After two days of entertaining, I am so exhausted I could fall asleep at my keyboard. Therefore, just a brief pit stop here before I turn in for the night. Our pizza party was a huge success; round the table today was a bunch of friends, old and new: “Uncle” (to Yonah) Seth Perkins, Meira Bennett (daughter of our good friend and faithful blog reader Janice Bennett) and her schoolmate Esther, and Shuie’s childhood friend Zelig Barr, his delightful wife Emily and their three kids, Aviella, Naava and Azariya.

Meira and Esther were the only ones keeping two days of Yom Tov so it was an interesting mix at the party, with our music playing and people talking on cell phones while two Americans were still observing the holiday. During the meal Esther and I were talking about being a part of a family where some people are observant and some aren’t (like in my family), where under the same roof some people will watch television, use electricity and run errands on Shabbos and holidays while others of us are Shomer Shabbat (observant of the laws of the Sabbath). Esther smiled. “That’s sort of like it is here today.” I laughed. “Exactly!”

After the crowd left later this afternoon, Shuie took a looooong nap in the Sukkah and Seth and I visited for a while. I hadn’t seen him for a few weeks and I was glad to catch up with him. Not only do I really enjoy his company, but I also feel an obligation to make sure he’s doing okay since his family is taking such good care of Shira back in the States. I fed him like a clucking Jewish mother hen and tried to convince him to spend the night in our Sukkah, but he had already made plans. Before he left, he promised he would come back for our party on Tuesday night and will gladly stay in our Sukkah then

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Just when I was ready to settle in for the night, our friends Judah and Ariella invited us to come hang out in their sukkah (build on the roof of their building which is, of course, at the top of our street), so we mustered up our energy and made the hike up. It was so nice to visit with friends, especially in a different sukkah. It made me really appreciate the experience of Sukkot in Jerusalem; most people live in apartments and build their sukkahs any place they can find the space outside: rooftops, parking lots, back gardens, on the sidewalks. Everyone becomes instant neighbors in their little wooden houses. You can hear people talking, singing, eating, arguing. Even though we all have our own little Sukkahs, one gets the feeling that we’re all really in it together here. We were learning some torah from our Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach at the table in which he said that all of Am Yisrael (the nation of Israel) are all under one sukkah during this holiday, that we are all connected and together during this joyful time. Here is Israel, I can see how that’s true.

One more quick thing, and then it’s off to bed. Due to both the morning rush and taking care of Yonah, I don’t get much time to daven (pray) in the morning. When I do get the time to really get into it, I always end up crying. Yesterday morning, while Yonah was napping, I took an hour to daven and, of course, ended up in tears. I told Gd that I wished He could just come and hug me, that I could get that sense of a loving embrace from him on a physical level and not just a spiritual one. When I told my friend Michal about that she said, “You built a Sukkah, didn’t you? Walk into it. That is Gd hugging you”. That one comment opened up this holiday for me in a way I have never experienced it before. I share it now with the hope that it brings some inspiration to anyone else celebrating Sukkot, that they might feel more connected to the experience of this awesome holiday.