A couple of weeks ago, I received my property tax assessment and my jaw dropped. Over the last two years, the value of my home has almost doubled, which is wonderful news if you want to sell your house, but I don’t want to sell mine. As a matter-of-fact, I hope to be dragged out of my house feet-first. My wife, however, has been telling me for over a year that the house is too big; she’s trying to prepare me for the fact that sooner or later it’s going to exceed both her capacity and our needs. I get apoplectic when I hear her talk this way . . . I plug my ears and shout invectives.



This is not just my house — it’s an extension of my body and soul. In our home of 35 years, four generations have slept here, smelled here, tasted here, and partied here. We have lived our history here, and every nook and cranny comes with its own story. My grandchildren’s placentas are all buried outside around the house; each has his or her own bush, vine, or tree. I’m hoping that, like the old Indian tradition, they will come back to this place and roll around on the ground to honor the earth to which they were first connected.

This place is part of me, and it reflects my tastes, habits, and holds my spirit. When I think about the spirit part of me, I know it can’t be contained in this place, or any other place. My spirit is not in the box, the house, the marker; it’s in everything and every place I’ve touched and loved. I tell myself it’s not in a place that I leave my imprint . . . but I still don’t want to leave my house.

Alas, I’ve grown too attached to the place. I can’t fathom the history lived in these walls summarized as, “3BR, 3BR, 4 fireplaces, separate office, may need some upgrades.” Frankly, I’m not sleeping as well since my tax assessment came, knowing that I’m resting inside this big checkbook, whose balance I don’t even want to know.

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My friend, Rabbi Avi Weiss, is the distinguished head of a yeshiva in New York City and a preeminent social activist. He was in town to support the opening of a new Orthodox congregation led by one of his students, Rabbi Darren Kleinberg, whom he wanted me to meet.


R. Darren is an English-born Generation X-er, who is married and has a two-year-old daughter. Not raised in an observant Jewish home, he is a blues guitarist who found his way to Israel, and ultimately to his religious vocation. We were drawn to one another, and he invited my wife and me to join him at a Friday night service. It’s been a while since I’d worshipped in an Orthodox congregation, but I wanted to support him and see him in action, so we attended his tiny store-front synagogue.

The Torah portion for the week had to do with a detailed description about how to build the Tabernacle that would travel with them through the desert. Every member of the tribes of Israel was commanded to contribute half a shekel towards the building of this sanctuary. More specifically, it was written that the money be used to purchase the silver sockets into which the supporting posts fit that held the entire structure together.

R. Darren asked the question: why such detail for a piece of insignificant hardware that was hardly visible? No similar detailed instructions were given about how the ark should be carved, or its materials, or how the scrolls should be covered, even though that’s what most people see. He offered this commentary: it’s not the gilded, most ornately visible trappings that sustain faith, but rather the participation of ordinary, mostly invisible, people who are the heart of the community. What supports a community of faith is a collective soul of nearly imperceptible sockets. One of the most important teachings he learned from his Rabbi, Avi Weiss, was that a community of faith is defined by the support it gives to its most vulnerable members: the invisible sockets that are ordinary people of faith.

Then he told this story . . . he had just gotten a call from a doctor in a hospital who was treating a patient with recurrent tumors. The doctor saw the patient’s wife sitting at his bedside reading the Tehillim, the book of psalms. The doctor asked her who their Rabbi was, because he would call him and ask him to visit. The patient’s wife said they did not have a Rabbi, so the doctor asked if he could call one for them, and he called the new Orthodox Rabbi in town. R. Darren spent time with this man and woman who had no organized affiliation to the Jewish community.

R. Darren said to his congregation, “I’m asking you to make Torah come alive, give your half shekel, be a holy socket and reach out to support our most vulnerable members.” Then he gave them the patient’s name, the hospital he was in, the floor and room number, and told them to live their faith.

In this storefront synagogue, sitting on a hard, uncomfortable, metal folding chair, a young Rabbi kindles my spirit, reminding me that if we can come together in community to heal ourselves, we can heal the world.

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Beloved Bro’...


I have just this day returned from a week in Portland, visiting with many dear hearts including my new colo-rectal specialist, for a 6-week follow-up exam. I am ABSOLUTELY THRILLED to report that our Sacred Whammy seems to be working!!!

As you know, this life comes without written instructions or reliable guarantees, as do these mid-stream medical findings... and yet they hold great promise. “Things look beautiful in here!” Obviously, Dr. Lee has a rather skewed view of “beauty,” but I am celebrating this long-awaited compliment with every fiber of my being.

Apparently, my tumor site has “softened” considerably these past few weeks, which I’m told is a “very good sign.” Dr. Lee says our next step is a thorough “anal mapping” (multiple site surgical biopsies) scheduled for June or July. This procedure will hopefully verify that all cells are now “quiescent” and healthy so that permanent colostomy surgery will NOT be necessary.

Please tell all those wonderful folks who’ve added me to their Blessing Basket (thanks to your recent Schlagbytes offering) how deeply I appreciate their help. I am eternally grateful to be reminded that none of us need make this arduous life journey alone.

