O PINION
Hochman Continued from Page 18
Th e bat mitzvah began.

Anndee distributed the booklet
she had prepared to those
present. Th e rest of us accessed
it through screen-sharing.

“Why is this night diff erent
from all other nights?”
Anndee asked, borrowing
words from the traditional
Passover Haggadah.

“I chose to open that
way,” Anndee said, “because
I had come to think of this
home-based ritual with all of
us wearing masks as diff erences
that enlivened and enriched
the experience. It felt resonant
and immediate because we had
cobbled it together so quickly
Phillips for a reason that made it
memorable.” All eyes kept moving from
Scout’s face to her bubbe’s.

Scout could see her leaning
forward in her wheelchair,
humming the prayers and
mouthing the words.

“It was clear that she knew
exactly what was happening,”
Anndee said. “I watched her
lips move as she said the Sh’ma.

She was as present, alert and
checked in as I had seen her in
months.” Scout’s Torah portion was
about celebrating the Sabbath
and the gift s that each person
in the community brings to
the occasion. Anndee wanted
this community of bat mitzvah
guests to mark the moments
an opinion on some issue,
they make it clear. And that
Continued from Page 19
makes their silence regarding
Greene’s extremism all the
Authority without stooping more conspicuous, and all the
to absurd and baseless more disturbing. ●
claims about the Capitol Hill
rioters actually being Antifa Moshe Phillips is national director
provocateurs. of Herut North America’s U.S.

Right-of-center Jewish division; Herut is an international
groups have shown over the movement for Zionist pride and
years that they can be quite education and is dedicated to the
prolifi c and vocal when they ideals of pre-World War Two Zionist
want to be. When they have leader Ze’ev Jabotinsky.

when Scout would move from
learner to teacher and to
shepherd her in her journey
toward adulthood.

Scout fingered the yad
that would help her keep her
place as she chanted 15 verses
from the Book of Numbers
in the Torah that her father
had imported, FedEx, from an
Orthodox rabbi in Brooklyn.

It had arrived before sundown
Friday and would be returned
on Monday. Scout’s voice was
clear and resonant, and she
spoke directly to her bubbe,
whose eyes were riveted on her
youngest grandchild.

She read fl awlessly, then
confi ded, “I was very nervous
about today because I wasn’t
sure what it was going to look
like. But anyone who knows
me knows that for me family
always comes fi rst. And I
wanted my bubbe and all of my
other grandparents to be alive
and observe my bat mitzvah.”
In a room so hushed you
could hear a tissue fold, those
who attended knew they were
part of a singular ceremony
they would always remember.

Anndee conferred her
priestly blessing on Scout.

May your life be rich with
laughter and may you always
sleep peacefully at night.

May the sun shine its
warmth upon you so that you
can walk confi dently knowing
that you are perfect, just exactly
as you are.

May you always feel the
love that surrounds you at this
moment and may you grow to
return that love back into our
world. “Th is couldn’t have been
any more beautiful if you and
Scout were on the bimah,”
Scout’s bubbe whispered in
Anndee’s ear.

“My only wish,” said
Anndee, “is that there had been
enough physical space to do
the hora, to join hands and do
one circle around the room.”
Eleven days later, Joni
Spivack, Scout’s beloved bubbe,
passed away. ●
Gloria Hochman is an award-
winning journalist, author
and broadcaster. She lives in
Philadelphia. Be heard.

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