Cover to Cover

I wrote this piece for a spoken word presentation called a "sermon slam" that was held over shavuot, the holiday that celebrates the Jews receiving the ten commandments at Sinai. The topic had to relate to "Torah" in some way.  

I don't know if you remember the first book of Torah that you read in your native tongue. If you remember that first chunk of Tanach you sat and read cover to cover, start to end. Instructed only to understand the grace of the language or story before you.My first cover to cover story was Job.Job.An English assignment given my senior year in my public high school. By the way, the first I’d read in Hebrew (the language I did not yet comprehend, with moments of translation, only glanced) was Eicha. Good luck to me and my theology.The Job assignment was on adaptation and was followed by a reading of the play JB by Archibald Macliesh (I recommend it.) But before that, we dove deep into the Torah. When a day-school educated classmate attempted to read aloud the Hebrew of God's poem, the voice from within the whirlwind, I learned the complicated poetry of Torah and I also learned that Job of Ur was not a Jew.So I went through the rest of my life just knowing this.
Other parts of books of Torah I'd been taught as a child had been disproven, or rather reclassified as Midrash. But this text I knew intimately.

From Eicha to Job, the ancient Jewish literature I'd been exposed to outside of Shabbat morning services was gritty and complicated, like my dear Maya Angelou the poet, the author who'd inspired me for years. She was able to tell deeply personal stories. Dirty secrets and all.

God seemed to have spared no secrets from us, the Israelites in ancient times, which were carried to each of us. And so I was ready to engage with a God who kept no secrets from me. In fact, before I got intimate with Job I was intimate with Kabbalah. (I know, right?)

I don't know if you remember the first sermon you slammed, the first Jewish text you taught. But mine were the kabbalistic teachings of Isaac Luria who gives to us that when our endless God, (known as) Ein Sof created the world a shattering had to occur to make space for us and the world as we know it, and divine sparks spread across the land. Ein sof left these sparks, markers, for us to gather, to act in concert with God by committing an act of repair, of Tikkun Olam.

What is your Tikkun olam? Is it the Torah you teach or the Torah you practice? Is it the way you spread light in the world, or amongst your closest friends? No matter the reach, your Torah, you, have value and worth beyond measure. So share yourself. Bring the spark. Or perhaps, you can let the spark be brought to you.

Just four years after I'd first uncovered Job I sat where God often isn't. Summer school. In a theology course. There, we reapproached Job with a professor who said, "I learn from my students, and I teach what they say when I lecture across the country, but I've never been given reason to quote my undergraduates" I gave him a reason. He asked why Job has been included in our canon. My answer felt trite to me.

When he teaches Job, he teaches me. And it seems, whenever I learn, Job finds me. Just last week, I picked up the newest book written by my most revered teacher, Adin Steinsaltz. It's called "My Rebbe" about the lubuvitcher rebbe. Until just a few years ago the very thought of the rebbe made me shiver. When I was living across the country and he was Ill, I attended Lubavitch yeshiva. We were made to fast for him twice. I was in 5th grade. You can imagine that went over none too well.

But back to, My Rebbe. Not even a full page in, Steinsalz writes "The concept of holiness is not confined to traditional Jewish thought; nor are holy people only Jews. An entire book of the Bible tells the story of one such holy man who was not a Jew: Job.  His conversation, as presented in Scripture, speaks of the spiritual realm, about a connection beyond the everyday world."

And in the next chapter, he focuses on the idea of Tikkun Olam referencing first its mention in the Aleinu prayer. He explains: “The work is ours to do. None of us is exempt from this universal mission. The completion of the world, its elevation into holiness and the elimination of evil: these tasks belong to all of us. In this way, we achieve God’s purpose in creating humanity.” He goes on to say Chasidic thought here rests on an ancient mystical tradition: the world is imperfect because God is hidden. It is true that – whether revealed or hidden – the Almighty is everywhere. A godly spark resides within everything in creation.”

Somehow my Torah is Steinsaltz’s Torah, is his Rebbe’s Torah, is my Torah. Handed. Down. Unknowingly. Perhaps. We are all in line for this Torah.

But I ask you now: What is your Torah? What text circles its way back in to your life over and over and over again? What is holy to you? What is the Torah that can be taught in your name? Mine is simple. If faith in our Lord can be held by the downtrodden non-Jew, shouldn't it also be held by you? It should certainly be held by me.  A keepsake. If the Torah can be used as a tool to understand God, if it can be used as a tool to understand humanity, if it can be understood as a tool to understand holiness. I want to be immersed in Torah for the rest of my life.

That's all I'm asking as you sit or stand at Sinai. Each time you approach Torah or Torah approaches you. Make space. Make space in your heart make space in your life make space in your dreams. If you create room for Torah, however you define it, your path will be more clear, your heart more complete, your teachings spread amongst all who are here to listen.

May her memory be a blessing...

Today, a woman who was very influential in my life passed away. This is the piece I wrote about my memories of her in the middle of June, having heard she was sick. I wrote while recovering from my second surgery on my leg.

Thinking about dance after not having danced for six months made me extremely happy, if tearful... I'm not yet up to the kind of dance that would have impressed Fran, but I am back on two feet and working towards it.

My memories:
I remember the first day I met you, Fran. I was stretching outside the audition room, waiting for West Side Story dance auditions to start. I was a freshman and I’d only signed up for dance and acting auditions, I think. I didn’t yet have a strong enough voice to sing for Alan. At least, that was the impression I had from my mother’s high standard. Anyway, I hadn’t set foot in Theater South yet except to see the production of Our Town (and the One Acts). I was avoiding high school drama, by avoiding drama all together - because I held a Sag and Aftra card, and how would that go over w/typical teenagers who were dreaming of life on the stage?

