Adventures in daily prayer

My mother died. I decided to try to go to minyan every day and say Kaddish for her. It's coming up on two months. Here are some of my experiences.

First, a preface. I own a large print daily prayer book. I wavered over whether to get it during COVID, then I told myself, your eyes aren't that great and when davening in front of a computer, you don't have to lift the book very often so go for the bigger print. This has been a good call.

Back in early 2020, my congregation held minyan in person every day and served breakfast. That was then. Now there is no in-person daily egalitarian minyan in my city (except on Sundays). So I'm going to the congregaton Zoom Wednesday minyan, the congregation Sunday minyan in person, and Saturday morning in person. The other four mornings I'm online. New York minyan starts at 7:15, but if I miss that, there's a very nice Chicago minyan that starts at 8:45 ET. First I thought I would mostly go to the Chicago minyan, but I am up and awake for New York, so I find I'm doing that. New York's streaming service has had some hiccups, and then I go by Zoom (on mute, mostly no video) but otherwise by livestream.

One week into daily minyan, I decided to upgrade my computer sound system so I could hear the minyan better. Three weeks in to daily minyan, I decided I needed a new talit to honor the experience. I found a beautiful soft silk one that is so small it could fit in a jacket pocket. It's joyful. Putting it on I feel like I am dressing up, even if I'm still barefoot and in a TShirt and jeans. I tell myself these are "hiddur mitzvah", the Jewish excuse for buying anything remotely connected to prayer that happens to be expensive.

Morning minyan, some days I'm awake and alert, some days less so. The other day I went for a shower after minyan and I had forgotten to remove my kippah. It is made of cotton - fortunately. I took it off in the shower, but it took a while to dry out after that. But if I shower before minyan, not only do I have to be up earlier, I have long wet hair to deal with. If I leave my hair down, it is bad for the silk tallit. So I have to put it up.

About six weeks in, I decided I wanted to wear tefillin. I had never wanted to take on this responsibility. It is a responsibility. Somehow in this period of mourning, when there is nothing more I can do for my mother, I want to take on responsibility and ground myself to the world. I try and be very attentive with my siblings who are going through this too. I get myself up for minyan. So although I never thought I would, I am laying tefillin.

I started laying tefillin four days ago, and to be frank, I don't think I've gotten it exactly right any time yet. There are great videos on Youtube but they can only help so much. One day I forgot to take the arm tefillin out of its case before putting it on my arm. And that's such a long and involved process, I just left it in the case. One day I showered and had a bun of wet hair before minyan and I had to navigate the placement of the head tefillin a little carefully. One day I put on the tefillin triumphantly and only when I was supposed to be gathering the four corners of my tallit for the shema did I realize I had neglected to put on the tallit. The tallit is supposed to go on first. One day I got the long strap of the tefillin hopelessly tangled with the tzitzit. Exactly one time have I managed to put them away neatly enough I can zip up the tefillin case. These things happen.

Wearing tefillin leaves an impression on you. My husband pointed out my arm while I was eating breakfast and said, "I can see you were wearing tefillin". There are indentations in my left arm. They subside after half an hour? Definitely by lunch. My head feels different with the weight of the Torah on it, even after I take it off. Like wearing a ski helmet, but you can still hear clearly.

I don't know why I am enjoying morning minyan and wearing tefillin, but if there's one thing I've learned in life, it's that if it works, it works. If you like to do it (and it's not hurting anybody), just do it. You might argue, that's not the reason to go to minyan and lay tefillin and say Kaddish for your mother. You're supposed to do it because it's a commandment. I know that. I applaud people who do it because they're supposed to and don't even like it. But I like it, and I feel good doing it, so I think I will continue to do it.

Maybe it is the swaddling. Infants enjoy swaddling. The tefillin swaddle my head and arm and I am comforted, and I sing praises and pray to the God who is always there, just the other side of the conversation. In some ways as real to me as the people on the other side of the livestream.