On Sunday, we had a second ladies-only Open Mic night at my synagogue for women here in L.A. Despite it being Oscar Night, the evening of a big community bar mitzvah, and the height of cold season, we got a decent-sized crowd. 
The participants were awesome. The youngest was in her twenties, I think, and the oldest was 68! The audience was just as diverse. More people I didn’t know already came this time, so I think that word-of-mouth is getting around. Continue reading
Yesterday, I had a kid home sick.
Actually, yesterday, the day before, AND today, I had a kid home sick.
The first day, I got writing done. This was pretty amazing because I usually have problems writing when someone is in the house with me. Just the sound of breathing or a page turning in a magazine is enough to snap me out of FLOW and distract me. I can usually manage to do some editing with people around, but not writing. The fact that I actually wrote a first draft with a little cutie around on Tuesday blew me away.
Yesterday, though, it wasn’t happening. Continue reading
Tablet’s running my essay about the weirdest thing that happened to me due to my OCD, which is so freaky that it’s taken years for me to write about. The only reason I finally did so was because I’ve seen some talk about these symptoms in Orthodox magazines, but none in mainstream media, and almost all of it was written either anonymously or by a non-sufferer. It became important to me that people know they are not alone, not losing their minds, and that they get help and understanding that they need.
I’m getting incredible, supportive feedback, thank G-d. A couple people have reached out to me because they or a relative have scrupulosity or OCD in general, so I thought it might be good to share a few more resources. Continue reading
So, in the Klempner household, preparations for Pesach — Passover — are in full swing. We’re vacuuming and scrubbing the house, the car, and the van like crazy. I’m muttering things like, “Why do I let them eat in carpool?” and “How do you get cookie crumbs in sock drawers?” under my breath.
Photo by Pptudela and available through Wikipedia Commons
One of my favorite parts of Pesach cleaning is finding things you’ve lost: the missing token from a game you’ve been wanting to play on rainy days, spare change, receipts for purchases you’ve been meaning to return, missing socks.
I’m not suggesting you pull out the 409 and start scrubbing down your file cabinets (although, if a toddler has access to its drawers, it might be a good idea). I’m suggesting that you flip through some old stories — ones you discarded incomplete, or complete but not yet ready for prime time viewing — and revisit them.
Last week’s Hamodia/Inyan Magazine had an article by one of my favorite columnists, Rabbi Fishel Schachter entitled “Guided by Tale Winds.” While today Rabbi Schachter is well-known in the Torah world for essays and presentations for adults about the weekly Torah portion, parenting, and other subjects, he first gained popularity as a rebbi and storyteller to students in Jewish day schools.
Rabbi Schachter explains in the article that one of the adults in his audience told him many years ago that he had to choose between teaching grown-ups or kids — and he indicated that the natural choice for a man of Rabbi Schachter’s talent and intelligence was to teach adults.
Turning to his own rebbi for guidance, Rabbi Schachter asked if teaching kids was really beneath him? Were all the silly voices and so on undermining his stature?
Last year’s Thanksgiving post deserves a second helping. And if you need more reasons to thank G-d for your rejection letters, check out a story by Nina Badzin here.
Thanksgiving is upon us here in the U.S., and this is a wonderful opportunity to reflect upon gratitude, whether you celebrate the holiday or not. I’m a big fan of Rabbi Zelig Pliskin and also of Rabbi Shalom Arush, and I’m going to combine their approaches for this writing exercise appropriate to the Thanksgiving season and year-round. This exercise is useful whether you’re Jewish or not–please don’t get turned off to it just because it was inspired by a couple of rabbis.
Rejection is just about the hardest thing to cope with when you decide you’re going to become a writer, but it’s something that you need to learn to accept graciously. When that rejection letter first comes, you are often overwhelmed by feelings of resentment, anger, and frustration. You might lash out, calling the editors idiots or saying that the publisher doesn’t know what good writing is. You…
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Rebecca Klempner 