Why Am I So Tired?

The obvious answer to this question is because I don't sleep enough. In fact, I go to bed late after working on my book and I get up early with the kids and sometimes I spend time in between awake and chasing coyotes. So, I know that I don't sleep enough.

 But I finished a 15-mile bike ride the other day and I was exhausted, as you can see in this picture. By now in my training, 15 miles should be a perfectly acceptable ride. So, what's going on?

When I started this training, Neil Lyon, a member of the community who apart from being a mensch also has a wonderful first name, asked if I had a road bike. I said that I did. Six or so weeks later, I mentioned to him that my suspension had stared squeaking. "You don't have suspension," he said. "I do," I replied. "No, you don't," he retorted. I didn't know what to say, so I took a photo of the suspension on my bicycle. His reply was clear, "You don't have a road bike."

Ah. Sometimes we're divided by a common language. What he calls a road bike, I call a racing bike. What I call a road bike, he called a cyclo-cross bike. When he realized what I had been riding, in typical dramatic fashion he said that he needed to go and lie down because he was so exhausted thinking about how much effort I must put in moving this bike along the road.

I've always ridden mountain bikes and cross-bikes. I have a bad left knee that hurts and suspension ensures that it doesn't. It can be so painful that I had to give up my lovely Nissan Almera because the clutch was too heavy on my left knee. Without suspension, I genuinely worry that I'll hurt that knee. So, Neil has offered to try to find me a suitable sized "road bike." I'm not sure, though - I'm used to a bulkier bike for balance. I worry that with a road bike I'll come off and hurt myself

Moreover, I can't help noticing that even on the same bike, my times are getting slower. Time doesn't really matter per se - if you cycle 100 miles then you cycle 100 miles. But, if the times are dropping then that's evidence that I'm getting fitter. But they're not - over the last two weeks they've been getting steadily longer for the same ride. So, it's not necessarily about the bike.

I started to get concerned. Maybe I'm really not going to finish this race. Have I bitten off more than I could chew? Then I remembered something very important from my last (shorter) bike ride - how much easier it was with company.


If you don't know Ben Larzelere, then you're missing out. Ben is a retired Lutheran minister who is loved by very many members of Temple Beth Shalom. He comes to services often, and has been called Rabbi Ben by people for many years, which was slightly confusing for me when I started because the community already had Rabbi Ben Morrow, who is an actual Rabbi. Early in my training, I got in touch with Ben and asked him if he wanted to spend an entire day in interfaith dialogue with me, discussing spirituality, comparative religion, etc. There were provisos, though. It had to be on September 18th in Acoma on bicycles for 100 miles. Having cycled all across the country, Ben agreed.

Last weekend, I cycled 20 miles by myself and came home in 1 hour and 46 minutes, and I was rather pleased with that. That was the longest I had done so far in this training. This morning, though, I asked Ben is he would like to join me for 25 miles. We met at 6am because I had a 9am adult banot mitzvah class. As we cycled away, it became clear that Ben is an accomplished cyclist and that we are extremely well matched in terms of speed - he could go faster but doesn't need to. And I couldn't help but notice how quickly we were going. We followed exactly the same course as last week and completed it exactly ten minutes quicker - in 1 hour and 36 minutes! We added five more miles, which took us an extra 24 minutes, meaning two hours in the saddle. And with an hour to go before the class, I asked if we could add another five. Including the stop for when Ben's chain came off, we came home in exactly 2 hours and 25 minutes. And, most importantly, I wasn't exhausted. If I didn't have a class, I could possibly have gone much further.

Now, I'm starting to believe that I really might finish this race. Thirty miles without real stop in 2h25m and without being exhausted is really good progress. And it goes to show that if you want to face a big challenge, it's better to do it with others. So, how do I stop being so tired? Firstly, go to bed earlier. I get that. But also I need to train more with other people. Lesson well learned.

Next week as well as the usual mid-week rides, I'll be aiming for 35 or 40 miles on Sunday, although I do have an X-Wing tournament later so I shouldn't push it too much. Priorities, after all!

So far, four people have pledged sponsorship, totally $1700 if I complete this challenge. Please consider pledging to help spur me on, by going to https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/655G575 and making your pledge. Thank you.

