An old close friend from seminary I haven’t spoken to in over 20 years sent me an e-mail. She’s in Israel.
I call.
“It’s Esther” I say.
She’s as happy as I am.
She sounds exactly the same. Well actually her voice sounds wiser more grounded and settled.
She can’t see me but I’m crying. Because of so many reasons. The past meeting the present.
“We did it ” she says.
“We followed Him through the dessert and clung on.”
“Yeah ” I barely say.
“So tell me about the kids ” she asks.
“Well one’s in China.”
She laughs because she thinks I’m joking.
I change the subject.
“I can see you right now sitting on the couch in the dorm first day I walked in ” I say as so many pure sweet memories tied up in a bundle start unraveling by the second.
We catch up in about five minutes seeing that so many of our details match.
She says something we both laugh about.
“You’re still laughing that’s a good sign ” she notes. “Are your parents still in Edison?”
“No moved to Florida a long time ago ” I say thinking what an unusual question that is for this conversation. I don’t remember she knew we lived in Edison. Maybe another detail I tucked in to keep it neat.
And then something strange happens. The voice that comes over the phone is mine but for a second I don’t really recognize it. So many things I’ve worked hard to contain over the years in order to march on just start pouring out.
And I think of how in this week’s parshah everyone’s crying as they reunite their souls. Yosef turns his head to weep so no one will see him. Yehudah cries. All the brothers cry.
They go back in time. They go over the past and meld it with the present like condensation on a window when cold meets warm. It makes them cry.
I met a woman the other night in the stairwell at the doctor’s office. We started to talk in the corridor a few minutes and we somehow got onto the subject of life’s struggles. How in her country they were very strict about perfection. And how instead of applauding a 96 she got on a test they’d ask what happened to the other four points. She talked about her long journey of coming to accept herself and her imperfections. And she talked about all the days she cried.
She said she’d been at a class the other night and they were talking about Avraham and the Akeidah and how when he was about to sacrifice his son he cried. And how it puts a whole other perspective on crying. It doesn’t mean it stops us. It means we can both do and cry.
Crying is a great thing. It’s one of the only things guaranteed to open up the Gates of Heaven. Though I think it’s why and what we cry about that’s the question.
Are we crying because we feel sorry for ourselves? I don’t think that opens the gates. Yaakov actually gets punished for that.
Or are we crying because we’re alive? Because we’re feeling great happiness or deep sadness? If we don’t feel we don’t change or grow.
Actually not crying when you need to is like the humidity before it pours a heaviness that clogs your whole being gives you a headache.
Once you cry it lifts the whole thing brings blessing opens up the heavens.
Like rain. —