Happy 5767

The temple is the same as I always remembered it. The service is the same as I always remembered it. Quite frankly these memories of it all being the same are the same as I remembered it. It’s a two and half or three-hour service depending on how long the Rabbi’s sermon is.
Everyone looks the same as I scan over the sanctuary; the older members seem ageless to me because they have always looked this old although I know that they have aged just as many years as I have. I am wearing the same kind of suit my parents buy for me every time I grow out of my old one but for some reason I have never bought dress shoes or socks. So every year as the family is in the frantic rush to look nice and get to temple on time before the good seats are taken I have to borrow socks and shoes from my dad.
We always find seats as close to the front as possible and sit in the same order: me, mom, Jay and dad. This used to be so that my mom could keep an eye on my brother and I when we were younger, now anything else just doesn’t feel right.
My dad has a very nice singing voice but doesn’t always join in for the singing parts of the service he usually just hums along. My brother never sings. He never wants to be here anyways. I sing sometimes and like to believe that I get more of my singing voice from my dad than my mom. Mom likes to sing the loudest. She sings with all her heart and not a clue about how tone deaf she is. No one every stops or corrects her, I have actually grown to enjoy it and even though I cringe once and a while I know I would probably miss it if she ever took singing lessons and changed her tone.
So that’s where I am this year and probably where I will be next year, in Temple on Rosh Hashanah sitting in the front row with a mother who can’t sing, wearing socks that don’t belong to me and having the strongest sense of déjà vu.