I Need Your Help

I cycled ten miles this morning and my left knee hurts. I am clearly much more unfit than I realised. So if I’m going to complete this century – the longest bike ride I have ever undertaken – I am going to need your help. If I know that each mile raises more money, then I’ll push myself a little bit further and I’ll be more likely to complete the ride.

Why am I doing this? I’m doing it because I truly believe in Temple Beth Shalom as a world-changing community. I know that some people criticise religion and say it isn’t relevant or necessary in today’s society, but such people obviously haven’t seen Temple Beth Shalom at work. This community helped found the Interfaith Shelter for the homeless who were being turned away from other shelters. These people were dying on the streets but once the Shelter was set up, the deaths from hypothermia at winter stopped. We continue to support the shelter and save lives – last month we worked with other communities and together raised $54,000 to keep the Shelter open over the summer.  Temple Beth Shalom is a community that ensures that anyone of any faith and from any family, even those with little finances, can get a 5-star accredited Preschool education, even if that costs us money. We fight in the local legislature for equal rights, we fight against discrimination and we fight for social justice. We are a key voice for positive social change in Santa Fe. We work with local schools and with local schoolchildren who are struggling at school. We support the bereaved, we befriend the lonely, we bring people together. That’s the most relevant work possible but if that work is to continue as it does now, we need your support.

I believe in this community. I believe in the work that we’re doing. I know that it is good work, that we help change lives…. that we literally save lives. You can help save lives by making a pledge.

This 100-mile bike ride is going to be my biggest physical challenge yet. I did a 70-mile bike ride four years ago but much has changed since then. I weigh much more – about 15lbs more. I’m cycling at altitude, which means the air is thinner and that doesn’t help my asthma. And talking of asthma and health – at the same time as training I’m having allergy injections three times a week which are exhausting me – yesterday I slept from 4pm to 10pm – and all of that fatigue affects my training. And the challenges aren’t just about me not being overweight, unable to get enough oxygen or being totally fatigued. It’s also hot. Really, really hot. The bike ride four years ago was on a typical grey English day and there was even rain to help cool me down. Not so here – we’re expecting it to be around 75°. I’m going to have to train not just for distance but also for heat exhaustion.  Moreover, it’s  further than I’ve ever cycled before.  And then look at this profile of the race – the race starts going downhill and then starts climbing for a long time before….see that around 25 miles? That’s a steep grade 4 climb. And then there’s a descent before a long, long climb for a very significant part of the race before an extended grade 3 climb, shortly followed by another grade 4 climb. And even when heading downhill afterwards, there are more climbs. That’s some serious cycling.

 

But don’t just take my word for it – here’s what a friend who has completed The Tour of Acoma says…

“As someone who rides at altitude in Taos and had completed a 98 mile ride from Philadelphia to Brooklyn only 3 weeks earlier, I found the Tour De Acoma to be among the most challenging I've attempted.  The combination of heat, gradient of the climbs (plural) and the road surface make this a hard but beautiful and rewarding day's work.”

Appreciating the enormity of this challenge, then, and the importance of this work, please click on the link below and pledge generously. I need your help … the people whom Temple Beth Shalom supports need your help.

Thank you.

 

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/655G575

 

 

Weight A Moment

 

As a more experienced cyclist totally smoked me this morning, disappearing into the distance, for the second day in a row, I've started to seriously think about weight. Why am I so exhausted when I ride? Why are my tyres, which are fully pumped, sagging on contact with the road?

 

I have to be real with myself and answer that it's to do with my weight. When I was at university, I used to play at least an hour of Ultimate Frisbee every evening out on the lawn in front of New Hall. I was stick thin. My teenage years were certainly a time when I was at a healthy weight. As a child, I was always fairly chubby, probably because we had "tuck" every day from the tuck shop and also if we behaved at home, we were allowed a piece of chocolate after dinner. Once I started training to be a Rabbi, some of the weight gain started and I remember that in my first 6 months of Rabbinic life, I gained a stone (14lbs) in weight. The heaviest I've ever been is 204 lbs, which is 14 1/2 stone.

 

Even though I now haven't eaten chocolate in many years, I've been overweight especially since Jenny became pregnant with Zafra. I comfort ate with her because it was convenient and I've never shed the many pounds I gained at that time. When she became pregnant with Asher, I did it again. Then moving to America two yeas ago, where so much has added sugar and where all the portions are much larger, resulted in around another significant weight gain. So, today I weigh 194 lbs, or 13 lbs 12 oz.

