7 years ago, I performed my first wedding.  6 years ago, I performed my first Bat Mitzvah.  Today, I am so proud to announce the official launch of “Shema Koleinu“, our non-profit synagogue-like organization that provides outreach to South Florida’s Jewish and Interfaith/Intercultural unaffiliated community.  After several years of providing quality, meaningful life cycles for families who do not belong to synagogues, I wanted to do more.  I wanted to mean more.  I knew, that in order to truly be “My Personal Cantor”, I must provide everything a true synagogue did, but was committed to eliminating the membership, dues, and business aspect of the synagogue.

It was not only critical to provide meaningful life cycles, it was critical to bring my community a place of belonging, a place they could call their community, and feel great about building. We can create community by action, not by dollars.  We can create community through mitzvah projects and group prayer, and not need to pay electric bills to do it!

But yet, we must build.  Bringing my community an amazing High Holy Day worship experience was my priority this year, and I’m so excited to announce that I have contracted with the Miramar Cultural Center, to bring West Broward its first meaningful, uplifting, and spiritually abundant High Holy Day services for the unaffiliated.  Regardless of your affiliation – or not – you can now worship and honor the new year with us, in a beautiful setting, with meaningful prayer and leadership.  Our services will be family-friendly, so bring your children!  And – we are even offering a tiny tot worship service for both Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.

We need the community’s help in building something they can call their own!  For more information, please contact Cantor Debbi Ballard at 954-646-1326.  Watch for our official ticket sales announcement in the next few days, and please – let us know what you can do to help.  This is not MY event – this is YOURS!  Please come and be a part of something – REVOLUTIONARY!  You’ll be so happy you did!

B’Shalom,

Since I live in downtown Ft. Lauderdale, I am constantly driving by the park on Broward, just east of Andrews, where countless homeless people live.  When I moved here, I began cooking double batches of food, and as I cooked for myself, I would package the 2nd batch, and drop it off as I drove by, with plasticware, in disposable containers.  (recyclable – for sure!) The first time I dropped off my food, I marveled at the impact it had on me.  Driving down Broward, with tears rolling down my face, I felt a new gratitude that I had never felt before.  Not grateful for the big things, but for the small things.  That I had my own food, and water, and knew every day where I was sleeping, and that it would be warm and dry.  It broke my heart that so many others had so much less.

At Purim, we give Shaloach Manot – Food Baskets – for the needy.  With 62 children in my Hebrew School program, I wanted to organize an act of giving. Not an act of giving where we just dropped food off at a truck.  Yeah, that’s good too, but – I wanted my kids to know what homeless people looked like.  I wanted them to see that they were real people, people who might have just lost out on chances, and this is where they ended up, for now.  I explained that sometimes, people choose this life, and while I wanted them to give to someone who had less than them, I did not want them to look at them with pity.  Just look at them as people who have less, and no way to get what we have, and know that you are doing something good when you share it with them.

I organized a food drive.  Asked every family to donate some food for baskets, to organize the baskets, and drive to downtown together, to drop them off.  I told them we probably wouldn’t stay there, just long enough to share – and leave.  Several families asked if I had press coverage.  ”No”, I replied – I didn’t want any.  This wasn’t about me, nor was it about my kids, but it was about simply – giving.  Nobody would know we were coming.  No organizers were there to make sure it all worked out, but something deep down inside told me that the ultimate Organizer, Blessed be He, was going to take care of it all.

I got nervous.  What if our giving caused a riot?  What if we didn’t have enough to go around and something bad happened?  What if my innocent children who I brought to Ft. Lauderdale with their families experienced a good plan gone bad?  Not today.  It wasn’t going to happen.  The Organizer was at work, making sure it was all good.

And so – we met at Dunkin Donuts, in the parking lot.  I was overwhelmed at the number of families who showed up, brought amazing food, and even some extra friends to help out.  Within minutes, my kids and my families put together 42 bags of food, and we kept some as leftovers, because I actually ran out of bags.  (We’re doing this again on April 10th!)  I wanted to take pictures, document the process, but I managed to catch a few quick shots, and they were all ready to go!

