A Week With the Bayit Board

[image error]Every Bayit board retreat is a reunion. You exist, beyond the tiny Zoom box that's been on my screen all these months! Sometimes it's a reunion of people who have never met in person. We've been building together, and now we get to walk in the world together for a time.

We stroll on the beach and marvel at soft sand between our toes. We talk about high holiday sermons: what we need to say, what we're not sure how to say, the pressures of this year that are not quite like any other year we can remember. 

We talk about the next book we're bringing forward -- Adam Green's stunning Recover, a journey through atypical anorexia chronicled through key moments in Jewish time -- and about other publishing projects on the horizon. Spiritual practices and tools and deep dives into text.

We pray outside under the shade of a tree with purple leaves. We talk about this week's parsha and how we reconcile with difficult verses. We discuss divrei Torah and teachings that have moved us. We talk about who's using the tools that we create (and who's not, and who might, and what they need).

One day after morning prayer I'm inspired to write a new psalm, which Steve illustrates on the spot. The publishing team looks at another manuscript, and we brainstorm what we might co-create with its author. We talk about roles and responsibilities. We set goals for the year ahead. 

We talk about what we're reading, who we're listening to, whose voices inspire us. We talk about women's voices and nonbinary voices in Torah and mishnah commentary, and whose ideas we want to figure out how to uplift. We work on new curricula, things we can teach now.

High holiday sermons ebb and flow in our conversations like the waves. We make slides for the pre-high-holiday class R. David and I are teaching. We talk mussar and ethics and spiritual practice. We cook meals for each other, dance around our shared kitchen while doing dishes, sing and laugh.

We daven with guitars and harmony and spaciousness. We daven with tiny siddurim and occasional melodies and a lot of silence. We daven maariv in the hot tub one night, and sing Adon Olam to many delicious tunes. I revel in the sweetness of friends who love the liturgy as I do. What a mechaieh.

On Friday evening we take part in "Devotion by the Ocean," a Kabbalat Shabbat celebration created by Shirat HaYam, co-led by half a dozen clergy and musicians on a bandstand at the shore. As a bonus we get to meet Bayit Liturgical Arts builder Joanne Fink in person, because she's there too!

We soak in the sweetness of a Shabbes together. The birkat hamazon. Text study over coffee. Leisurely davenen. The rishrush of the waves at the beach. Singing the ashrei quietly to the Shabbat afternoon tune. A poignant havdalah when it's time to begin preparing ourselves for returning home. 

Now we'll continue building and dreaming and co-creating together from afar. I'm already looking forward to next summer's board retreat when again we'll convene to dream up what we want to build. For now, I know these memories will energize the work of my hands -- and lift up my heart.