#and that every convert is just a wandering jewish soul coming home

[dynamicentropy]

I recently lost contact with an online friend who lived in Gaza. I am currently in the process of converting to Judaism as an American.

All of this leaves me with a lot of things to process, especially in regards to my personal relationship to my family history and to my current synagogue.

I send this out because I know there are others who are grieving the same way I am, and because I can't grow an olive tree yet, so.

At least I can do this.

Here's what I wrote about it, in prose.

Biography: Growing Trees in The Cold

I was born a grandchild of Sicily, already adrift in Appalachia.

My hands were stained by olive oil all my life, through recipes, steps, and pain like echoes. 

A parting gift from my grandfather's home.

He ran from one, and fought for the other.

He was looking for peace. 

He stained his hands.

He ran.

He pulled out his roots and dragged them down through our family tree.

It left a hole, smoking, all the way down.

Like the bombs he narrowly missed.

It smells like olives, in a forest of pine.

It tastes like whispered warnings over seasoned vinaigrette, 40 years later. 

It looks like the paintings of orchards I will never see etched into labeled glass bottles, olive trees inscribed in gold leaf.

It sounds like the silence of grief, like the echo of questions a child should not be asking.

It echoes.

As I feel the oil seep into the wooden grain of an antique table,

given to us by the jewish temple that I would eventually pray in,

It echoes.

It echoes.

Again.

Where did this recipe originate?

Add a teaspoon of olive oil.

Again.

Where did our traditions come from?

Rub this into your skin. You're all scraped.

Again.

What did we lose, in the hole dragged behind?

In the branches cut?

This can't be all there is.

…

The house smells like olives.

The foundations creak.

It echoes.

I go outside. 

To garden.

Eyes wide, I climbed the branches of every tree I could find.

I climbed higher and higher,

Always told to run from the hole of my roots,

So afraid of falling beneath the canopy,

Until the branches would break

Under the weight

Of me.

I grew familiar with clutching at pine needles in the frigid air, a cross tied to my neck. 

I could never tell what stung the most.

But secret, creeping, quiet, the olive oil would ease the scrapes, the aches. 

The smell would quiet me in a way the nights never could.

As I grew, I ripped away the cross and searched my soul, pulling out splinters.

I searched my garden, as my grandfather had, digging through weeds.

I looked at the hole that was left there.

A crater.

At the edge of everything I've ever been.

I don't know what I was looking for.

I asked my teacher as a child, 

"What type of wood was the cross made from?" 

She was silent, for a second.

It echoed, in the stares of students.

Then looking at me, annoyed,

"The type isn't the point of the lesson. However, 

Pine, most likely."

I learned young that trees could hurt.

The splinters dug in.

The branches cracked.

And I ached.

We don't grow olive trees here. It's too cold. 

I tore out the topsoil in search of my roots. 

The hole had to have something left.

Anything.

The grass flew like needles, 

Splintering like dry brush into a fire,

but I couldn't see anything left for me. 

So, I tried to plant something new. Something that would bring me joy.

I wandered the forest and let myself gather seeds.

Step by step. Take it slow. 

Don't lay your roots until you're at home.

A willow tree would grow here.

So that's where I began.

I dreamt beneath its leaves and met you along the way. 

I planted the willow tree, but I yearned for  more, a taste of the garden I had dreamed of.

So, I made room for the myrtle tree, just as you suggested. 

I planted the myrtle tree, and... It felt like a comfort. A place to truly rest in the shade. 

However, I couldn't stay there forever.

So, I planted the palm tree, and felt myself pulled towards something that felt like home.

Then, I took the last step and planted the etrog. I made the space and went slow, careful to keep the balance until everything fit right.

A full garden! I felt so excited, 

and it felt so right.

I wouldn't be searching,

And climbing, 

And breaking branches.

The empty space would finally be filled.

I felt like I had finally connected, 

Like I could lie in the soil and finally breathe.

It smells of olives and citron.

Oleander dances around my feet.

Like a warning.

The roots start to tangle.

I stumble.

You were so excited for me. 

You were so proud of the garden under my care.

We played music to celebrate.

We talked about the possible and impossible, and all those futures we desperately were going to hope and work for together.

It echoed in my dreams.

I feel like I'm spinning.

My rabbi thought it was too cold to plant etrogs in America! He said they

Only

   Grew

     In

       Israel.