We got in our cars, caravaned down 595, and like a parade of cars, pulled in to the spaces that bordered the park.  I jumped out of my car, and was just looking at all the homeless people, and was almost speechless.  I was overcome with emotion, and didn’t even know how to start.  Thankfully, a young man, who was sitting on a blanket came to me.  I explained that I was a teacher, and in these cars behind me were my students and parents.  That we just celebrated Purim, where we were thankful for our abundance, and wanted to show our gratitude by sharing our food with them.  I told them we might not have enough, and asked them please kindly to share and make sure everyone got something.

Suddenly, every person in the park was standing around us – respectfully – eagerly – waiting to see what we were doing there.  They heard my explanation, and I could immediately feel their incredible gratitude for just showing up for them at this moment.  I then invited my kids to get out of their cars, and carry a bag to each person that was standing on the sidewalk, and suddenly, all of the people in the park began thanking my children profusely.  Again – I was overwhelmed.

A nice looking man – actually he was fairly clean cut, and seemed to me to be “recently displaced” spoke up.  He told my kids that they might not realize it, but that it only takes one person’s small act of kindness to change the world.  Maybe not the whole word, but HIS whole world was changed today, and I suspect, so were many others. But you know what’s funny?  I think for the people receiving the food, their day was changed.  But for those of us who brought the food?  That’s whose lives were changed the most.

Can you imagine the feeling of watching one of your precious students, clutching his mother, as he sobbed in her shirt, in despair for the unfortunate people whose day he just brightened?  Well, not only was his world changed today, but mine was changed even more.  To know that I just watched so many of my precious students, and their parents take part in true, direct giving – from their hearts, and from their wallets, was one of the most life changing experiences I have ever had.

I’m so thankful today. Thankful for my wonderful families.  Thankful that for my $63 investment at BJ’s yesterday, I changed many people’s lives.  Thankful that I saw giving as a pleasure, not as a duty.  Thankful that I shared this moment with my students, and hopeful that they will always be inspired to give – more, and more often, to those in need.

We will be doing this again on April 10th, and if my friend Elizabeth has her way, this is going to become a monthly event – because truly – people are starving every day – right here at home.  Not just on Thanksgiving or Yom Kippur, but every day – and because we can – we should make giving a daily event. Thank you to all who shared in today’s Mitzvah.  I am truly grateful for having you in my life.

B’Shalom,

(Article)

Bar Mitzvah Training: It’s not just a job….

The New York Times story about on-line bar mitzvah preparation caught lots of attention (at least for a few minutes).  You should read it if you have not.  It offers a window into some basic problems we face in the American Jewish community today.  First, what do synagogues matter anymore?  It is possible to do everything Jewish without a synagogue.  We often say that the community you find in a synagogue is vital to your Jewish life and not available anywhere else.  Whether or not that’s true, the parents featured in the article don’t seem to care.  And yet, they DO want bar mitzvah ceremonies for their kids.  Or do they?  The other important issue in the article is about the meaning of bar/bat mitzvah?  The final line of the article says it all: “Once Joanne Kapsack had found a rabbi for Eli to work with, she pretty much bowed out of the preparations, she said. “I just cared about the party.”  I am sure this happens equally often in our temple (and others).  I must admit that I have never been a bar mitzvah party naysayer.  I’ve either stayed out of it and treated it as something outside my scope or I have embraced the idea of the parties as part of the mitzvah and part of the community gathering that can occur.  But, nothing has disappointed me more than hearing the post-event assessment from two recent bat mitzvah mothers: it was a let-down.  They whole experience, when it was all said and done, was a let down for these mothers.  What else could it be after all the hype, the buildup, the money and time spent on it?  I have no problem adopting new technology – though I don’t really want an office that looks like the trading floor of a brokerage house.  I have no problem with adopting different standards than previous generations simply accepted in order to become temple members. I also have no problem with completely revolutionizing the way we do Jewish education in general.  But I do have problems with the ongoing march toward deification of bar and bat mitzvah.  Within this trend is not so much innovation as desperation.  We will do anything, it seems, to make our kids and ourselves feel good while we and they wallow in ambivalence about our Judaism.Dear

(My reply)

Rabbi Roos,

I just came across your comment and wanted to share another aspect of this situation that many seem to forget, or are not aware of.

It saddens me, too, to see the rite of passage as nothing but an excuse to show off one’s financial stature. I’m not a nay-sayer either, but whole-heartedly believe that the community celebration should be one of meaning, with the closest of friends and family surrounding the child, and showing love and support.

