There is a certain type of mourning that elevates. Just as upon observing proud triumph or awful beauty we feel ourselves wrenched from our narrow horizons and pushed upward toward a higher view, so, too, in recalling or witnessing bitter tragedy are we forced to acknowledge, by the power of a story, that the universe does […]
This story takes place at the same Yeshiva as A Lesson For John On King George St. and Kalman’s Heart. Akiva kicks the side of the dumpster for the third time and hurts his foot. He swears and staggers down the road. He is pretty drunk, and the weight of his full backpack adds dangerous momentum to […]
Pokémon Go may be the most effective video game ever at making people move their bodies, but my interest has always been more drawn to those games that move the soul. Allow me to advocate for them for a moment. Just as listening to Explosions in the Sky makes me want to grab the nearest […]
They met that Winter in the bowels of the Capitol building in the dead of night. In earlier eras one would have dressed all in white and the other in darkest sable, but things were, for better or worse, different now, and one wore a coat of grey with a cream scarf, and the other […]
Douglas Adams Wasn’t An Atheist
“He felt that his whole life was some kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.” … “Curiously enough, the only thing that went through the mind of the bowl of petunias as it fell was Oh no, not again. Many people have speculated that if we […]
Nodding in despair, leaning on the Chevy, I considered my options. It was a bright Friday morning in May and the southern sun beat down on my hat and jacket, mocking the choices that tormented me as they torment all mortal men. The short ceremony at the imposing villa was over and I’d retreated to […]
Dear frum-from-birth Orthodox Jews (even the ones I know), I’m just writing to say thank you. I am a Baal Teshuva. I did not grow up within the traditional Jewish world. I was brought into it by people like you. And for that, I am eternally grateful. Now, I know you’re waiting for the sucker […]
The World’s Shortest (Jewish!) Personality Quiz
Somehow, in recent years, BuzzFeed has revived one of the oldest irritating features of the Internet: useless “which character are you” personality quizzes. Also quite popular nowadays are the more serious tools of personality analysis, such as Meyers-Briggs (INFP, regrettably) and the Enneagram (9…no one believes me). Generally, ever-larger swaths of the population are engaging […]
Hello. It’s 2 AM. And Pesach Is Coming.
I learn Torah now from 2:30 to 3:30 on Thursday mornings. This is how it happened: I have a chevrusa (a one-on-one study session) with a genius from Israel once a week. It involves a lot of him talking very quickly and me nodding as if I understand, and we used to do it at […]