My voice.

Echoed.

As I told him he was wrong.

As I asked why he thought that when California, Georgia, Texas-

The temple grew quiet.

With the echo of the student asking the teacher about-

The wrong question.

Asking about a cross made of pine,

A child asking their mother about where grandpa's home is if it isn't here-

A teenager asking his aunt about his family tree-

A son asking his father why he gets nightmares about the military-

Asking why my rabbi, this trusted teacher, thinks your people deserve this.

Asking the right question.

The response

Leaves

Me 

Falling.

With nothing left to catch me.

I burned the olive oil into the pan the last time I made this recipe.

Isn't that funny?

It was my fault. 

I wasn't paying attention.

I'm sorry.

I don't know what to do now.

Beyond the calls that go unanswered.

The links that no one opens.

The videos I force myself to watch.

The reading.

Searching for any sign of you.

It's not enough.

I would rip every vein from me 

Like roots from the ground if it could-

Something cracks.

The beat on the song you were playing echoes, but it makes me feel sick now.

I breathe in the willow, the myrtle, the palm, and. 

It really does help.

For a moment.

"The feeling of weightlessness in free fall is just contact forces pulling us away from gravity.

Then eventually, gravity wins,

And it hits you all at once."

But not enough.

Not for you-

All of them-

My people-

My family-

I feel like I can't do anything to stop this-

My hands feel sore.

The bottle breaks.

I fall through the canopy.

Nothing eases the landing 

once you see it coming.

Your grandfather had olive trees, too. 

I never knew what happened to ours. 

I'm sorry for what happened to yours. 

Etrog roots jammed into rows on your family plot.

Even those roots will run dry as the water runs out.

Olive oil spills from your bleeding hands.

There are no hospitals left to aid you.

I watch from thousands of miles away, hoping to see words on a screen instead.

The shattered glass of a green bottle cuts into my hand, gently bandaged and cleaned.

I sweep away the debris.

The part of me that wishes I left the glass on the ground for everyone to see is mostly put to rest.

Where are you?

Do you still hold the lulav as they chase you down?

Are your candles lost in the rubble?

Where are you?

Do you feel the citron sting on your skin?

Do they cut you down like the olive branches?

Where are you?

Are your feet sore from running?

Who are you running from today?

Are you still able to run?

…

What a jewish thing to ask.

Where are you?

I can't stop thinking about olive trees.

I never learned how to grow them.

You told me to plant one for the both of us once I went to college. 

In a big fancy greenhouse.

I'm not even in college yet. 

How will you get the pictures if you're not there to tell me how bad it all looks?

How can I do this without you?

Where are you?

I keep dreaming of olive trees.

And etrogs, crowding the land.

And of scorched olive branches from the river to the sea.

And you say to me.

Oseh shalom bimromav 

Hu ya’aseh shalom aleinu...

I respond.

V'al kol Palestine.

And you say, tiredly, like you always do,

V'al kol yosh’vei tevel.

I wake up in a cold sweat.

I stain my hands with olive oil to heal the cracks. 

Like my mother, grandfather, uncles, aunts, and cousins.

Like you do.

Hopefully, you... still do.

It echoes, my movement.

like my grandfather's voice.

It echoes, 

like the prayers of the temple,

a calling to peace.

It echoes,

like you playing a new song for me.

Like footsteps.

Like running.

Like the tearing of roots.

Like the breaking of branches.

Like the rustling of pine.

Like the cracking of glass.

It echoed like bombs.

Where are you?

[ruffboijuliaburnsides]

Hi! Obviously ignore this if I'm asking something too personal, but you've mentioned that you're in the process of converting to judaism and I've been wondering how did you start? I've done a good bit of research and think it's something I'm interested in, but I have no idea what the actual process of conversion looks like, much less where to begin. Obviously feel free to ignore, or send me towards someone else, but thought I'd ask!

Hey no worries, anon! So, I will preface this by being forthcoming and saying I got partway through the conversion process, was forced to move, and ended up in a different part of the country with only one shul nearby whose rabbi (and community) are… very unfriendly to converts. They don’t SAY they are, but a few months of attendance and a handful of meetings with the rabbi with regards to conversion really hammered home that neither my wife nor I felt even remotely comfortable converting here, considering it’s a very personal and often vulnerable process, and wherein you have to actually like… trust and communicate with the rabbi you’re working with. So my conversion, while I still consider it “in progress”, is in an indefinite stall until we can move somewhere else or can reliably get to the next closest shul, which we currently cannot for various reasons.

