"World events do not recognize my opinions"

When I have been in moments of grief and someone tells me, “You will learn so much from this,” I want to scream.

I think of the Omer—this period of time we are now in the midst of—as learning to count, learning to wait.

Camp is a microcosm of an ideal Jewish, American life. There, we celebrate both American and Jewish holidays, we are able to connect to each other socially and spiritually, and even when participating in a “secular” activity, we are still learning and exhibiting Jewish values. For example when playing sports, we treat each other fairly and respect our teammates and opponents. When we are working on an art project, we are sharing our materials with friends and beautifying the world.

When I think and talk about teshuvah, I usually focus on change. How can we take stock of our lives and improve the parts of ourselves that we wish to change? This year I was struck by a different aspect of teshuvah. I realized that teshuvah doesn’t need to be focused solely on changing who we are. Teshuvah can also be about learning to accept and forgive ourselves, and learning how to embrace our abilities, limitations, bodies, and relationships.

Describes the parallelism of Sarah's oppression of Hagar, the Egyptian, and Pharaoh's oppression of the Israelites