But my study group spent last night in Sefer Yetzirah, which gives every month a letter, a sign and a sense. Cheshvan gets the letter Nun, the sign Akrav (Scorpio), and the sense of smell. And Berachot 43b says smell is the one pleasure the soul enjoys and the body doesn't.
So that's my practice for a month without holidays: noticing. Wet leaves on the walk to shul. Woodsmoke from the neighbor's chimney. Challah at 4pm on a Friday. Not a holiday, but holy enough.
Moonlight through the sukkah roof
First night of Sukkot, and the moon came up huge, a breath from full, right through the gaps in the schach. You're supposed to be able to see the stars through the roof of a sukkah, it's practically the law, and we could see all of them plus the moon plus a curious raccoon on the fence.
We ate my lopsided round challah (round for the new year, lopsided for authenticity) in our coats. My study group has been reading about the ushpizin, the seven holy guests invited in over the festival, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Aaron, Joseph and David, each linked to one of the sefirot. So I set an extra place.
My partner asked if Abraham wanted soup. Obviously Abraham wanted soup. He's famous for hospitality.