"We all fall down."

Of all the chaplains in my department, the one who is most enthusiastic about distributing ashes on Ash Wednesday is me.  I think it's cool that I may be the only rabbi in America who has grey vestiges of burnt palm fronds on her right thumb after an afternoon of smearing the sign of the cross on Catholic brows.  I have been fascinated with the ritual of Ash Wednesday since elementary school when I saw classmates coming to school one morning with smudgy marks on their foreheads:  Through inquiry, I discovered that these marks were remnants from a religious ritual that had occurred at church before the start of the school day.  Something about it seemed so incredibly Jewish that it astounded me. Christians do rituals, too??


My personal take is that Ash Wednesday is the Christian Yom Kippur.  The intention of today -- "opening day" of the Lenten season -- is to make penance through fasting, prayer and giving to the community in order to prepare one's self and one's soul for the season of rebirth later in the Spring.  Sackcloth and ashes are standard biblical garb for displaying humility and grief -- in order to be reborn, you have to acknowledge that something in you's gotta die.


Yesterday I took off work so that I could make some serious headway on getting my stuff boxed up.  And in between phone calls, snacking and back-to-back episodes of Downton Abbey on Netflix (SO addicting.  Like crack for the nerdy and health-conscious.) I did make some progress.  As I tackled the items tucked away in the far reaches of my garage, I ended up coated with thick grey dust - my clothes, my hands, my face.  The symbolic parallel with the Christian season didn't escape my notice.  This process isn't just about the physical dissolution of a Boise life.  Rebirth lies in my future only if I acknowledge that there needs to be dismantling of some unhelpful attitudes and habits as well.


I came to Boise as a 33-year-old mom of a toddler and a 5-week-old infant. I was chronologically young and emotionally even younger.  I've received a generous amount of  love and support in the intervening years -- a lot of grace that I did not always deserve.  And life has also kicked me in the butt on occasion - not nearly as hard as most but enough to jar me out of some of my self-righteousness, my rigidity, my self-absorption. 


As I look at the scene in my house - living space broken down, walls bare and hidden dust revealed -- I know I need to be cognizant of this -- my own personal (non-Christological) Ash Wednesday.  I'm sadly leaving behind a lot of good -- people, natural beauty, community -- but I also need to say good-bye to the aspects of myself that have not been helpful. That's got to be part of my internal journey over the course of my cross-country travels.


When Jews return to the house of mourning after a funeral, there is always, among the casseroles and baked goods, a bowl of eggs.  There's death, there's life.  Sounds like an appropriate breakfast for when we cross into Maryland.