Out of the blue for everyone!

Tonight I got an email from a friend from Junior High/High School. It has been years since we emailed, maybe since I was in college. I decided that hearing from him gave me permission to find someone I had been thinking about.

As I create a jewish community for myself, I can’t help but think about Adam. One of three jews my age I knew when I was a kid, he is the one I keep thinking about. Today I went to my first Bar Mitzvah and thought again about the year that Adam had his Bar Mitzvah. I can remember the classroom at Woodrow Wilson Junior High where I sat close to him and Lara, the jewish girl. I kept my fingers crossed that I would be invited to his bar mitzvah or her bat mitzvah.

I wasn’t invited. I was neither popular or jewish.

I was desperate for a bat mitzvah or a quincenera. I wanted more than a sweet sixteen, I wanted a coming of age something. Maybe desperate is overstating it, but I was very envious of Katy’s confirmation, Adam’s bar mitzvah, and the after school special about a quincenera.

That’s one of my early jewish signposts that I can remember. There was another when I saw my name on a tombstone with a star of david. Of course, I didn’t realize that Leah is a common jewish name or the name of a Matriarch. I just thought it was wild that I might die a jew. (The tombstone had my name with the name of the OTHER jewish boy I knew. I married him and converted and died 100 years before I walked by the tombstone. I was a romantic eighth grader, what can I say?)

Regardless, I might have found Adam. I took Kevin’s lead and sent him a short email. If it isn’t him, I’ve found an interesting jewish Adam in Atlanta.