I am one of those Officiants, who provide unaffiliated lifecycles to my families, however, not for the purpose of fast tracking, eliminating, or for any other motive. These are families who got lost in the synagogue shuffle, and felt that synagogues were busy expecting congregants to meet their own financial needs, rather than vice versa.

In my town of Weston, FL, the Reform synagogue was bursting at its seams 5 years ago. With 700 families, they had one Rabbi with a lifetime contract since day 1, and a Cantorial soloist (not even a Cantor).

B’Nai Mitzvah services were doubled, to two a day, on Saturday morning ONLY, with 2 students in each service.

Many families wanted Havdalah services. Many families wanted smaller, private services to be held in the chapel, without the big pomp and circumstance and showiness of keeping up with those Jones’s. Many wanted their Rabbi (or officiant) to actually know their child’s name, but couldn’t commit to 3-5 days a week at the synagogue because of other commitments and demands on their childrens’ and families’ lives.

So – because the local synagogue couldn’t (or wouldn’t) meet those families’ needs – and because they truly wanted a meaningful, intimate connection to Judaism, and an opportunity to make their Judaism more personal and meaningful, and relevant, they found me.

I am a deeply traditional, spiritual Jew, with a profound belief, and relationship with G-d. I actually teach my students how to pray – how to understand G-d, and make G-d meaningful and relevant. I actually engage my students in learning, and experiencing Judaism, by cooking in their homes at holidays, teaching them how to teach their parents (many who are in Interfaith marriages) and how to initiate a worship-style dialogue at their Friday night Shabbat dinner table.

Please know that not all of us have offices that look like Wall Street. Mine is covered with photos of families I have worked with, pictures of places that my incredible job has taken me to, and is an environment that helps me remember that I am here to serve people, and not the other way around.

Perhaps if synagogues began acting the same way- more families would walk in the doors, rather than out.

With the most profound respect for your thoughts,

Cantor Debbi Ballard

www.mypersonalcantor.com

Reprinted from August 17, 2008 by cantorballard

On the heels of my blog about “What do we want from Hebrew Schools”, it becomes evident that our view today on religion, as a whole, has experienced a tremendous shift.

USAToday’s recently published article tells us that Americans lean more towards the upbeat, positive aspects of faith, while moving farther and farther away from dogmatic practices with hard core rules and restrictions. We are more prone to look to our religious traditions and rituals at time of lifecycle events, but in our every day lives, we want to receive the positive messages and encouragement faith offers.

So what does this say about our society, in terms of G-d? How do we define G-d? If we reject the rules and structure – will faith continue to exist? And – if all that – is – what is faith? Do we turn our faith into ourselves, becoming completely self-accountable? The question kind of scared me.

I do what I do to serve those who have already decided on moving away from dogma, and embracing feel-good spirituality. Sometimes I, myself, find that I really subscribe to that theory as well. We say – well, I don’t have to observe Shabbat, and…It’s ok to bend this rule, and that…It’s ok to get married “just before” sundown on Shabbat, to accommodate the caterer, etc. But- what power do we give G-d, then? I don’t feel any less connected to G-d than I ever did, in fact, in my quest for spirituality, I have grown closer.

To me, the answer is in living strong in principals, rather than rules. I go out of my way to do the right thing to and for people, to observe the golden rule, to care for the earth, caring for the sick, giving to the poor, those are things that bring me closer to G-d, because I know they’re the right things to do. I’m no less Godly, I just don’t worry about the details, in favor of the bigger things.

I’ve seen clergy – well respected, highly highly highly dogmatic, and staunch in their public ritual observance who are -pardon the expression – complete jerks – sinners, even. Are they more Godly than me? What about the Catholic priests who commit heinous acts against children – they followed the dogmatic rules, but didn’t live a life of G-d in their hearts.

What’s wrong with wanting the spiritual, upbeat message? We get the negative ones daily. You’ll get cancer, you’ll lose money, you’ll do this or that, and it’s usually bad. No wonder our society wants to gravitate to things that make us feel good while we’re here on earth – we don’t get much of it from anywhere else!

I’ll take my double dose of spirituality. I believe it is what makes me smile when I’m in your presence, to let you know you have brightened my day. I believe that being happy because I woke up this morning makes G-d feel good about me. Please forgive that I didn’t light my Shabbat candles right at sundown, or that I took my child to the movies on Saturday – at least I spent time with them, let them know their Mom loves them, and I know that makes G-d feel good about me too.

