Rosh Hashanah Kavanah (Intention) on Community Care: 5783 / 2022
I shared these words at Nehar Shalom in Jamaica Plain (Boston) for the second day of Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Year). Rabbi Leora Abelson invited me, along with two other community members, to share on the theme of care.
Hi, my name is Nadav and I’m honored to be sharing a kavanah (intention) on the theme of care. First, I want to recognize my sisters, my family, and my disabled, queer and trans, femme, Mizrahi, Black and Brown friends and teachers who taught (and learned with) me so much of what I’m sharing today.
In the last few weeks, I’ve been reading and listening to recordings of Tehillim (Psalms) often as I pray for healing for beloved friends and family members. One verse that sticks with me every time I chant or sing it, and is also in the text of the Shofar service for Rosh Hashanah, is Psalm 118.
Min hameitzar karatiyah, annani ba’merchav yah.
In my distress I called upon hashem (g-d or spirit), and they answered me and brought me comfort (abundance or set me free).
This imagery immediately brings care to mind for me. It brings me back to my most difficult moments where I’ve called out for support and when I’ve been called on to show up for others. And, it helps me to imagine a future where we can collectively call upon each other (not only g-d), and are answered with many types of care and durable structures.
Eleven months ago, I was riding my bike on Centre Street when I was unexpectedly hit by a repair van turning onto Pond Street. It was a shocking and scary experience that would shape 5782 for me, especially in terms of physical and emotional recovery and healing. It also deepened my commitment to building webs of community care that sustain all of us, and that resist the profit driven and coercive “care” systems that surround us.
In the immediate moments following the collision, I was struck by the lack of care that I was offered in this moment of need. The driver got into a yelling match with a bystander while I was laying on the ground, and the police and first responders were more interested in escalation and paperwork than presence and comfort. Fortunately, I knew intuitively that what I needed was the loving accompaniment of community, and, I’ve been a part of building the structures necessary for us to turn to neighbors and loved ones, rather than policing, in moments of crisis. I called several of my closest friends and neighbors, and within 15 minutes, our beloved community member and my dear friend, Simona, arrived.
After a big hug, loving affirmation, and a calming presence, I was ready to be driven home. I arrived home, took a long bath, and made a visit to urgent care. I then began to feel even more of my community eager and ready to show up in many different ways for the coming months. Friends delivered meals and healing remedies, they checked on me regularly in person and virtually, accompanied me to massages, PT and community acupuncture, and in the shabbat following the accident, I was invited by Rabbi Leora to say Gomel, a prayer for survival and recovery.
The experience of receiving such meaningful, loving and responsive forms of care was humbling and transformative. Amidst such immense devastation and violence around us, it left me feeling so grateful for the communities we’re building and the sustenance our Jewish traditions offer us. I don’t take my experience for granted, knowing how many people are left alone and unsupported through crisis, and how exhausting building care structures can be. This experience set the tone for my learning on care and care work in 5782.
We live in a capitalist culture and economic system where individualism and independence are celebrated, where care and care work are invisibilized, undervalued, unpaid, underpaid and ultimately, exploited. This translates to care and care work falling disproportionately onto poor and working class people, people of color, women, immigrants, queer and trans people.
Aislinn Thomas, a disabled and chronically ill Jewish writer notes “Individualism is an illusion, and a dangerous one. Those of us who require daily support and care are intimate with our interdependence and the contingent nature of life. Bootstrapping rhetoric is harmful. We do not have full control over the conditions of our lives. We are acutely aware that we are, all of us, always reliant on others for our survival and thriving. We are connected. We are vulnerable. We need help sometimes or often. This does not diminish our value.”
For these reasons, practicing interdependence and collectivity requires reaching for each other and recreating structures. And it doesn’t come easy, especially for those of us who have been less relied upon or expected to take on caretaking roles, because of identities that shape us. In the year leading up to my bike accident and the time since, I’ve made active choices, especially as a cis man with class privilege and an able bodied person, to strengthen, through practice, my care skills and capacities, think more expansively about what care and care work can look like, and learn from mistakes.
We all have roles to play in creating more sustainable and accessible webs of care and these practices are critical to the organizing we’re doing to both resist current systems and to build new ones. For me, this has looked like; helping coordinate accountability processes to address harm, participating in support teams for friends who are dealing with mental health crises, building relationships and providing resources to currently and formerly incarcerated people, and working to build an economy that recognizes the importance of care work in all its forms. As the disability justice organizer and writer, Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha writes about, care is not (only) a feeling, it’s an action.
Through several of these experiences I’ve also learned the importance of tending to the needs of people offering support, and normalizing the need for rotating roles. Earlier this year I showed up for a friend to help them de-escalate a situation with a family member. On my way over to their house, I reflected on the need for me to also feel backed and supported through this experience, which I expected to be heavy and require significant after-care. So, with encouragement, I reached out to a small group of friends, some of whom were available for texts and calls during and after this escalated moment. This made such a difference for my ability to show up. Weeks later, my friend was in a similar situation with their family member, and this time the support team and structure we had built allowed for others to rotate into the role I had previously played. This allowed for me stay in this care work for a longer haul amidst challenges, and I hope for others too.
With those lessons in mind, I pray for this coming year to be a time in which we open our hearts and call out from the distress (mein hameitzar) to hashem (g-d or spirit) and to each other, and are answered with abundant, loving, sustainable and affirming community care. Thank you!
