KADDISHEL
A Life Reborn
At Rosh Ha’Shana, people did m’chila, apologizing to each other for the actions they regretted and doing their best to make up, in- creasing the sense of sholem (peace), wholeness, and well-being in the community. Of course, there were some exceptions, but most people tried to make peace with all of their neighbors, Jew and non- Jew alike. That is how we lived. For the Rosh Ha’Shana Tashlich ceremony, groups walked from our synagogue to the Slusch River or the smaller Kolchik Creek and threw in bread crumbs to symbol- ize cleansing and casting away of our sins. Between Rosh Ha’Shana and Yom Kippur, people traveled to the graves of their relatives, even if they were far away. On Yom Kippur, huge yahrzeit candles that burned for twenty-four hours or more were set in boxes of sand within the synagogues in memory of deceased loved ones. Everyone, of course, fasted. On the major holiday of Sukkot, we ate our meals in our suk- kah, the temporary dwelling we built to commemorate the tran- sient lifestyle of the early Israelites traveling out of Egypt. It was cold, but we thatched the roof with greenery from a far part of the meadow behind the house, the same area that used to get flooded in the winter and was used for ice skating. We would invite many friends to eat with us in the sukkah. My father car- ried his lulav (bundled palm fronds and other branches) and es- rog (citron) into the sukkah in keeping with the tradition of the holiday. On Simchat Torah, the people of Ludvipol walked with torch- es from the various synagogues to Rabbi Akiva’s house, where he made Kiddush over vodka and honey cakes. The children carried flags topped with an apple stuck onto the stick and a candle stuck into the apple. On that day, in addition to reading from the Torah, we danced around the shul with the Torah scrolls. Little children who began to learn Hebrew at that time of year licked honey off of Hebrew letters as a symbol that it is sweet and good to learn, and we all dipped apples in honey for a sweet new year. On Hanukkah, we exchanged small presents and played dreidl (a game of tops), betting small amounts of money, like pennies
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