Counting Down and Looking Ahead

Yesterday afternoon, in the middle of religious school, it felt a little like time stopped when I saw on my cell that Dr. McIntosh's office was calling. So, now we have a date: June 28, 10 a.m.

It was a lot further off than I thought it would be, and I was surprised to feel a little let down! On the other hand, it allows me over a month to do preparation at work for next year and it means Ari will be all done with school and officially "on vacation." So he can join Alex in being available to help.

From everything I have learned today from Dr. D'Amico, the surgery should take about 4 hours and I will probably be in the hospital only 48 hours, so hopefully home that Wednesday. The rest of the process is a lot longer, and if I need chemo, longer still. (They won't "install" the final implants until a month after any treatment is over.) And, that process is done under general anesthesia although it does not take very long.

But distraction came in the form of work: Luckily, last night was a special Kadimah program that quite spontaneously erupted into half the students on the bimah singing "Don't Stop Believin'" (made popular again by the TV show "Glee") and the other half rocking and singing in the pews. We made the most of the new sound system as Rabbi David Segal provided backup lyrics and music, courtesy of his laptop and Journey's original recording. We ended past our official closing time of 8:30, but not a child moved from that room until the song was over. It was really quite magical and one of those things you want to take a snapshot of - and look at once in a while - and smile like crazy.

Then tonight was our Shavuot and Confirmation service, and the five young women and five young men were really quite inspired and inspiring. Ari was one of the members of his class (next year's Confirmands) to symbolically "receive" the Torah from this year's group, which was especially fun for me, of course. Then the final song's (part of my "new favorite song" list) verses were sung by one of the girls (brava, CC), and it was especially moving to hear it so beautifully done. So many proud families in that room; it was hard to know who to watch!

And so ends the penultimate week of my seventh year as head of this religious school. I'm not sure I've ever felt in control all the way to May before (usually by February all the planning has gone by the wayside and we're flying by the seats of our pants,) and I'm very proud of the whole endeavor. It's nice to feel in control of something, for sure.