But despite my attempts to avoid my TS fate, I became friends w/so many cast and crew members. I thought, perhaps, I would hone my craft. I’d already decided I wanted to commit my time to cultivating friendships rather than getting rejected by the casting agents William Morris sent me to. So, finally, a friend (Greg Stemkowski) who knew about my childhood acting (from catching the Disney movie I was in that played on channel 11), convinced me to get involved. Who could refuse a face like Greg’s?

So there I was, warming up right outside of the audition room. I was wearing a black bodysuit and what would probably pass as yoga pants these days. I’d only lived in Great Neck for just over a year, and very few people knew much about my life back in California. Some girl said, “hey, you dance for real, don’t you?” I’d been taking dance classes since I was 2 1/2.  “I’ve taken lessons,” I called back nonchalantly. Everyone had probably taken lessons, at least amongst the girls. That’s what moms do with their daughters, right? I had taken 3 kinds of dance, which eventually became 4, ballet, tap, jazz and ‘street funk’ — but you know all of that, Fran, because you recognized it too - immediately - and gave me a role in West Side Story that took my breath away with every high kick. There I was, a featured dancer, and I promise you, every part of my body thought that those moments on stage would become my college essay.

The rush of getting a routine perfectly right as the curtain closed on a pose impossible to hold for just one more second, that was one of the most exhilarating feelings I ever could have imagined having. I was a Shark. It didn’t matter that my pale complexion and red-hair would have told you otherwise. A lesson in bronzer ensued. And my expertise in eyeliner did not go to waste. In fact, it became my reputation so much so that I’d often do make-up for the guys in shows for the coming years. How I loved having that skill, and so what if it came from professional make-up artists, very few people would ever know that.

On stage without wardrobe malfunctions.

The following year we did Cabaret, so, of course, with my voice still inconsistent despite it’s years of training, I was dancing my sexiest heart out. On stage in Victoria’s Secret underwear, and a sequined Banana Republic vest that my New-York-City-living aunt had bought me. I have the picture and I’m not sure how my mother bought me those items w/out asking more questions! During previews, you remember, those times we would show a few scenes in an assembly with nearly the whole school in attendance? We did a big kit kat club number that, thanks to the structure of the preview ended with curtains down (and darkness). Lucky me, as I was laying with my back on the ground doing a full split in the air, when the vest, formerly snapped shut, bust wide open. That’s what I got for not letting you do my costuming, I guess.  But I don’t know if I ever told you. In fact, I told as few people as humanly possible. Instead of explaining the situation, I formed an internal lacing system with safety pins and, of things I had handy, glow in the dark elastic. It survived the shows, but I never could look at that vest again.  In fact, to this day when I’m asked my most embarrassing moment, that’s the first story that comes to mind.

So back to where I started, the first day dancing with you became many days, and to my good fortune, even when my priorities changed in high school, and I started observing shabbat my junior year, you found me in the halls and asked, “Sheridan, why didn’t you audition for the musical this year?” And I explained to you that I couldn’t imagine getting approval not to perform on a Friday night. “What?!” You said, aghast! “I would have built choreography for that! Of course I would. To not have you on stage is a real loss.” I couldn’t believe my ears, Fran. And thanks to that conversation, I did Music Man in my senior year. And while I couldn’t accept the singing solo Alan Schwartz offered because I’d be out Friday night, I could dance my heart out because you knew how to make that happen. Your choreography was a blessing, even when it was difficult. Even when we had to go over it again. It would always elicit a smile from yours truly.

You are truly one of the reasons I am able to look back fondly at Great Neck South. For its uniqueness, its understanding, its ability to meet my needs as a student, learner and active participant in the community. I went on to get to BAs - one in English and one in Modern Jewish Studies (from Columbia and the Jewish Theological Seminary) and from there, my Master’s in Education, focusing in informal and communal Jewish education, also at JTS.  I worked with teenagers for the first three years after graduate school - first creating educational material for youth groups and then at the Sid Jacobson JCC, where I was encouraged many times to get involved in their musical. Then, I started working at my alma mater - Columbia University. Nearly five years later, I’m still here, serving as the Assistant Director of the Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies. I sometimes joke with my colleagues and the PhD students and faculty whom I oversee that my public high school was a lot like a yeshiva. I learned the book of Job, I took Hebrew, I was able to comfortably observe shabbat … remarkable, really. You were part of that experience, and I’m so grateful to say that’s so. While in college, I had the opportunity to see Cabaret on Broadway with Alan Cumming as the Emcee - it was extraordinary, to sit at the small tables so close to the performers and smile so big to keep myself from belting out the songs with the cast. From the obscene to the absurd and back again, or as they say in Cabaret; “every night we have the battle to keep the girls from taking off all of their clothing. So don’t go away, who knows? Tonight we may lose the battle!” Well, I wish you well with every battle you face, a complete healing as we say in hebrew, a refuah sheleima. Thank you for always being an inspiration in your dedication, understanding and commitment to excellence.

Love always, Sheridan Gayer GNSHS ’95-’99

P.S. I write this just days after having a very involved surgery to correct something that went wrong when I broke my leg in January. I have run a tour in Israel on crutches since then, but I have hobbled around with a cane since. Right now I’m in a cast for the second time in six months, and for the next two weeks I’m not to do anything but keep my leg elevated and use crutches when I go to the bathroom or get up for water. The less often I’m up, the happier the doctors are. That’s a long way of saying I haven’t walked normally in almost six months, and it has been a privilege to recall my days on stage with you during my own recovery.