Confidence, the musical (metaphor)

Never Done: Practiced singing Handel's Messiah with score and recording
Tshuve: 20 years of community building

I started the day with a plan for my Never Done du jour: I was going to stop in and consult with a street psychic. But the day took a turn when the printer I went to couldn't read the file I had sent them, and I had to go back to my apartment to get the file in another format. I didn't actually know where I was going to find a street psychic (I don't track their locations) but on the way back to my apartment, I passed a beautiful young woman sitting on the sidewalk, with a big sign that she was having a $2 special. BUT .... I didn't have time.

So I hurried on home, making a new plan as I went. My new plan was that I was going to go to an art supply store near Brooklyn College. Going to see Brooklyn College, and its neighborhood, is on my list. It's held a somewhat mythical place in my mind for the past 20 years, since hearing stories of my good friend Carol's young days in Brooklyn. Now I live 10 minutes away by car, and it still feels mythological, since I haven't gone. I also have some friends moving into that neighborhood, because it can actually be affordable to buy a house over there. So, I was excited to go, and to get the art paper I needed for my printing job there. BUT on the way to my apartment, I passed a store I hadn't know about, that had art paper.

And then I passed a different printer. I ended up spending the next couple of hours working on the printing project with a different set of people than I had planned. As the afternoon wore on, and the work day neared an end, and I was heading to my Mussar Va'ad, and I didn't have a Never Done back-up plan, I wondered how it would all work out.

As I arrived at my friend Zeva's building where the Mussar Va'ad meets, I saw Margie and Victor approach the building. Margie is going to MC the JFREJ Marshall T. Meyer Risk Taker Awards next Wednesday, and we've been talking on the phone a lot lately. Since I know she doesn't live in that building, I asked where they were going. She said they were going for a PCUN fundraiser. Really?

PCUN is Pineros y Campesinos Unidos -- the farmworker union in Woodburn, Oregon. I was very close to PCUN over the years I lived in Oregon, but haven't seen many people from there since I left. I asked who was here -- was it Ramon? No, it's Larry. Really?

Larry and I were close friends and colleagues. We co-founded Progressive Jewish Alliance together after New Jewish Agenda folded. Margie suggested I stop in and say hi. So I stopped in for a minute, and saw Larry for the first time in probably 10 years. I promised to come back after my Mussar Va'ad, but as I was leaving, Margie asked me to go over the khanike blessings with her and Ellen. I knew both Margie and Ellen before I actually knew them, back when I was working for Workers Organizing Committee in Portland, and they were both leaders at foundations that funded us. They, like Brooklyn College, felt somewhat mythical to me when I lived in Oregon, so when I moved to New York and they were in my midst, through JFREJ and Kolot Chayeinu and PCUN fundraisers, I was a little awestruck at first.

I'll abbreviate the evening. After a deep talk about truth at Mussar Va'ad, and after stopping in again at the PCUN fundraiser, I arrived home to an email from Kathleen, another close friend from Portland (who actually grew up in Queens.) She had written to say that she had reached out to Scot (yet another Portland organizer friend) to ask for advice about film funding, and that Scot had suggested that we ask Ellen for her thoughts, and if we didn't know her, he could make the introduction.

You guessed it. That's the same Ellen I had recited khanike blessings with just a few hours earlier, who interviewed me in 2004, when I became the Development Coordinator of JFREJ. Some days it's just impossible to stay isolated. More to the point, what a wonderful, wonderful view I received of the thread that binds my connection to, and roles in, progressive and artistic community building over the past 20 years!

But did any of this count as Never Done? I didn't think so. It was 10 PM -- still time before bed. So I took out the scores of Handel's Messiah that I borrowed from the library, and I put on the London Philharmonic recording I downloaded earlier in the day on iTunes, and Josh and I tried to sing the bass and alto choral parts to the first 7 oratorios. Oy. It's gonna take practice, plus picking my lines out on the piano, so I don't keep being drawn to the soprano lines, which are mostly, but not entirely, in my range. And also, so that I can sing out with confidence, and not mumble my way through the score. Which is my new goal -- not just to attend the Sing Along Messiah, but to sing it out with confidence. A metaphor to live by. Omeyn.

That was really the end of the post, but I didn't write nearly enough about truth, or decisiveness -- last weeks, and this weeks, Mussar mides (middot.) I will try to work that in to upcoming posts. And, since I'm writing a little addendum, I'd like to ask again that if you are willing and inclined, that you click on the FOLLOW button on this blog, and become a follower, and that I invite you to invite your friends to read it. Thank you for reading. I love getting your comments and feedback.