 

When I did my last large bike ride, I was around 20lbs lighter, and I notice it now when I'm out on the bike. Interestingly, when I trained for that last ride four years ago, I didn't lose a pound in weight, probably because I was converting fat to muscle. I'm fairly certain, though, that I should be able to do both now. My BMI is 27.1, which puts me right in the middle of the "overweight" category.

 

I know I'm overweight. I hide it well with loose clothing so many people don't realise, but I am. It's better than it has been in the past, which was apparently "borderline obese," but if I'm going to cycle 100 miles, I need to shed the pounds. The more I weigh, the harder it will be to cycle because more energy must be spent moving a larger mass. It really is that simple. And I know that the biggest part of losing weight is mental discipline, something which I really have lacked in the past when it comes to food. I acknowledge that this is an area I need to work on.

 

And the simplest first step is to make more sensible choices. As lovely as some foods may be, they are not my friends. Like Trader Joe's Vanilla Joe-Joes. They are really, ridiculously addictive, but they are not my friend. Even the humble bagel, slathered in cream cheese, is not an ideal companion on this journey. People often talk about "everything in moderation" but I know that I'm addicted to sugar. I thought I was addicted to chocolate, which is why I gave it up years ago, but in truth I'm addicted to sugar.  And I'm not alone - millions of people worldwide are the same.... http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/08/sugar/cohen-text)
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/11232747/Americas-sugar-addiction-Just-how-bad-is-it.html)

 

 

I have been addicted to sugar since childhood and the consequences of that are very clear now.

One of the things I remember from the last bike ride was that eggs fill me up. They are eggstremely healthy (sorry!) and low in sugar. I know that I need to eat more eggs. I love eggs. Just like Mr Strong here from my childhood, who apparently seems to be making an obscene gesture in this picture. Maybe he's staring obesity in the face and telling it what he thinks of it...

 

As I've said before, a lot of bicycle training is mental. I have to make more conscious food choices, including on Shabbat. I always used to joke that there are no calories on Shabbat but that's actually not funny. We're meant to enjoy ourselves on Shabbat but that's different to poisoning ourselves and I've definitely been doing that with all the sugary foods I've been known to eat on Shabbat. Thankfully, at Temple Beth Shalom the selection at our oneg has become healthier and healthier in recent months at my request, but when there's sugar on the table the temptation for "just a little one" is too high. Then I go back for a little more, and then a little more, until suddenly I realise (as I did last week) that I've eaten half a cheesecake.

 

So, my progress today isn't in cycling, but in mental attitude. I need to lose weight to make this bike ride much easier, and to do that I need to take control of what I eat. That is why, while typing out this blog entry, I munched on...



Passing a Milestone

As you will have seen from my last post, I have started to worry a little that I'm not cycling far enough on each ride. With only ten or so weeks remaining before the big ride, I've only been able to cycle 10 miles at a time. It is said that if you can cycle half the distance during practice then you'll be able to cycle the full distance on the day. By that reckoning, I will currently only be able to cycle twenty miles, instead of the full 100.

Week 5's schedule was clear - 10 miles on Tuesday, 10 on Wednesday, 15 on Friday and 30 on Sunday. Instead of the first ten miles I did 5, although I did get to do the second ten. Thursday night was a tough night for me so Friday's ride wasn't possible, and I was immensely frustrated. So this morning I tried to at least get in my first 15 mile ride (instead of the 30 on the training schedule).

I set off later than usual and my legs were sluggish. I knew that this wasn't going to be a record-breaking ride. It was interesting how much warmer the temperature was as compared with my normal rides and it reminded me that closer to the ride itself I'm going to have to do some heat training. I'm not used to temperatures like this. The first five miles I covered in 22:36, a good minute and a half off my personal best. But then I found my groove and got stuck in and, to my surprise, I finished off 10 miles in 43:35, which meant that my second ten miles had shattered my 5-mile PB at 20:59. This was now my new 10-mile PB, if only by 9 seconds!

