CHOCHMAS NASHIM: WHO AM I?
By: Suri Davis
For women’s history month, I’ve asked local women to answer the question, Who Am I? They all were stunned by the request, and desperately wanted me to qualify and explain what I wanted from my article request, and I refused to set boundaries or limits. Our women rose to the occasion, mostly identifying with ancestors or their profession as identifiers. I struggled with the question as well, here are my thoughts.
I am part of the sandwich generation and am acutely aware of it. My father passed away two months ago, and I have gathered his papers and organized them for his accountant. I made piles of his bills and his financial statements, by far the highest pile was that of his charity receipts, and it gave me pause. The donations were not momentous amounts, but they were quite varied, indeed there was no motif or theme in my father’s giving, it appears as though he gave something to everyone who asked. A huge lesson. Maaseh avoth siman l’banim/the actions of our fathers are a sign to us as to how we should act.
Last year at this time, I had one child at home, my youngest. My eldest was in Israel, the second in Stern College, the third in YU. In one fell swoop, they all came home to roost, and the house became full of love and excitement and hungry mouths, and mounds of laundry, and fear, and hesitation, and unknown, and senior dreams dashed, freshman partying cut short, and fear of the angel of death outside the house, was as palpable as the angel of death hanging over the homes in Egypt, immediately preceding the exodus.
The excitement of having them all home was laced with this fear, I was foraging for house necessities for my home and for my parents’ home, together with my clients’ fears and needs. And getting ready for Pesach, the first holiday of pandemic solitude. Balancing the needs of parents versus children, not easy, but finding a solution was key in ensuring the security of my children with kibud av v’em/honoring mother and father, wanting to please both, hopefully not at the cost of the other.
About a year and a half ago, I was sitting with my aunt, Miriam Feller, in YILC hashkama one Shabbos and she asked offhandedly if I add the name verses to my praying at the end of the shmoneh esreh prayer. I looked at her for a moment to consider the question and I replied in the negative. Miriam said I should consider it, and so I did. My Jewish name is Sarah Leah, and the name Sarah, corresponds with the verse from Psalms “Lift your hands to Heaven [G-d], and bless G-d.” That was a nice verse to correspond with my name. The second name, Leah, corresponded with the first verse of Psalm 144: To David, Blessed is G-d my rock, who trains my hands for battle, my fingers for war.” The verse was not talking to me, it was too militaristic for my yoga meditative self, although it is a great verse for a litigation attorney. So I replaced this given verse with the verse, “To G-d is the earth and its creations.”
What’s in a name, as Tovah Feldshuh explained in her interview, a lot is in a name, how we identify is in our name. In both of my given name verses, there is the use of the hands. In the first verse, the hands are going heavenward, and the second, the hands are doing battle for G-d, both to sanctify G-d’s name.
Many of my law students reach out to me as they flounder when they graduate law school deciding what field to enter, whether they even want to practice law at all. I tell all who will listen, that we are placed on Earth by G-d to sanctify His name. When G-d created us, He blew in us His spirit and made us in His image. Every person who calls you, the lawyer, wants help, comfort, satisfaction, and they have confidence that you can provide it to them. G-d gave the client to you because G-d knew you, the lawyer, could help him and give him menuchat nefesh/comfort. We are service providers, not just materially, but spiritually as well. Wherever we go, no matter whom we meet, we are meant to do our best to make the other person feel better, and to service him/her to the best of our abilities. We are servants of G-d, and ambassadors of G-d, and that’s why G-d thought we needed to be placed on Earth.
I’ve been asked to speak on panels on how to succeed in business, and this is basically what I say. Everyday, dress, daven, go to the office and have faith. Do the best that you can at any given moment, and remember that you are what your reputation says you are, shem tov mshemen tov/ it is better to have a good reputation or name/than wealth. Whenever I receive a check, I stop and say a chapter of Psalms in gratitude to G-d for providing for me. Since I do not say kaddish for my father, ah, I have taken on several mitzvoth/good deeds in his memory including trying to wash for bread at least once a day, a mitzvah my father took seriously. I love grace after meal, it is a long blessing of acknowledgment and gratitude to G-d for our bread and sustenance, gratitude to G-d is paramount, from the time we open our eyes in the morning and thank G-d for returning our souls, to the shma prayer acknowledging G-d’s sui generis, before we sleep at night.
With my father’s passing, his good deeds have been highlighted in my heart and mind. As his signs of what were important to him have been passed down to next generations, I am acutely aware that inherent in the name that my parents gave me, there is the mandate to do battle for what is right and wrong, defending the rights of the underserved elder and special needs population, while tempered by my first name’s verse, to G-d is Earth and its creations.
I didn’t really know or appreciate the depth of how I am connected to G-d every minute of every day until I was denied the right to do mitzvoth for the day and a half between my father’s death and his burial, a period of time that the heir of the deceased is called an onen, and is tasked with the task of properly preparing a burial service for a loved one. Every minute of every day I am in G-d’s presence and servitude, not being able to make a blessing or praying, drilled this fact acutely into my conscious, and was literally painful for me, I missed the connection with G-d. So who am I?
Who Am I? An orthodox Jew.
Shabbat shalom.
Suri