Hurricane Ike and High Holidays

So as you may know we had a hurricane here about a week and a half ago. They shut the space center down on wednesday when work ended and I came home to try to get some stuff ready-- bring my things in off the patio, do some laundry while there was still power and water, and talk to my mom. My original original plan was to go to Texarkana where my friend Elizabeth is living for her job, but that is 6 hours north before you start adding evacuation traffic (and mandatory evacuations were starting at 7am... plus at this point we were still expecting to go to work for some, if not all, of Thursday). So I decided it would be easier to stay in my apartment. I had canned food, water, flashlights, and nearly a full tank of gas which would have taken me to nowhere near Texarkana (as a full tank barely got me from home to Orlando and that is twice as far, plus sitting in bumper to bumper traffic with the AC on because its 90 degrees out there does not help gas mileage any) but would certainly be enough to last me for the few days after the storm. This was not my first rodeo, as they say, so I thought I would be fine. I think that was mostly fake confidence because I didnt really see better options, and not because I actually think I could have handled this storm on my own. Then my mom calls me freaking out about how I dont have a landline so if the power went out and my cell tower got knocked down I would be out of internet and cell reach and nobody would know what happened to me. Still playing brave I told her I would go find a payphone after the storm if I needed to and that it would be fine. Then she calls me a little later saying that she and my dad (usually the calm one, so I knew it was serious when she was in it) would pay for me to fly out to Florida the next day to avoid the storm. I was still pretending I would be fine in the storm but certainly wasnt going to turn down a trip home so I set to packing and preparing the apartment to leave the next morning. Checking my work email, the official word was to open the space center until noon and then let everyone go on evacuation leave to prepare and bunker down.
So I got up the next morning, with a ticket into Orlando booked for 8:20pm, and finished packing, collected the stuff from my fridge that was sure to go bad and get gross, shoved everything else in the freezer praying that a short power outage combined with the amount of frozen foods and me not being there to open the door might actually result in my food making it through the experience. I has been planning to make lasanga and tacos so I had all the ingredients and I didnt want to lose them all. I went grocery shopping the weekend before because, honestly, nobody believes hurricanes will hit Houston, especially in September. Its been 20 years since a hurricane came near houston and did any damage, and Ike was predicted to hit northern Mexico at that point. But we all know that when hurricane magnet Stephanie is involved Francis makes me turn 18 on the turnpike and ali turn 18 trapped in her parents house under hurricane lockdown, Wilma does a u-turn on the Yucatan peninsula and run right over south florida, and Ike shifts unpredictably up from Mexico to Corpus Christie, to right the fuck over my apartment basically. So I probably should have known.

Luckily my apartment had no damage, and the power was only out for 2 days so my mom says my food should still be good. I admit I'm kinda scared to try it though. You know how I feel about potentially spoiled food. And I got to spend a week in Florida pretending to be a UCF student and hanging out with Rami, and Heather, and other peoples. The space center got some damage and because of the lost week the shuttle flights have been pushed back and alot of people had some big damage to their homes. Mostly from flooding, and alot of downtown, which got the eye, had some windows in the tall buildings blown out. Predictable hurricane stuff, but it doesn't make it any less upsetting. Thinking back I never should have thought I wanted to go through another hurricane. Its hard, and the aftermath is no fun (no power, no showers, no internet, no restaurants, food from cans... its not fun), and seeing all the damage is eerie and reminds me alot of past hurricane trauma. So yeah, I'm glad I got out, I'm glad I got a little vacation rather than staying hidden in my apartment praying for things to get better. I am very grateful that my parents let me do this. And I'm glad Rami took me in for the week. And I'm very lucky my stuff made it through too. Its not as important as my life, but it does make things easier to not have to start over, even though insurance usually makes that a profitable experience, its a stressful one.
We got back to work this week, things are kinda out of sorts, and not too much is getting done. Alot of processing, trying to reschedule, and wrap our heads around things. The space center looks different, the trees, the tarped buildings. And the streetlights around are out alot which makes the driving suck. Next week starts the official training classes which were supposed to start last week. Also tuesday (well monday night) is Rosh Hashana. And that brings me to a great big dark cloud topic over my life....

Tuesday, smack in the middle of the first week of training, is not a day to go home for the holidays. So I have to find somewhere here. At school it was easy... go home if I could, go to Hillel if I couldnt. But here... I need to find a temple. And with my recent Chabad-ing experience, Rami said I should go there. They feed you, they pray, you don't have to pay though I have a good job so I will give them something, and you don't have to be a member. The problem is its rather far, down by Rice university and the UT medical school. Good thing about that is alot of young people, and I wont be the only one without a family. But I'm not sure its where I belong. I am giving it a try this weekend for Shabbat services and as long as it isn't some kind of terrible, awful, shoot me now experience it will certainly do for the high holidays. But I am starting to wonder... what if I could find a piece of my religion in which I truly belong. And further more, if it werent for Rami, I probably would have taken this new training as a good reason to give up the Jew thing altogether so maybe he was kinda sent to me to keep me from giving up my religion. If not, he's having that effect anyways. So then... we had used the Chabad website to find the Chabad in Houston. And then I started clicking around the website seeing what I could learn. I am still put off by the separation of men and women. And by the not counting women in a minyan. And by not letting women read Torah. It still bothers me... but I thought lots of people do it and maybe I could see what they had to say, maybe it would make some kind of sense. So I got to the section for women and found a rather interesting article, that you should read (or at least skim... it is crazy long): http://www.chabad.org/theJewishWoman/article_cdo/aid/385355/jewish/The-Back-of-the-Synagogue-is-Not-the-Back-of-the-Bus.htm

