כִּי אַתָּה שׁוֹמֵֽעַ קוֹל שׁוֹפָר וּמַאֲזִין תְּרוּעָה

 Yesterday,  I blew shofar three times. 

I was one of the shofar blowers during our synagogue's live-streamed service. I hadn't stepped into our synagogue since Purim. As I got dressed to go to synagogue I thought about who I wanted to bring with me in my attire. I wanted to evoke my dear friend S. so I wore a  silk skirt she had handed down to me a couple of years ago. Our families go way back and I wanted to connect to both of our families. I pinned a brooch that had belonged to my mother to my fitted jacket. It was a little chilly to go out without an additional layer so I wrapped myself in the beautiful wool challis shawl Mrs. Grossman had given my sister ( my sister is horribly allergic to wool). I also needed to choose a pair of gloves to wear.

I have many pairs of gloves. It was clear that I needed to choose from the beautiful collection that Penny hand sent me  of her late mother, Ruthie's gloves. 

I can't listen to the Haftarah from the second day of the holiday without hearing her husband weeping through the Haftarah as Ruthie (her Hebrew name was Rachel) lay dying in the hospital. One of the lines in the Haftarah is

רָחֵ֖ל מְבַכָּ֣ה עַל־בָּנֶ֑יהָ

  Rachel weeping for her children. 

Every year after that my mother would get weepy hearing the Haftarah.

The sanctuary of our synagogue was rearranged for the live-stream . There were many twenty seats all socially distant. I went with my boys. My husband was a little under the weather so he stayed home ( don't worry it seems to be a garden variety cold that he is nipping in the bud). I pushed my seat so it was almost but not quite where I normally sit during the high-holidays. 

I realized as I sat in the room so familiar to me that our rabbis and chazzan created an artifice of a service that worked not badly on a computer screen. The artifice worked and was even at times, really moving.

After services ended there was another short shofar blowing on the steps of the synagogue.

You can see me blowing a t'kiya gedola, the big blast. I'm the one in the red boots. We are facing away from the crowd to keep them safe. This photo appeared in the West Side Rag a hyperlocal news blog.

Synagogue members gathered at the steps of our synagogue just as we so often do after services on the High Holidays. It felt so precious to see people I hadn't seen in months, but in real life. 

So much of what takes place at the High Holidays comes out of the pages of the machzor/the High Holiday prayerbook. A large piece of the experience is reconnecting with people in my community. People return from summers away. Grown children of friends return with their own children. Other friends don't attend synagogue all that often. We check in with one another. How is your health? How is your family? How are you getting through grieving? We visit with one another. yesterday was like our service, a taste of what we expect during non-Covid-19 years.

At four I blew shofar again as part of Shofarot on Broadway. Nearly every intersection from 65th Street to 116th Street had someone blowing shofar. I was assigned to 100th Street along with my youngest.

In order to prevent the possible spread of Covid-19 we had to cover the wide end of our shofarot with cloth.  I used linens that had come from my collection of fine linens from the dead mothers of friends. 

My son began the shofar blasts with the "short program" using the black shofar. 

תקיעה: שברים תרועה: 

תקיעה. שׁברים. תקיעה:

תקיעה. תרועה. תקיעה:

I used the harder to blow lighter colored shofar and blew the "long program".

תקיעה. שׁברים תרועה. תקיעה

תקיעה. שׁברים תרועה. תקיעה

תקיעה. שׁברים תרועה. תקיעה

תקיעה. שׁברים. תקיעה:

תקיעה. שׁברים. תקיעה:

תקיעה. שׁברים. תקיעה:

תקיעה. תרועה. תקיעה:

תקיעה. תרועה. תקיעה:

תקיעה. תרועה. תקיעה גדוֹלה:

 I was my son's caller, calling out which sounds to blast, he was mine. My son stood on top the barrier at the end of the median strip to recite the bracha and to blow.  

Then it was my turn. I faced the people gathered on Broadway. My husband tells me that there were well over 100 people gathered at our intersection. I closed my eyes, as I always do to blow the shofar. I felt the sun on my closed eyelids I listened to my son call out the sounds I needed to produce. 

It's a mitzvah to hear the sound of the shofar. As I blew I could feel that people were listening to the shofar blasts not just because it was mitzvah, the people standing on the median strip, the people across Broadway, the people filling the street needed to hear the shofar. They needed to hear the sound vibrating inside their bones. Other shofar blowers followed me. At the end of all of the shofar blasts the people gathered cheered. I was about to start singing a niggun, a wordless tune, but just in time, I remembered that it was not safe in the time of Covid.

Each year when I blow shofar in my synagogue I am anxious. I want to be sure to do a good job. As I stand in front of the room, I feel my own anxiety but I feel the anxiety in the room. Everyone is worried along with me hoping that the sounds I produce are true and strong.  When the shofar blowing is over, and I have produced the blasts well, I feel the joy in the room. Yesterday, on Broadway I felt that joy.

At a time when nothing is normal. We all thirst for the scraps of our lives that still feel normal.