A Big "S"

Our separation will begin on Wednesday, October 10. It’s hard to think of separation as having a date. It’s hard to think of separation. I think that’s separation with a big S.

Separation.

We agreed on Sukkot as an island of time in which some sort of family normality would be upheld before the big S began. We would build a sukka as usual. We would have company around as usual. We would bring the TV up and watch “Lord of the Rings”, all three movies, in the evenings. In the daytime we would sit in the sukka with our laptops, Aryeh would sing and play his guitar, the children would come by and visit, food and drink would be plentiful, the breeze would lift our hair and our spirits around five, the sun would set around six, fairly lights would be blinking in the sukka by seven.

This year unepxrtected winds and rains have rifled through the sukka like agents of CIA looking for evidence. Pictures lift off the walls and wineglasses roll to the floor and smash, sending shards of glass all over the floor. The “Ushpizin” I lovingly painted and framed many years ago falls forwards and clatters to the floor. Lying back on the Sukka couch and gazing up at the decorations my eyes fill with tears. I don’t like to call this the “last sukkot”. Two ominous and dramatic for me, a term for death. But a lesser death nevertheless is occurring here; the death of how things were always done, the death of a home which functioned a certain way, the death of two people’s chosen life together moulded into one. I think my soul has not yet begun to mourn the passing of these things. The idea of my home no longer being home is something I can hardly touch the edge of. But it must be touched. It must even be embraced.

My jouney only beginning, I lie back and stare up at the sukka palm leaves, all grown in my own garden, between them the stars winking. Wish me luck. I know there will be times when I will long for this sukka - I pray to be blessed with another one day. I loved my Bayit Neeman Be’Yisrael. I pray to be blessed with another one of those, too.