10 Elul:
Recently I noticed a scab on our daughter’s
knee, and I was brought back to when she was born. Babies’ knees are perfect when they are born,
and she was no exception. Of course I
believe she was perfect all over, but I found myself transfixed by her perfect
little knees. By the time our daughter
was born, our sons were 5 and 3. Their
knees were already roughed up and often scabbed over. In fact, most of us tend to picture knees as
these scarred, ugly things that tend to go out on us with age. This is probably why her knees fascinated
me. If our knees are a testament to how
active we are at roughing them up, then her knees were a completely blank
slate. Her smooth, pudgy legs had
endured nothing, and she had her whole life ahead of her to bang them up and
make them into the rough joints that look so natural—just like the rest of us.
With knees we do not expect
perfection. Coarse, bumpy, slightly
greyed patches of skin are normal, and perfectly acceptable. Why then, would we expect any less of the
rest of us?
Life makes us marred. Humans are not perfect (except maybe when
they are babies), so there is no reason to expect anything more than coarse,
bumpy, slightly greyed individuals. The
High Holy Days are a time to reflect on that which makes marks on us, and how
we impact others.
(DNY)
11 Elul:
An often repeated
quote from the Dalai Lama, when asked what surprised him the most about
humanity: “Man. Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money.
Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And
then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the
result being that he does not live in the present or the future;he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived.”
(BGL)
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