The fast isn't all that hard.... some thirst before bed in the evening, then a bit of hunger at 10-ish, when I often have a morning snack and a cup of tea, then ok until about 5:15, when my stomach growls a couple times and I realize how thirsty I am....
Sappy story.....the rabbi started the day with a very sappy story. But it made me tear up....actually into the weepy stage....
It can be long......5 services plus Kol Nidre (which is often misunderstood by those who just seen it in isolation and without any background in halacha) - but by the end, only the hard-hearted aren't feeling lots......
The 13 attributes – for those of us who like a nice helping of tradition with our worship, there's not much more traditional than this: the 13 attributes of haShem are supposedly what haShem taught Moshe Rabbeynu after the incident with the golden calf. Actually sung in real unison, very powerful.
The line after the Shema that's only said out loud on Yom Kippur....makes it quite powerful as well.
Avinu Malkeynu and Ki Honay get me each time they are repeated....
The neighborhood that the synagogue is in is heavily Jewish and so very quite right around the time Neila (the last of the 5 services) ends with a blast of a shofar and the cry of 'Next year in Jerusalem' ..... and 15 minutes later, everyone is rushing home to break the fast.
The stamina of the men who lead the services.... while the fast isn't too hard for me, I'm not standing in front of 400+ people, singing loud enough to be heard with no sound system.....and some of them had the energy to dance at the end..... One of the rabbis was here from NYC, and is one of the few people who use the pronunciation Toy-rah whose Hebrew I can understand with my minimal grasp of the language.... the fact that he's funny and thought-provoking is a nice addition.
I love all the strollers line up outside the building... singles, doubles....lots of them. And the kids inside: some oblivious to the day and just happy to play with friends, some clinging to Abba/Daddy while he prays (even if he's one of the rabbis.....), or [in the case of one boy tonight] kneeling near the edge of the action taking it in all wide-eyed.............
The synagogue is now in a former church building – enough like the building of the church I grew up in that it feels a wee bit strange.....
Every year, I say I'm going to read the actual Hebrew well enough that I don't need the interlinear machzor the next year but I never quite make it. I'm almost ok for Shabbat with just the Hebrew/English but services for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are different enough that I like the training wheels still ;-)
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