We all deserve to feel good, and we can do it with G-d in our minds and our hearts, even if we don’t follow all the rules..

I work with so many Destination Brides, and I know that so many brides must encounter this challenge when they are getting ready to travel for their weddings.

If you are in the ketubah market, I highly recommend Daniel’s work, as an original, inspirational artist and designer.  Enjoy!

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by Daniel Sroka of www.modernketubah.com

When my wife and I got married, we were still living in San Francisco, but our wedding was closer to our family in New Jersey. Let me tell you, planning a long distance wedding has its challenges! One of which is how to safely bring your ketubah on the plane with you. I get asked this a lot, so I thought I’d share some advice. First, have me ship your ketubah to you, not to the wedding site. It is really important that you see your ketubah in person, well before the ceremony. This will let you look it over carefully, and make sure that it is exactly what you ordered. And if it got accidentally damaged in shipment, this will give me a chance to replace it for you.

Traveling with your ketubah

I ship your ketubah rolled between sheets of acid-free tissue paper, and placed in an extra-strong shipping tube. Experience has shown that this is the safest way to ship unframed fine art. (Shipping it flat is both more expensive, and results in more damage.) So the best way to travel with a ketubah is to reuse this shipping tube. Place your ketubah between the tissue paper I provided, and carefully reroll in and place it in the tube. You now have a safe and portable package to carry with you. Be sure to bring it with you in carry-on, or stash it safely deep in the middle of your suitcase, surrounded on all sides by clothes.

When you arrive

When you get to the location of your wedding, take your ketubah out of the tube, and let it unroll. The paper will keep its curl for a while, but don’t worry. The paper of your ketubah is 100% cotton-rag, so it will easily “forget” the curl over time. When you remove it, you could gently use the tube to roll it in the opposite direction to remove the curl more quickly. If you feel uncomfortable doing this, just lay it flat like I suggested for a day or so to get rid of the worst of the curl. For my own wedding, I used an inexpensive poster frame to flatten the ketubah, and then protect it throughout the wedding and reception. When you are ready to have it framed, your framer can make sure that any remaining curl is removed.

So, I’m about to begin another Jewish year.  Not only do I know I have tons of work to do in getting ready for HH ’09, but, I have lots of work to do looking back.  I couldn’t begin looking forward until I spent some time catching up on where I’ve been over the last few months.

Last I wrote, I had just gotten back from St. John, where I performed the wedding for Jen & Ilan, and their 2 little girls.  It was so amazing!  Then, I was in San Juan for Meredith & Vincent’s wedding – that I still need to blog about.  It was at the Fort, and it was a beautiful day!  Right after the wedding, I was rushed back to the airport, to perform Susi & Joe’s wedding in Key Biscayne the next morning, so needless to say – it took a while to recover!

Of course, there was Reid’s Bar Mitzvah, the following week, which was such a great experience.  Kudos to Richard & Jayne,  who defied social tradition, and had a lovely,  small, private, intimate service right in their home.  Reid did a great job, and I was so proud of him!

THEN – the highlight of my month – I took off to the NC Smoky Mountains, where I go camping, hiking, and white water rafting for 10 amazing days!  Just wait till I post pictures of my TENT – and the bear we came across while hiking!  We got lots of rain towards the end of the week, so we headed off to my friend Kerin’s cabin in Boone, and spent the rest of vacation in the beautiful Pisgah National Forest.

I thought August would be quiet, but today is the 27th, and I don’t know where the month went.  I performed a Bar Mitzvah for Makhail, where everyone came in “Jedi” costumes, and a very sad funeral, for the loss of my friend’s mother, a beautiful woman who was taken far too early.  Then, it was time to take Trevor to Gainesville, and Lauren to Jacksonville, and that brings me to today- where I just returned home, ready to go!

I am, however, going to take a few hours to hit the beach, and go for a walk, enjoying the beautiful Florida outdoors.  I have missed sun, and relaxation, but I just couldn’t hit the sand and surf without taking a few minutes to write.  I want to write about all of these things that I have done this summer, but I also have many new and exciting things to cover coming up.

Oh wait – did I mention I got certified to scuba dive, and will now be performing underwater weddings with ProDiveUSA?  Yeah, so much to tell…

Stay tuned, I’ll be back – but for now, going to get a dose of vitamin D!