I set off for the third leg and found it hard going. But for the first time in over four years, I was able to cycle for over an hour, and completed my first 15-miles in 1:07:30. This is a major milestone for me. I appreciate that my training schedule is harassing me to be at 30 miles by now and that I'm well below that, but at the end of the 15 I felt like I could probably go on and do 20. I didn't because I had to go home, shower, have breakfast and then get into work for the Ritual Forum.

A lot of cycling distance is mental. I know that I can theoretically cycle 70 or so miles because I did for the Rabbis' Relay Ride back in England four years ago. Of course, there it was cooler, at much lower-altitude where the air was easier to use, and I was healthier back then. In particular, I was about 20 lbs lighter. That makes a difference - the more I weigh, the more effort I have to put into shifting my bulk. But mentally I'm not there yet, as well as physically. Now, though, I have no excuse not to cycle 15 miles as a minimum for each practice ride. Interestingly, week 6's schedule has two 10-mile rides, one 15-mile ride and a 35-mile ride, a total of 70 miles. That's not going to happen. If I can do 10, 15, 15 and 20 this week - a total of 60 miles - I'll be making real progress.

Training Highs and Lows So Far

I spent a while looking online at century bike ride training schedules and found one that was 16 weeks long, which is ideal because the Tour of Acoma is 16 weeks away. I printed it off and took it home in preparation.

The first week I just wanted to see what it was like being out on the bike. I cycled two miles, instead of the thirty that the schedule demanded. I think it was assuming I was fitter than I am. Truth is, though, that this isn't just about physical fitness but also about mental preparation, and I found it difficult to get up especially early in the morning, particularly on mornings following when I've been out trying to scare coyotes away from our property!

Week 2's schedule asked for two 5-mile rides, a 10-mile ride and a 20-mile ride. I did my first five miles in 29 minutes. I was totally wiped out. I actually sat in a bath for half an hour afterwards. It's really different cycling at altitude. I know I've lived here for two years so walking around is fine, but exercising at altitude is different. And I came to realise exactly how unfit I am. The next day I went out again and shaved three minutes off my time. Although the schedule asked for ten miles on Wednesday, I just did five, in 27 minutes and then the following day I did another five in 27 minutes again. So the schedule asked for 40 miles and I did 20, which is at least progress.

I'm very lucky in terms of route. From my house to Desert Academy is exactly 2.5 miles, so there and back is 5, and it's a nice ride in the morning. I'm behind schedule at this point, but I'm making progress.

Week 3 asked for 5 miles on Tuesday, 10 on Wednesday, 10 on Friday and 25 on Sunday. I'm finding the Sunday rides difficult to fit in because of work. Because I didn't do a Sunday ride last week, I go out on Monday and decide to try 10 miles. I'm flying after 5 miles and shave my PB (personal best) down to 25 minutes. I'm starting to notice that I'm getting fitter. I start my second lap and after about two miles my back tyre gets a massive puncture. Really frustrating. It's fixed by the end of the day so on Tuesday, I decide to attempt 10 miles, and smash my 5-mile PB with 21:33, and set my first 10-mile PB at 43:44. That's the longest I've cycled in four years. Thursday I try again and get 22:14 and 45:12. It's not a brilliant ride but it's another ten miles on the schedule. 25 miles cycled this week - slow progress because the schedule asked for 50, but at least it's progress. Every time I go out for a ride now, Asher says he's happy that I don't get a puncture.

Week 4 asked for less - 30 miles - but work, allergies and fatigue meant it was a very lean week - two five mile rides (23:06 and 22:40). The first one my head was in totally the wrong place. I finished the first five and really pushed myself to go onto the second. Less than half a mile in, I changed gears on a hill and the chain came off. I took it as a sign, fixed the chain, and walked back home.

Now I'm onto week 5 of training. By now the schedule suggests 65 miles this week. That's a lot of miles considering that my maximum so far has been 25. This week, I pull out the cycling gear that I wore for my bike ride 34 years ago. It helps mentally to look the part!

 

On Monday I once again smashed my 5-mile PB with 21:21, and this morning I cut it down again to 21:00 exactly, and matched my 10-mile 43:44 PB.

5 mile times	10 mile times
29
26
27
27
25
21:33	43:44
22:14	45:12
23:06
21:21
21:00	43:44

I take some comfort from this chart. In four weeks, I've been able to take 8 minutes off my 5-mile time, that's 28% off the original time. If I can do that for the 10-mile and then the 15-mile rides, I'll be in good shape in ten weeks' time.

