Pearls of Wisdom

And then this: I found myself in joy in the middle of work. Well, at the end of work. 8:30 PM, Friday night, shabbes dinner slash performance as part of my new social justice Jewish performance festival  listening to Juliette Holmes tell a story about the first time her (African American) parents voted, in the face of repeated attempts by others to suppress of their vote. Sitting with 50 other people who all wept at the same moment when she brought the story home: at the age of 93, her mother voted for the first African American president of the United States. Thinking about how every single one of us has dozens of stories that could matter to every single other one of us, if the stories were well-crafted, and if we were truly open to hearing each others’ stories. Happy to look around and be with the community in the room. People I’ve known for years from one place, and for years from another. People I’ve been getting to know since I started at the JCC, and people I was meeting for the first time. Wondering what our stories are, the people in the room together. Hoping that one day everyone there gets a chance to tell.