LOVE YA!

I truly do know there are amazing things in store for my life.  Great things are presently happening, and I couldn’t be more excited, and full of positive anticipation.  Bring life on!

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Continuing in the Anti-Boredom vein for July, this week’s interview is with a woman who performs underwater weddings, fights for human rights and plays guitar while officiating ceremonies. How totally fun is that?

Who: Debbi Ballard of My Personal Cantor
Debbi Ballard is a Jewish Maverick and lifecycle celebrant, who employs her passionate and spiritual presence to unite people of all faiths through unity of shared common values.

Name one moment in your life when you threw a pity party for yourself and the reasons why you felt you weren’t able to achieve your goals. Were you feeling stuck? Had you felt you failed? What wasn’t working in your life?
I had just gotten divorced, failed miserably at a new career path, and completely lost all financial security. I had 2 small children, and felt completely worthless. I threw myself a pity party, because I knew I was worthy of so much more than what my life situation appeared to be, and I felt like a complete failure at the time. Nothing was working for me. Everything I saw myself doing involved failure, and I felt so hopeless that I would never get out of the failure patterns. Truthfully – “I” wasn’t working in my life – or for my life. I was in a negative dialogue = negative results pattern, and I knew in my heart that in order for life to change, I was going to need to change first – but…how?

Even our lowest moments fulfill a need in us or express our desires. When you threw yourself that pity party, what did you hope to gain? What need did you fulfill?
Great question! I needed to console myself, and to validate myself for my own feelings. I felt as if the outside world was against me, but I realized that I just wanted to feel sorry for myself, because nobody else was. Deep down, I knew that if I made things bad enough in my life, I would be validated in my own pity party, and feel justified in having it!

Tell us what you did to break up the pity party. What actions did you decide to take? Did someone help you buoy your spirits? Push you along?
Honestly, as hokey as it may sound – I knew then that my own dialogue was creating the life situation, and that in order to change the life, I needed to change the dialogue. Instead of crying and complaining about how bad things were going in my life, I decided to pretend things were AWESOME. I told everyone that everything was AWESOME in my life – and that I couldn’t have been happier. I almost choked on those words at first, but they became my mantra. I can clearly remember the moment when I caught myself telling someone how AWESOME my life was – and it actually WAS! It was then that I knew that the conversation had finally changed my life! And, while I always had a great support system of people who were cheering for me – it wasn’t until I became self empowered that anything actually changed, so it had everything to do with me, and my own perception of life, and the actions I took for myself.

Can you look back on that moment and tell us how you felt when you did decide to take action? What results came about from your decision to take charge and move on?
I felt so empowered, because I actually knew that I could control this conversation, and the direction of my life. I began to see myself as being successful again in life, and it gave me an incredible feeling of power to know that I could change the course of my happiness. Instantly, everything began to change. My job started to produce more success, my living situation improved, my children’s happiness improved, and the more powerful I felt, the better life became.

Everyone has a Someday problem hiding deep inside, even little ones. What variety of the Someday Syndrome do you currently harbor? What would you like to achieve but haven’t yet?
I consider myself so fortunate to have turned my passion into my livelihood, and in my mind, I already feel very successful. But, even deeper in my mind, I see a hundred times more success is possible for me. However, my Someday problem is often an inertia – an almost paralysis in actually executing the tasks I need to perform to actually achieve that hundred times more successful state. I make lists in my mind of awesome ideas I have to take to reach those next steps, but when I actually sit down to do them – I manage to find a hundred other things that take me off course. Some days, I just don’t know why I allow myself to be taken off my path, and I get so angry at myself. Other times, I get overwhelmed by all the things I know I should be doing, so I just do something else, and tell myself that I’ll get to those important things “later”. It’s funny – I spent my whole life wishing I didn’t have a ‘boss”. Now I wish I did! I might be incredibly productive!

Examining your Someday Syndrome problem, what are you currently doing to resolve it and eliminate it from your life?
I wish I could list 10 things I was doing to resolve my Someday Syndrome. Perhaps I’ll do that – later….. No, all kidding aside – I’m not doing enough. My greatest change has been my utilization of different colored sticky notes all over my office. Some are motivational, others are task oriented, and others are goals. I like different colors, and when I see things up on the wall that I can move around or remove, then it makes everything seem more “do-able”. Therefore, I do them, or take action on them more often. If I have everything floating in my mind, they don’t appear to be real, or movable, or do-able. It’s beginning to work.

