    |
|
||
|
||
|
|
|
Creating a Grassroots Jewish Community: How One Group Got Started After the initial Break Fast, another newly found marginalized Jewish friend and I began to gather people for Shabbat dinners, Chanukah parties and more High Holy Day meals. We made lists and individually called people to invite them, encouraging them to bring other friends. Over time people became intrigued in our intimate, somehow alternative, yet comfortably-touching-on- tradition approach to sharing the holidays. It was like that old Breck commercial: "They told two friends, and they told two friends..." Together, we gathered lots of what I like to call "alterna-Jews," individuals who somehow felt alienated by congregational Judaism - or their family's brand of Judaism - and people who lived in the margin anyway: artists, writers, activists, etc. Most of the people were unaffiliated and/or not practicing. In the first few years, it was just about breaking bread Jewishly together - Break Fasts and Shabbat dinners. There was an initial Pesach gathering which, unlike a traditional seder, didn't involve a Haggadah. Instead, we had a discussion about the story of Pesach, and shared stories and poetry. A visiting performance artist, known as "Tap Goddess of the Lower East Side" tap-danced the Four Questions - with Hebrew help from a locally-based poet and professor. We had become a family. People began to take for granted that we would spend holidays together, and often called me ahead of time to learn what was next. People began to work together outside of our events, and be each others' audiences or cheerleaders. When I met the love of my life, people in the circle of alterna-Jews lined up to meet him, gave us their blessing, and welcomed him into our family. After a few years, when things had really grown, both in terms of the size of the group and the interest in ritual, we got more organized. Another friend, an AIDS and Queer Activist, performer and self-proclaimed, "Queen of the Jews" had gotten involved with some of the organizational work, bringing more names to the circle through calls he made. We created a database for a mailing list, with as much address, phone, fax, and e-mail information as we could gather. Then we did a mailing inviting people to a Tashlich service (a service done at Rosh haShanah near a body of water, in which people symbolically throw away their sins) on the beach (living in Florida has its advantages) - with a pot luck dinner at my place; and a Break Fast at someone else's. At that point, there were about 40 households on the list, which represented 65 people. We identified other dates and delegated responsibilitie, inviting people to help organize services or host events. Eventually we had one meeting immediately before the High Holy Days to which everyone was invited. We sat down with a Jewish calendar and identified one event per month - the list had grown to 60 households by this point. The events ranged from the same High Holy Day activities as in the past to Havadallah services on the beach, making our own spice boxes and Havdallah candles, or a Purim party complete with Hamentashen baking and our own version of the Megillah, to a Tu B'Shvat seder, as well as the Bring-Your-Own-Chanukiah Chanukah party which became a tradition. We also instituted our own version of the traditional money pitch to pay for postage, copying, and any incidentals which a host might have to purchase. We put out two jars, one for the expenses (with a suggested donation) and one for Tzedakah. Later, the group would later decide how and where to donate - looking specifically away from the traditional "establishment" Jewish charities making it relevant to our lives and our values. Pesach became our "sell-out" event. It was the only event that had a cap on participation, and was the most organized. It was capped because it would be a sit down dinner in one person's home. We had decided to create our own Hagaddah, and the meal and hosting would involve a lot of work. So we instituted our first "Committees." Not wanting to mimic the "establishment" and burn people out, we didn't call them committees, and their work had a clear beginning, middle, and end. We established the "Haggadniks" to create the ritual - identify its pedagogy as informed by open individual input and build the Haggadah; and the "Balabustas" to organize the meal. The Haggadah that emerged was, of course, forward- thinking egalitarian, but most intruigingly it had a focus of the on-going Jewish Diaspora and a theme of "the journey," be it physical or mental. The seder was structured so that it flowed automatically without a leader, voices joining each other in unison and in dialogue, as succinctly as a playreading. Every community has its love stories - and we, of course have ours. Not that this group intended to be anything like your typical Jewish singles club - matchmaking was distinctly not our purpose - but we have our own event- generated shiddach (match) as well. One year at the Chanukah party a couple met - they were married about 15 months later. A week before we drove up to New York for our own wedding, the group threw us a mikvah in the Ocean, based on the traditional pre-wedding ritual of cleansing and purifying onself in a ritual bath before a wedding. We waded out into the water and dunked three times, reciting the blessings together, encircled by these friends. It was actually our marriage that inspired the name our group finally settled on, as another friend gave us a card that read, "To My Sandbox Friends," - referring to our time spent in "ritual play" on the beach. After four years, the group finally had a name: Sandbox. As much as Miami was home, we moved to Atlanta for job reasons. But our Sandbox community assumed we'd be "home" for Pesach. So we drove down to Miami, lugging reprinted haggadahs and vegetarian matzoh ball soup for 40, honored to remain integral to the family structure. Nothing seemed more appropriate than heading home to the Sandbox for Pesach this year, to my congregation, my community which had evolved its own personal and relevant ways of practicing Judaism. I had watched the group grow from three people to over 75, with a huge range in age, geographical origination, Jewish backgrounds and experiences, education, sexual identity, race, career, political views, and household structures. Some people relied on SandBox to be their congregation - others,
myself included, had been propelled to join a synagogue. Some
haven't joined a synagogue, but have begun to participate in
shuls like never before. It was truly a dream come true to watch
as relationships to each other and to our Judaism grew. We became
unto ourselves a virtual shtetl - and even at a distance it warms
my spirit and my soul to feel my place in that community.
|
||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||||||||