Prayers work! And occasionally, so do bribes. Last Tuesday I struck a deal with Dr. Lee – “You save my ass, and I will teach you and your 16-year-old son how to fly fish. “ A purist might call it chumming, but it never hurts to seed one’s success.

Well, dear brother, there’s your latest installment of T’s Tushy Review. All kidding aside, I can’t tell you how honored I feel by your powerful efforts on my behalf. Perhaps you, me, and even the inscrutable ass man will chase some trout together one day?


Yep. More chumming.

Endless Love & Blessings,

Sista T

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Here are two newsworthy items that almost slipped by unnoticed by the American public. The first was the Congress getting wind of the fact that the President decided (without their involvement) to offer the United Arab Emirate of Dubai a contract to run the U.S. ports of New York, Baltimore, New Jersey, Philadelphia, New Orleans and Miami. Dubai’s ruling Sheik bought Peninsula& Oriental Steam Navigation Co. from the British who were previously managing those ports. The President didn’t think there was a lot of difference between England and Dubai; he said the Emirates have been “good partners” and that there was no security risk. The Emirates have funded some of the world’s largest terrorist organizations and were implicated in the 9/11 World Trade Center attack.


Dubai is a short flight from Iraq where we are currently engaged in a war on terror. To justify our escalating costs of involvement, this Administration has sensitized our security consciousness to the point of color-coded paranoia. In the President’s urgency to democratize Muslim countries and thus restore our sense of security, we have lost 2,000 American soldiers, are mega-billions in debt, and Iraq is now on the brink of civil war.

Then, responding to lawmakers who disapproved of the UAE running US ports, the President said, “People don’t need to worry about security.” Does he think the American people are stupid?

At the same time, this story appeared which also might never have seen the light of day, had a Circuit Court in Maryland not reversed a lower court decision. Raymond McNealy, a 44-year-old man, mooned his neighbor, Nanette Vonfeldt, a board member of the homeowners association with whom he had some issues. She happened to be accompanied by her eight-year-old daughter.

McNealy was put on trial for indecent exposure and found guilty. His moon could have cost him three years in prison and $1000. Circuit Judge John Debelius III, said in the acquittal that the act is “disgusting” and ”demeaning,” but McNealy was showing his disapproval and intended to offend only in the sense of being critical. The judge said that buttocks are never private parts and do not fit the crime of indecent exposure; he declared it was a legitimate form of communication.

Here’s a thought about lightening up in this age of fear and insecurity . . . let’s stop prosecuting mooners, and start mooning Presidents.

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My River Sister, “T.,” is a native Oregonian, a health consultant, author, and (what I admire most) one of the great fly-fishers and guides in the West. By the age of three, she was her father’s favorite fishing buddy. T. once took a solo fishing trip that lasted four months and covered nine states and 9,000 miles of blue-ribbon trout water. The reverence with which she comes to wading streams is, for her, like going to church. She has always understood that it is never just about the fish; it is always the sacredness of the place, the awe of the wilderness.


We share a love of the fishing experience that runs deeper than any river, and call each other “River Brother and Sister.” We’ve known each other for many years, during most of which we don’t see each other face to face. I read the articles she writes in outdoor magazines, and we correspond regularly; she is a funny lady, and we respect each other enormously.

Last October, T. wrote to me “ . . .imagine my surprise when out of the blue this morning, the husband of an old Swiss friend e-mails me from Zurich asking me if I know you and wondering if he should fly halfway around the world to attend your workshop. I told him you were a first-class schmuck, and to send me the airline money for saving them the trouble . . . but I think I’m going to join them.”

Weeks before the event she wrote and said she wasn’t coming. She’d been diagnosed with a large anal cancer, which for years had been misdiagnosed as a persistent anal fissure. By the time it was discovered, it had spread into her pelvic lymph nodes. She wrote to me and many friends asking for “butt blessings” while she was going through major surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. I prayed about her in my daily meditation, took her into sweat lodges, temples and tipis.

During treatment she wrote, “It’s a hard road and radiation is taking a toll on my tender tushy. My butt looks as if it’s been dipped in a deep fat fryer. It’s not fun, I have my weak moments but it’s doable because of your powerful prayers and blessings. You have empowered the warrior in me. I am 104 #’s of hairless, fighting fury!”

A couple of weeks ago, T. wrote saying the three-month follow-up scan revealed some residual cancer at the original site. Surgical and oncology specialists have held the door open that by some miracle the tumor may shrink when they examine her again this week. If there is no shrinkage, she will have additional surgery and a permanent colostomy. T. says, “I don’t like it much, but I’d much rather be a bag lady than a croaker, who didn’t know her ass from a hole in the ground. Pray for me, it encourages me.”

T.’s sense of humor is intact, and she isn’t walking away from the table, choosing to play the hand she’s been dealt. I asked her if it was OK to invite my readership who might be so moved, to pray for her in whatever ways they do it, and T. said, “Sure and I’ll send some pictures.”

Remember my River Sister as she prepares to wade these new waters, and remember other friends and relatives who are looking at whatever tough hands they’ve been dealt. We all face uncertainty better when we are connected, even at long distances. I say thank you, for all my relations. Mi Takuye Oyacin.

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