In theory, tomorrow is meant to be a 15-mile ride, and for the first time this morning I felt like I would be able to do that. In fact, there are no more 5-mile rides in the schedule at all - 10 is the minimum from now on, so that's the PB I really need to be focusing on. I also need to start doing the longer rides. This week's long ride is suggested at 30 miles, but that's not going to happen. If I can do my first 15 tomorrow and then maybe another 15 on Sunday, that would be a total of 45 miles this week, which would be a big jump. That said, I’m aware that I’m really going to have to step up my game here.

Week	Total Miles on Schedule	Total Miles Cycled
1	30	2
2	40	20
3	50	25
4	30	10
5	55	15 so far…

 

I think this schedule assumed that I was fitter than I am. Next week it's going to be asking for 70 miles in total and I'm going to have to start doing more than 50% of what it asks. Revd Ben Larzelere, who is hoping to be joining me on the ride, says that if you cycle 250 miles before a Century, you should be fine. He might be right - I've so far cycled 67 miles and I know I'm not ready. The total on the schedule is 1045! I'm rather hoping that Ben is right...!

 



 

In our morning service, we thank God for the wonder of our bodies in a prayer known as n’kavim n’kavim and follow it by a prayer thanking God for returning our souls to us each morning (elohai n’shama). Body and soul are separated in our liturgy and as a result it can be easy for us as Jews to disconnect body and soul. Even a Rabbi splits the two off in the Talmud:

Rav Huna said to his son, Rabbah, “Why are you not to be found before Rav Hisda, whose dicta are so keen?” “What should I go to him for,” he answered, “seeing that when I go to him, he treats me to secular discourses?... He talks of health matters.” He exclaimed, “And you call them secular discourses! All the more reason for going to him!”[1]

While still alluding to a differentiation between body and soul, 12^th century Moses Maimonides made it clear that a healthy body is essential for a healthy soul:

“Since by keeping the body in health and vigor, one walks in the ways of God – it being impossible during sickness to have any understanding or knowledge of the Creator – it is a person’s duty to avoid whatever is injurious to the body, and cultivate habits conducive to health and vigor.”[2]

As profoundly moving the Rabbinate can be, it is not a healthy profession. Rabbis tend to either sit a lot (for example, when meeting people or when studying) or they stand still a lot (such as when teaching or leading prayers). We eat a lot, too, especially when celebrating Shabbat or festivals. I have come to realise that during my Rabbinate so far that I have forgotten, to paraphrase Rav Kook, that we have holy flesh no less than holy spirit. I intend to change that and for the community to benefit from this change.

It is therefore my intention to complete the Tour of Acoma, a 100-mile bike ride on September 18^th 2016. It has been four years since I cycled properly and I have never faced an endurance challenge like this for a number of reasons – (1) I have never been this unfit before, (2) I have never cycled this far before, (3) I am asthmatic, (4) I have never cycled at this kind of temperature before, (5) I have never cycled at this altitude before. If I am to do this, I need your serious support. The biggest way you can help me while training and on the actual day itself is to sponsor me per mile cycled. The more I raise for the Temple, the more likely I will be to finish this challenge.

My hope is to become much healthier for my benefit, for the community’s benefit and also to raise funds for the community at the same time. I will, essentially, be changing pounds into dollars, and yes, I believe that joke alone deserves at least some kind of sponsorship! This is without doubt the hardest physical and mental challenge I have ever faced, and I really hope that members of the community and beyond will sponsor me accordingly.

You will be able to follow my training exploits here, learn more about how to sponsor me and just send general words of encouragement on this blog.

 

---

[1] Talmud: Shabbat 82a

[2] Maimonides, Book of Knowledge, Laws Relating to Moral Dispositions and Ethical Conduct, Law 1.

Being a Winner

I recently took part in a competition for a table-top game called X-Wing Miniatures. It’s a Star Wars themed game that involves spaceships from the Star Wars films. In this National competition with the top prize of a flight to America, there were 60 people playing. I brought a completely unique squad that had never been flown before and came joint 27th. So no flight to America although I did win a playmat signed by one of the game designers. I left the competition feeling fairly happy – I had won three games and lost three games in my first ever tournament where I had tried something risky, made a couple of mistakes and just wasn’t lucky with the dice.

