Community

If it takes a village to raise a child, what about the rest of us?  We, too, need the village, the community to help us through life.  Communities can make joys much happier and sorrows much easier to bear.  Communities celebrate both the talents of each individual and the needs of the entire group.  Communities become a second family (an extension of the extended family) and give more than friendship and understanding.  Communities bring people from all walks of life together and make the whole much richer than the parts.

But what is it that makes a random group into a community?  And how is this group put together in the first place?  Where one lives?  Who one spends time with?  What about common interests?  Common values? Common culture?

I do feel like a part of my town and the local public school community.  I have met some amazing people through my  sons' schools--PTA, etc.  It's always so nice to see familiar faces and catch up with friends at concerts, events, graduation.

My neighborhood also has great people.  I see them when walking the dog, at the library, at the store, etc.  It's almost impossible to buy groceries without seeing several people I know.

The community I feel the closest too is my synagogue (Temple Sinai, Rochester, NY).  In fact, many believe I live at Temple Sinai. Those organizations that  send out the free address labels have been reminding me for several years that I do indeed reside at Temple Sinai!  Who else has both a classroom and an office??  But seriously, these are people are there for each other and can be counted on to fill a room in both happy and sad times.  How lucky I am to be a part of this group.

Tomorrow I embark on a new adventure.  One where a new random group of people will come together to form a learning and traveling community.  A community of Holocaust educators.  And together, this new community will venture to the  "Old Country"  -- a place where Jewish communities once thrived, but are now echoes.  What will we hear? Will we listen?