A Cold Plunge

The week between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur seems a little like how I imagine a cold plunge feels – if I ever had the courage to take one. Why? Because I go from celebrating the Jewish New Year, a happy time, to 24 hours of introspection, looking back at how I might have been a better son, father, partner, and certainly a better citizen. I look back on my thoughts and feelings about others over the past year. Perhaps it was Providence that a small photo, from an early Kodak camera, taken some time in the fall of 1951, of my sister Ruby, brother Marty, and me in front of my brother’s dorm at Alfred University in upstate New York, found its way onto my picture-cluttered desk. The three of us with arms around each other, and me, little 11-year-old Lenny, in the middle. My thoughts this week go back to the time and place that formed the fabric of my essence. Nurtured by my older siblings in a family that didn’t show a lot of affection, it was Marty and Ruby who, during the few years we all lived under one roof, showed me the love and expression of inner feelings that shaped my ability to care for and pay attention to the feelings of others throughout my life. This Yom Kippur, as the delicate tallit fringe falls between my fingers, my daughters and grandson beside me, I think about how my actions influence their life experiences. How can I help them become better people through the example of my own decisions and conduct?

No need for a real ice-water cold plunge. As I contemplate the upcoming Yom Kippur fast, that will be cold plunge enough.