As the days passed, I started to realise that I could have done better (although I probably wouldn’t have reached the lofty heights of the very impressive 7^th place achieved by David Sleet, BRS’s Community IT Director). The joy of coming in the top half of the table started to give way to frustration of not doing better. Then I read an online post by someone who said that he was pleased to have come 51^st because he’d never played the game against other people before! If he was happy with his 51^st place, what was my problem with 27^th? What finally helped resettle my mind was putting it into a larger context. Yes, of course in the grand scheme of things, the ability to move spaceships around a table effectively is utterly meaningless. But I was 27^th in the whole of the UK – that’s 27^th out of around 62,470,000 people who could conceivably play X-Wing Miniatures if they wanted. Being a winner is really a matter of perspective, it seems.

So what’s the Jewish perspective on competition? Well, the Rabbis of the Talmud weren’t into competition because they felt it took away from a life completely dedicated to Torah study, so they don’t have too much to say on the matter.  Perhaps we can say that Jewish tradition doesn’t focus on winning and losing but, rather, on the encounter with God which is something that by definition isn’t competitive. I think that sometimes we need to compete for the excitement, so long as we remember that in the eyes of God we’re all winners, albeit with varying degrees of closeness of relationship to God. And maybe next time I compete I’ll say a little prayer… not to act as some kind of magical enchantment of good fortune but, rather, to remind me before I compete on what’s important in life and why I’m already a winner.

We Were Slaves And Now Others Are Instead

The whole point of the seder service is to bring the Exodus from Egypt, an event from our past, directly into present day relevance. “We were slaves to Pharaoh,” “This is because of what the Eternal did for me when bringing me out of Egypt.” This isn’t a commemoration but a re-enactment. As we read of the Exodus, we take part in it. We become free and explore with food and questions what it is to be free. We are guided through the Haggadah to consider those who are not free and we open the door and invite all those who are hungry to come and eat. Then we close the door, either to keep out the cold or possibly because subconsciously we don’t know what we would do with ourselves if some impoverished person turned up on our doorstep at that moment asking for food.

As a child I always thought the message of the seder was that we are free but actually I think it’s more complex. I think more accurately the seder is a theological exploration of what it is to be free in a world where others are not. The seder doesn’t just say “We’re free!” but, rather, “We’re free…. so now what?” As information becomes globalised we now know more than ever of millions of people who are anything but free. There are people who are oppressed politically, who are oppressed because of their gender or sexuality, who are restricted because of starvation. There are those who have jobs but who are all but slaves in the most obvious sense, earning a pittance so that companies can make the largest profit providing us with the latest trainers, electronic gadgets or designer labeled clothes. The more we learn about this world the more it seems that freedom is the exception and not the norm.

The Seder service demands a choice from us - will you sit around and drink wine, or will you use your freedom to liberate others? Coupled with the Divine call for justice in the Torah – “Justice, justice you shall pursue” (Deut. 16:20) – the Seder service is the enactment of a theological imperative to recognise our own freedom and to use it to liberate others. Yet we spend so long planning the eating, drinking and reciting that we easily forget the urgency of the imperative. This Pesach, let us also hold the enactment of that imperative to be as important as any other aspect of Pesach. Let it be not just “This is what the Eternal did for me” but also “This is what I did for others.”

To Have Or To Hold - A Tu BiShevat Thought

When Zafra walks past a flower, there are two things that she likes to do - to pluck it or to smell it. Sometimes they're mutually exclusive - she'll sometimes pluck but not smell or sometimes smell but not pluck. Sometimes, she does both, in either order. It's rare that she doesn't at least pluck or smell. But this very simple act of plucking a flower (or not) always leaves me conflicted for a number of reasons.

Very rarely before I can stop her, she actually breaks the law. I know... seriously? If you're in park land then according to UK law it's illegal to pick deliberately planted flowers. Normally, though, this isn't an issue because it's normally wild flowers she goes for, but if something is really pretty then she can sometimes really want it. She doesn't terrorise local parks tearing up daffodils, so it's not normally the law I'm worried about.