ANYWAY. I started by doing a lot of research. Mostly I was just looking into… all kinds of religion, including Islam actually, because I missed the community and the structure and the spiritual anchors of my very conservative evangelical christian upbringing, but I didn’t like or want to return to the actual, y’know…. beliefs and tenets of Christianity. I found Judaism and just… the more I read and researched about the beliefs and the general culture of questioning and grappling with things within it, the more I felt like I’d found a people who I could understand, and a religion that understood me and would allow for me to be uncomfortable and question why things are taught certain ways and so forth. Which was one of many things that drove me away from Christianity, as I was not good at the whole “blind faith” thing. (they insist it’s not blind, but if you’re not supposed to question god then… what else IS it?)

At that point we were living in upstate new york, and the nearest reform shul was very small, did not have a permanent rabbi (there was one for a number of local communities that cycled around every few weeks), and really while they were officially reform they seemed to as a community have a practice and beliefs a lot closer to something like reconstructionist or humanist Judaism. I went to shabbat services on fridays there for a few months, and they were very nice but said they were very much not a usual reform congregation and that I should probably actually convert somewhere with a permanent rabbi and that was a bit more traditional, but that in the meantime they were more than happy to have me attend services and events with them. They were very sweet and I did appreciate that opportunity to accustom myself to the general pacing and content of a friday night shabbat service.

At that point we get to the part that you’re actually asking about, and I’m sorry if you’re just like “OH MY GOSH MAGS PLS JUST GET TO THE POINT” which is when we moved back down to Florida and I actually properly started the conversion process with a rabbi! I started out emailing the local shul and saying that I had just moved to the area, I was not Jewish but was interested in possibly converting and had been attending services at a very small shul up north, and is it all right if I attend a few shabbat services while I consider converting? I will say, I have never been told “no please don’t attend” about going to shabbat services, but especially with the world the way it is, and me being new and not knowing anyone in the community or having anyone to vouch for me, I prefer to ask beforehand so that they know to expect someone new who is reaching out and less likely to be a threat.

Anyway after a couple of weeks at that shul, I already loved the people and could tell I would get on pretty well with the rabbi, so I emailed her again about setting up a meeting to discuss converting. We had the meeting, talked about why I wanted to convert, what would be required of me, etc. She got me set up with a book list and some books from the shul library, gave me a reading assignment and asked me to write down any thoughts or questions I had, along with some other things that were kind of reading comprehension stuff, and told me to email her when I had finished so we could have another meeting. She also stipulated that she would have me live and practice through a full year of the Jewish calendar at minimum before she’d declare me ready to go to the mikvah, and we’d meet regularly, I’d do a lot of reading, I needed to attend a beginning hebrew class for adults that would be starting again over the summer, attend services (both weekly and holiday) as much as possible, and engage as much as possible in the community. (I really loved them. I was a soloist in the Purim spiel that year and I had friends and once I’d finished converting and could join the synagogue I’d already been needled to join their tiny choir and it was just a great group of people.)

Aaaand then we had to move due to things outside our control, and I couldn’t attend as often due to being a heck of a drive away (in a car with no A/C, in Florida, in the summer) so I tried to shift over to a closer shul whose rabbi my old rabbi knew, but it was High Holy Days and then he was travelling for some studies and couldn’t start doing anything like conversion until that was all over, and then we had to move again and now we’re here and have a very unfriendly rabbi and congregation, so we don’t attend services right now.

…………all this to say: you’ve done some research and you think you’re interested. Next step is to find the nearest shul that is of the movement you want to convert in, and call or email them and just let the rabbi know where you’re at and ask if you can attend some services respectfully to see if you still feel drawn to Judaism when engaging with it directly. If so, let the rabbi know, set up a meeting, and go from there. It’ll take time, a year at the LEAST and usually longer even if you DON’T have the sort of issues I’m currently having, but if HaShem is calling you home, it’s worth it.

(and if your rabbi requires to you take any classes or what-not, most organizations that run them that require you to pay some kind of fee offer scholarships or reduced tuition if you’re not financially able to enroll in them initially, so be sure to reach out about stuff like that, too.)