Communications and Changes '/.

I am enjoying crafting words to say exactly what I mean. So I am revising Chapter One - it is through the words that I understand what it is I mean. Ah! This clarifying is circular!

My research continues. I'm using my project manager skills to organize this paper. Setting up the right software, arranging sovereign study space, blessing and ritualizing my intention, personal discipline, permissions to succeed, to be joyful and excited about the Lecha Dodi - well, whew! how could a person not be thrilled, not be holy organized?! When it comes to detail I am a mundane person, yet I feel I will not become complacent in these next twenty-four months for this poem has so much life, so much inherent beauty, and such radiance that approaching this research and writing, editing and consulting, and developing more and more questions while realizing I must at a specific time, stop and formulate a conclusion - ah! I am humbled and energized.

Perhaps, simply perhaps, this Shabbat Queen will laugh when I cry, dance in Her light when I might hide under my shadowed covers, and somehow understand my yearning and love for Her presence. What an excursion upon which I am to embark - what joy. It is my hope and prayer that my Dissertation Committee shares alignment (mazal) of good (tov) intention (kavanah) and that we all see the Shekhina as our guide through this sacred/secular work of scholarship.

Printing

What was the turning point? Did printing the first siddur both affect and effect the fate of Lecha Dodi? There are so many questions to raise and perspectives to unpack. What a beautiful poem this is and one which carries such immeasurable strength. Stay tuned! the Rabbis of Safed continue to greet the Sabbath Bride even to the present day!

Research!

I'm so excited about my upcoming research! With the help of my professors at the Pacifica Graduate Institute and expert readers and advisors in the Jewish community, I feel that this subject will be one in which I will learn so very much more than ever expected. The process over these next two years in Jerusalem, Los Angeles, New York, Toronto, and Austin I'm sure will expose me to some of the many mysteries and revelations of this intimate poem.

This past week I learned that two of the verses are sung in a minor key, attesting to their sobering content. Thank you Cantor Melanie for this information. 


Meanwhile, my friend Anat is helping and coaching me with my Hebrew and my ulpan placement test for this summer's learning in Jerusalem - whew!


Thank you also to RJ's comment referencing Rabbis Diamond and Goldfarb at the Conservative Yeshiva - I'll speak with them this summer! I humbly request that you continue to leave comments on this blog sharing personal stories of  Lecha Dodi. Todah rabah.


Shavuah tov hevrarim

Summer 2011

Spring Quarter arrives at my Pacifica Graduate Institute. I eagerly await my course on God and my two dissertation courses. It looks like this Summer I will attend Session I at The Conservative Yeshiva in Jerusalem. I am very excited about it. I look forward to meeting more people from Pardes as well!