So ok its an interview with two women. One is the daughter of a rabbi, wife of another, director of some big Jewish school thing... one is a former christian feminist who converted to judaism and became orthodox afterwards. And they spend alot of time defending the position of women in judaism. And they make alot of sense. Women are respected, women are considered of higher sprirtual indepence-- the men need synagogue to guide them to G-d while the women instinctively can connect to G-d through their own minds. Makes total sense. And that the separation is because you are not supposed to focus on the people around you but send your prayers up. And that also makes sense.

But before you think I am going around the bend or something there is a... HOWEVER...
It still does not dispel the idea that women belong in the home, that their energy and spirituality should be focused inward on the home and family while men need and belong in the community. So I will, before deciding that I can spend any length of time past Nehila on Yom Kippur at Chabad, need to get serious answers from the Rabbi or someone there to these two questions:
1. Why, in 2008, does the separation still serve a purpose? Men see women alot, they go to secular school with them, work with them, see them in the world. And these people may avoid the world on Saturday but they still have to exist in it on a usual basis. So why, then can they not also sit next to them in prayer and still send their prayers up? And furthermore why should we perpetuate the notion that women are distractions?

2. Do they honestly believe that by choosing a big crazy career that will often take me away from the home, for believing that my husband will do most of the cooking, and for not being the sole or at least main childcare provider... by not following the normal gender role assigned by orthodox judaism to my gender do they believe that I am not living the way G-d wants me too? Serious question. Rami (and their website) says that the Chabad movement accepts you regardless of your level of observance. And I believe that. They may not look down on me or reject me for living that life, but the question is different. Am I not following the right path? Would they be ok if their daughters lived like this? Would they be upset if their sons married a girl like me? Tolerance of my different lifestyle choices does not imply condoning it or encouraging it or allowing the same from their own children. For all I know, having a real job, being the breadwinner for my family (as I fully intend to make way more money that the future mr. stephanie), is that like being gay? Yeah we'll welcome you, but we don't think you're living the way you should. I want to get a straight answer. I want the truth. And from there I will need to decide what that means for me.

I never really believe that Judaism devalues women. And this article certainly disputes that even more. I mean the religion of the child is the religion of the mother, that counts for alot. But I hold feminism and gender equality to a different yardstick than most. It is not enough to be equal, I want to be the same. And yes, maybe that ignores some physiological and psychological differences that are inherent in the genetic makeup of the different genders but lets separate out that. What makes a man: strength, mental capacity, penchant for toughness? I am not as strong... I cannot lift what a man can lift. But there are body builder women that can lift way more than a regular guy walking down the street can. However, mentally, I believe I am just as smart as any man. I believe that I can do my job as well as any man, and better than some. Ok and toughness... I think that comes from a variety of things. There are women at war, women who do tough jobs... cop, doctor, climbing moutains. Ok what makes a women: cooking, cleaning, maternal instinct? I can't cook for shit, and alot of men can. Like Emeril- I've been to his restaurant, its fantastic. And maternal instinct... it remains to be seen, but I don't think I've exhibited alot. While some men do alot of child rearing, teaching, babysitting.
What we are talking about is personal strengths... thats why I think people should be treated not only equal but the same. Given the same options, whether male or female, and let their own unique strengths come out. You can be a woman who wants to be a mom, but you can also be a woman who wants to be president or engineer. You can be a man who wants to be king of the boardroom, but you could also have a man who wants to cook or clean or be there for his kids. And that is personal, not gender specific. The thing about the more orthodox Judaism is that men have men roles and women have women roles. Both are significant, they are equal in importance and it takes two halves to make a whole... but they are not the same. There is no room left for those who do not fall in the usual roles. No room for a woman who wants to read torah or become rabbi or go outside the home for work. And no room for a man who wants to stay home and take care of the kids, who wants to cook. I always thought that Rami never got upset about this because he had the rights... but I see that men are just as restricted to their roles as we are to ours. I wonder if we asked the rabbi if G-d really wanted him to be the one to cook and clean and pick the kids up from school, I wonder if he would find that his path is not the "right" as much as mine isnt.

The bottom line is that maybe Chabad could be somewhere to belong. This is a very important time, I need to find the place I belong. I need to choose my relgious direction for my life.. it wont be handed to me the way it was, and I need to make a choice. Obviously its not permanent, but I feel that skipping this holiday, this choice would be a permanent step away from G-d. So, we will see. It would be nice to get answers I could live with, nice to find a religious path on which I belong. And maybe I will. Here's hoping.