Many people suffer the same problems you do. You’re not alone, and neither are they. What would you tell people in your situation right now to help them avoid what you’re going through?
I can definitely see how and why people get stuck in this rut – but the best advice I received that I would give, is to do just one thing towards the goal. Just write one thing down, do it, and cross it off the list, because it gives you a great sense of accomplishment. My son, who is a physics major, always reminds me that a body in motion stays in motion. And that it is always hardest to take the first step. I know that when I take those first steps, the next ones get easier, and then I find I am just a whirling-dirvish of activity! (I love that phrase!!)

If you could ask for one thing, right now, to help you overcome your Someday Syndrome, what type of help would you ask for?
More accountability. To someone, I just don’t know who. I have found that just being accountable to myself doesn’t work well enough. When I have an article that is due to someone, I get it done. When I have a ceremony or a speech that someone is waiting for – it gets done. But when I am the only one who expects something from myself – it just doesn’t get done often enough. So, I guess when I said I need a “boss” – that is what I would wish for. I guess that is what life coaches are called now – for those of us Self Employed Someday Syndrome sufferers!

If you’re like Debbi and want to have a “boss” checking in on you, sign up to the Accountability Clinic and make Someday Syndrome your boss.

• The Someday-Busting Coaching Services
• The Dream Discovering Ebook by Alex Fayle

These were from last summer, when Jim & Jade were doing a Monday morning segment, called “In Your Faith”.

Unfortunately, it was cancelled, but I really had fun doing the segments.  Click here to see the videos.

Deb

I knew May was going to be a ridiculously stressful, however highly rewarding month.  For the most part, May turned out exactly as I thought it would – a whirlwind month, with so many incredible experiences.  Toss in a few things I just didn’t expect, with a couple of personal setbacks I didn’t see coming, and BOOM – the seed was planted, and took root, instantly. What began as “I’m tired, burned out, and just don’t have the creative energy to write” turned into a self recriminating mantra that kept telling me that I wasn’t half the person I professed to be, if I couldn’t write just one blog entry this month!

Well – the self recriminating voice is gone.  We all have bumps in the road, don’t we?  Where would we be without setbacks that make us see just how strong we are?  Where would we be without experiencing some of life’s failures – just so we can appreciate the little successes with fervor and exuberant joy? Once again, Danny Maseng’s Return Again, or even stronger – Joel Osteen’s Begin Again series, giving me the permission to allow myself life’s little failures of time and followthrough, with a free pass to get back on track.  Begin again…isn’t every day a new beginning?

It’s so difficult to navigate life and be everything to everyone who needs us to be one thing or another.  Our clients, our family, our children, our community, our creditors, our friends, our less fortunate neighbors, the list is endless.  I sometimes forget – or wonder if I ever knew – who do I serve first?  What if I want to serve everyone, and the population’s desires of me are incongruent?  I tend to slip out of life when that happens.  I tend to forget that I must serve myself first.  Rev. Ernest Chu, author of “Soul Currency”, today reminded me that those of us with such strong compulsions to give – often forget to serve ourselves first – or even at all.  Well, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that the vessel that continuously pours out, eventually runs out.  Perhaps, the month of May was continuous pouring.  I really forgot to take care of me, and I so appreciate the messages of today, telling me I am still an amazing woman, worthy of self forgiveness, compassion, and lots of tender love and care.  Today was mine, and I can feel the blood really beginning to flow.

I’m excited again to write about May.  The wedding of Dan & BethAnne in Gainesville, with my all time favorite Catholic Priest – Father Tim. He is quite possibly the coolest Catholic Priest I have ever met!

The wonder-weekend of Nick & Remy’s wedding in the Bahamas, followed by Jenni (the love of my life) and Mike here in Fort Lauderdale, and then the whirlwind 2000 miles in 48 hour weekend of a Bar Mitzvah, 2 weddings, and a Bat Mitzvah.  I knew I would need time to recover, and here I am, on June 27th, looking July squarely in the eyes, wondering where in the hell did time go?  It doesn’t matter – because every moment that flew by is in the past.  I can only think about the present, and here I am – writing again, beginning again, and so excited to share all the joy that my life has seen the last month.

Stay tuned, the writer is back.  The procrastinator has been siezed!

B’Shalom,