Flying!!

Shul was beautiful this Shabbat, actually, and the building looks not at all like Beth Jacob Congregation, where I usually pray. I don’t just mean that it has a different architecture, but that there are two bimahs. On one side of the shul there is the Ark with the Torah scrolls, but on the other side of the shul, opposite the Torahs, is a raised platform on which the Torah is read, and on which the Rabbis stands during the service. After pesukei d’zimra, the Rabbi moves across the room to the raised platform. The seats are wooden, and in front of each is a desk on which to place books and on which a person can lean. Finally, for me, after visiting all of the museums and churches filled with paintings of the stories of Jesus, the lack of art in the shul is striking. Of course, this stems from the commandment that you shall make no graven image—but it also means that the scroll work and detail in the carvings is elaborate as well. But I suppose that it also means that the focus is on prayer, and a person cannot be distracted or focused on pictures; the person’s behavior is the focus. And the work of our artists is, first, in interpretation and not representation.

The praying was different as well. Venice is Sephardic, and I daven in an Ashkenzic shul. I recognized none of whatever melodies were sung, and some of the prayers were unfamiliar to me--or had unfamiliar patters. I was pleased, however, that I was able to follow word for word, and though the Torah portion was translated into Italian, another language I cannot speak or understand, I could follow the Hebrew perfectly. The trop, however, was different. The haftorah was Hazon, a haftorah which mixes the traditional melody with that appropriate to Tisha b'Av, and so I listened for how it was accomplished here, and felt part of the experience.
After shul I was invited to the home of a young couple. They prepared a lovely Shabbat vegetarian meal--and their hospitality was warm and open. I do not think that I was as gracious as I might have been, but I was a bit distracted, and did not stay until Birkat. Tally and Moshe are what Judaism means to me, however, and I thank them and carry them with me as I return to the United States.


Now, we have risen to the level of 'spa.' We are spa-ing, and attempting to be very spa-y. Cowboy Mitch and I have settled into Abano Terme and the Hotel Ritz. It is a resort-type place, and designated a spa. It is where rich (us?) people go to 'get treatments,' or just relax, perhaps. There are massages and mud baths and saunas and heated pools. And wonderful sun. After all of the moving about, and pulling the suitcase up and down streets in Florence and up and down the bridges of Venice, the only thing I am required to carry here is my towel. And actually, I shouldn't be carrying that, but leaving it at the pool for someone else to pick up. We are living in some kind of luxury and know barely how to respond. It is a hard row to sow. Dinner here is served at 9:15pm, but Cowboy Mitch and I are usually asleep by 10:00pm. Besides, tonight in the dining room they are serving 'homely turkeys,' an appelation which seems to me not only an insult to all turkeys, but an oxymoron at least. Turkeys might be homely, but perhaps it is impolite to point it out. Also on the dinner menu was ox-tongue. We went for pizza and gelato. Lovely dinner!