What I'm more concerned about is what message she'll get from the flower. Are flowers for her to pluck, take with her and enjoy with the family for a few days (before they wither and die) or are they for her to smell and enjoy without taking ownership? I'm reminded of Shel Silverstein's classic text The Giving Tree which is a clear critique of a utilitarian approach to nature. In essence (at least the way I read the book), it reminds us that we can't just take from the natural world according to our own wishes but, rather, have to live with the natural world. So, I want her to not pick the flower and just leave it be.

And yet, if she can take the flower home, enjoy it, and then watch the consequences of an uprooted flower, isn't there the potential for an even more powerful lesson? A lesson, perhaps, in how short-term pleasure isn't as satisfying as long-term pleasure, or that short-term human pleasure can often come at the cost of long-term existence of nature? A bit heavy for someone not yet three years old but definitely there can be the foundation of that lesson.

Then I think to myself, am I overanalysing this? This is a young girl, not an eco-Rabbi like me, simply living in the moment enjoying nature. Can't I just enjoy her enjoyment? So I put the thinking to the side and just live in the moment as she does. And then she goes to pluck the flower and I instinctively cry out "No!" I can't help it.

I share this personal inner debate on Tu BiShevat because while we may wonder about children, I think there can be no doubt about adults. We have passed so many ecological thresholds already that we cannot continue a utilitarian approach to nature. We have to put our short-term pleasures to the side whenever they contradict the long-term health of the natural world.

For me, Tu BiShevat is not just about celebrating trees or, even, planting a tree and helping us feel like we've offset all our paper usage and carbon emissions for the year (!).  Tu BiShevat has to be a call to re-evaluate our relationship with nature. We can have it in our lives for perpetuity or we can try to hold onto it, grasp it, use it, exploit it for a brief while before watching it wither. Let's have nature exist for it's own sake, not for our own. Let it exist because it attests to its Creator not because it's useful for us. Let Tu BiShevat remind us that our relationship with nature does not have to be utilitarian and exploitative but can be, should be... must be mutual and sustainable.

Chag Sameach!

Symbols of the Past, Present and Future

I was talking with someone the other day and they mentioned the Liberty Bell in America. I made some remark about how when I went to see it, I was one of those wise-guy tourists who loudly says, "But it's cracked!"

When I think about it, though, that isn't my overriding memory of the Liberty Bell. There are two things I particularly remember. The first was the security, the extraordinary security designed to protect a bell. The second thing that I remember was that outside in a street lamp a squirrel had made its home! The lamp obviously no longer worked and the squirrel had brought leaves and the like into the shade in order to make a very comfortable bed. I took more photos of that squirrel in the lampshade than I did of the bell, the actual tourist attraction.

This evening, I just heard that Jurgen Moltmann said that the future is more important than the past. I have much sympathy with that position. And yet the present is more important still. The Liberty Bell is an artefact of the past - an important symbol of freedom but a symbol nonetheless. The squirrel was alive, vibrant, a part of the great web of life. Yet the people around us paid more attention to the bell than to the living, extraordinary being in front of them. You might think "But there are millions of squirrels!" To which I would reply "But there are millions of bells." "Ah," you might think, "but there's only one Liberty Bell." "True," I would reply "but each squirrel is unique, too."

I don't intend to demean the Liberty Bell by comparing it with a squirrel... obviously not! Rather, what I'm saying is that the Liberty Bell is a symbol from the past that affects the present and the future. The squirrel is alive in the present, in the here and now. Although, of course, strictly speaking it was in the past, an event many years ago, and that squirrel may no longer even be alive today. Interestingly, the bell endures, a symbol of enduring freedom, in theory, at least. Indeed, the only way I can blog about this entire event is by reflecting back into the past to try to make it alive today.

So the past is important and can be brought into the present and the future, like the Liberty Bell. It can teach us valuable lessons, such as the importance of Freedom. And yet the past is not alive and neither is the future. Only the present is alive, alive as that squirrel I saw on the same day. Life is something so extraordinary even though we so often take it for granted. It is wondrous, beautiful, and awe-inspiring. Just as the Liberty Bell is a symbol, so, too, is every living being - a symbol of the glory of life, the wonder of existence and the need to never become complacent in the face of pure being. Those are the symbols that none of us can ignore.