Call me Schnorrer – again.

Posted on:

by Anita Diamant I am writing this because (1) it’s important and (2) you care about Mayyim Hayyim. I’ll start with (2). If you’re taking the trouble to read the Mayyim Hayyim blog, I’m betting that you understand what Mayyim Hayyim adds to Jewish lives here in the Boston area, New England and well beyond. […]

Continue Reading

Saying Goodbye

Posted on:

by DeDe Jacobs-Komisar, Development Manager This is my last post as Development Manager at Mayyim Hayyim. In a few weeks I’ll be heading to a new position as Institutional Giving Manager at the Huntington Theatre. It was an opportunity that fell in my lap, and after much difficult soul-searching I decided to return to my […]

Continue Reading

A Dream Mikveh

Posted on:

By Sheri Gurock, Incoming Board President There’s only one dream I can vividly remember having as a child. If I told you it was about the mikveh, would you believe me? It’s true. One day, when I was very young, I overheard my mom say she’d bumped into a friend at the mikveh. I’d never […]

Continue Reading

Spotlight on Religion

Posted on:

by Lisa Berman, Mikveh and Education Director I saw the new movie, Spotlight, last weekend. I felt geographically required to, as I did with Black Mass. I root for the Pats and the Sox, and I go see the movies about Boston scandals (okay, and ones with Matt and Ben, too); it’s what we do. […]

Continue Reading

Thankful for the Trailblazers

Posted on:

by Rachel Eisen, Mayyim Hayyim Intern I remember a story my mother once told me. At the beginning of her career, my mother, who holds two doctoral degrees from an elite university, was accepted into a prestigious research fellowship in her field. But she turned this incredible opportunity down, because her would-be boss told her […]

Continue Reading

History for the Holidays

Posted on:

by Walt Clark, Office Manager Wow. Last month was insane. We had 233 immersions in the month of September. That is the most we have ever had. In any month. Ever! We have been on track to have more immersions this year than past years, but this was something different. Many people came to immerse before the high […]

Continue Reading

Holy Days

Posted on:

by DeDe Jacobs-Komisar, Development Manager We’re now in the days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, aka Where Things Start Getting Real. If you have reflection and repentance on your mind, the whole process supposedly begins back at the start of Elul – the Jewish month preceding the High Holidays. We blow the shofar every […]

Continue Reading

Mem is for Mayyim

Posted on:

by Pam McArthur Mayyim. It seems simple, this Hebrew word for water, mayyim.  The humming, mother-sound, the letter mem at beginning and end. The ear might hear and think a palindrome, a word the same from right to left and left to right. You might think you could go from beginning to end, then turn […]

Continue Reading

Spiritual Courage

Posted on:

by Lisa Berman, Mikveh and Education Director I love Fridays in the summer. The anticipation of a weekend filled with family, beach, sun, swimming, cousins, and a book — when every meal is al fresco, including Shabbat dinner lit only by candlelight and, by dessert, moonlight. At Mayyim Hayyim, Friday afternoons in July are marked […]

Continue Reading

Reflections from a Flotation Tank

Posted on:

by Shira M. Cohen-Goldberg The internal dialogue goes like this: I have to go to the mikveh. Do I really have to go this month? When can I go this week? Do I really have to go? I have between 3-4 on Thursday, but my meeting gets out at 2:30, which doesn’t leave me travel […]

Continue Reading

Orange is the New Black but Mikveh is the New Orange

Posted on:

by Leah Wittenberg, Mayyim Hayyim Intern  “There was a mikfa on oitnb!” This was the slightly confusing text I received from one of my friends who is not Jewish, but knows I am interning at a mikveh, Mayyim Hayyim, this summer. She is also in tune with Judaism due to all the Friday nights she has spent […]

Continue Reading

Ritual on My Mind

Posted on:

by Rachel Eisen, Mayyim Hayyim Intern Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about ritual. And by “a lot,” I mean even more than usual for someone who is interning at an organization specifically devoted to ritual. There’s no mystery as to why—three things happened recently to cause this. First, I met with one of my […]

Continue Reading