Saturday, September 1, 2012

Family of a Different Sort

Last night Gregory and I shared the Sabbath with Jan and Jake and Isaac, Sheldon and Laurie (Jan's brother and sister-in-law,) their friends Janet and Dave and Laurie and Mike (now our friends too.)

Defined, the Sabbath is a day of religious observance and abstinence from work, kept by Jews from Friday evening to Saturday evening, and by most Christians on Sunday and while Muslims do not celebrate the Sabbath like Jews or Christians, they do have a day of prayer on Friday.

For Jews it is most significantly celebrated in the home at sundown on Friday with the blessings over the candles, the wine, and the bread, followed by a home cooked meal.

You have heard me say often that Gregory and I are NOT religious. He is NOT Catholic-ish and I am NOT Jewish-ish. At least in the religious sense. In the spiritual sense, YES. In the celebrations of tradition, YES. In relation to a well cooked brisket of beef or a Christmas Tree, YES. 


But the Sabbath is much more to us than religious, as we once again experienced last evening. It is the coming together of people we care for, it is taking a moment in time to remember what we have to be grateful for:
food, light, shelter, health, family, friends.


It was a chance to chat and share with Sheldon and his wife Laurie, whom we haven't seen in many years. It was the always interesting time we spend with Janet and Dave, Laurie and Michael. It was the love and closeness and support and those things in common which we always feel when with Jan and Jake.

It was spending time with our God-Son Isaac, recently home from Japan where he taught for a year, and appreciating him and his ideas and his humor and his outlook on life and his reminder that we too were once young (should I say "and foolish and wise?") 

It is a reminder that we are loved and that we love in return. "Good Shabbas," as is said.


1 comment:

  1. Finally got to read this after much site seeing and reconnecting with Shel and Laurie. Shabbos continues to be my absolute favorite time to reconnect with friends and family. You and Greg remain so very important to and so deeply embedded in our hearts and lives. Shabbos makes us all slow down and remember to not take each other for granted.

    I love you.

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