Story of the Day 12/ 6/ 2008

We were decorating the centerpieces for the dinner.
Every year, our synagogue has a “Hanukkah “ dinner and there is an honoree. Someone who has served the synagogue in one way or another.
This year, they chose my husband.
This has been humorous.
Not because he doesn’t deserve it, he does, but because people keep coming up and congratulating me…and , as far as I can figure , the only thing I have done is to marry the guy.

Every year, the centerpieces are something that is in line with the honoree's interests.
There have been some interesting centerpieces.
One year, it was baskets of golf balls. Nice, until some of the kids figured out they could throw them.
Very few children are ever present at the dinner, I didn’t mean they threw then , then- I meant later, during services- when the used centerpieces had been moved to the coat closet.
The coat closet is the place in our synagogue where things get put when no one knows where to put them.
You would be amazed at what you can find there .
Yes, there are umbrellas and hats that have been forgotten, and golf balls, but there are also things like maps of the cemetery….and a dog chew toy. Which is especially interesting, because as far as I know, there has yet to be a dog in our synagogue.

So, what is my husband interested in?
The mikveh.

Okay, he isn’t‘ interested in the mikveh- because we don’t have one. He is interested in having it built.
The space is there. The pipes are ready and waiting in the synagogue’s basement.
The only thing stopping its construction is about $200,000.
Only.

Well, Parisa, a quick thinker…or maybe I am wrong and she was mulling this over for weeks before presenting this idea….suggested we use the really nice vases- round bowls that the synagogue has for floral arrangements- filled with water, tinted blue, and with naked Barbie dolls in them- wearing a sash or something saying “Support the Mikveh Fund.”

I thought it was a wonderful idea.
Vandra, the artist, with whom I shared this idea, thought it was great.
Anne chuckled, and thought we should do it.
But after 48 hours of thought, my husband vetoed the idea.
Sigh……

We ended up making tzeddakah boxes labeled “The Mikveh Fund“.

Hours of cutting slots for coins in the tops of wooden boxes from Michael’s, spray painting them with 3 coats of a purple- blue to coordinate with the table cloths, and then hours of decorating them.
This last chore was divided three ways. There were 15 boxes.
Parisa took some, Rakhel, her mother , took some, and I was left with 7.
This might sound a bit lopsided, but I had help- my daughter, Sarah, and my in-laws, Amy and Neal. So, it was really lopsided in my favor.
And Saturday night, after Shabbat was over, we sat and painted.

Lopsided? Not in my favor, after all.
We never dreamt that Rakhel had a stroke of genius and realized that the acrylic paints were a pain to work with- so she used a batch of colored sharpie markers… which ended up making her boxes look a thousand times better than ours!
BUT did she call us and share her brainstorm?
No.
So , we struggled away with out brushes and paints.
And some of us struggled more than others.

Neal, after spending a great deal of time painting a smiley face, and a shoe- showed the box to Aaron, and asked, “What do you think this is?”
“A penis?”

Fortunately, Neal has not decided to give up his day job and go into the box decorating business…..
And, fortunately, he decided to work at that shoe a bit more- and with some additional colors- not just the original pink……

And, hopefully, no one else thought that it was ….