In a new article for the Jewish Daily Forward, I visit a family camp at the Pearlstone Center. Check it out:
Pearlstone Does Farm-to-Table Family Style
Tag Archives: Judaism
Publication: Shmita comes home
This past week, I was thrilled to publish my first piece for Tablet Magazine. It appeared on Wednesday, 9/15, right after Rosh Hashanah.
Check it out:
Giving It a Rest: What I learned by observing ‘shmita’—a sabbatical year—in my community garden
Filed under Blog
Image for the Day: Dude ascending a staircase
Last year, I helped to plan a Shavuot event in this ravishing church. Shavuot, the Jewish holiday commemorating receiving the Torah, is coming up again at the end of May.
I decided to use this shot of the church stairwell today not because I am obsessed with stairwells, but because I love how the serene spiral is interrupted by a cacophony of life and color.
Ain’t that how it always goes?
If the stairway feels like my ideal conditions for writing or thinking or healing–calm, solid, continuous–then the glaring orange traffic cones and the person running up the steps with a Giant grocery bag depict how reality crashes in.
Image: The National Swedenborgian Church of the Holy City, 16th St. NW, Washington, D.C. Photo by Rhea.
Filed under DC, Image for the day, Jewish community, Uncategorized
Image for the Day: Indulge yourself, it’s Lag Ba’Omer
Lag Ba’Omer falls on the thirty-third day of counting the omer, a Jewish tradition that marks the seven weeks between Passover and Shavuot. Usually a solemn period, on Day 33, the rabbis say we can let loose. Get married! Host a wild cookout! Cut your hair!* I don’t know all of the details about this, but I am a fan of chilling and joy.
Photo by Flickr user Özgür Mülazımoğlu.
*If you’re wondering why the last one, leave a comment and I’ll do my best to answer.
Filed under Image for the day, Jewish community
Zen and the art of weed whacking
(Cross-posted from The Jew and the Carrot)
Caught in a rainstorm in Guatemala, with only chafing rain boots to tackle the wet, muddy miles ahead, Joe Gorin is about to give in to misery. Then he remembers a Buddhist practice: walking meditation. The scene begins to change as he uses this tool for enhanced awareness and thought to smooth the journey. This scene comes from Gorin’s memoir “Choose Love: A Jewish Buddhist Human Rights Activist in Central America,” and illustrates how well his spiritual practice entwined with his human rights work in 1980s Latin America. The author, who is a psychotherapist and I just call Joe, works the plot next to mine in a community garden in Northwest D.C. Joe gave me his book this spring, after I shared that I write. Continue reading
Filed under Jewish community
Rhea Kennedy Morgenstern, writer 