Finding what's real

I read a job posting on Friday morning, asking for a reporter "to oversee coverage of the changing world of technology" -- at a newspaper. What journalist with a sense of "the changing world of technology" would sign up for a job with no online possibilities in sight? Who would be interested in working for an employer with their head in the sand? What HR rep wrote that job description? Please tell me that someone has since sat them down and explained this grand ol' thing called the Internet.

Later, I went to synagogue with a friend. We arrived late (My fault. Well, in all fairness, we should blame our tardiness on the 1 train.) so we had to sit in the balcony, looking out across the large congregation of smiling faces seated amongst old Gothic pillars. I exhaled, and felt the week's worries start to drop from my shoulders as easily as my winter coat had a moment before...

And then the band began to play. I've been to my fair share of "Shabbat Unplugged" experiences, and I am all too familiar with Debbie Friedman; this was not my first time at the musical Shabbat rodeo. But, one musician began to play a clarinet (or maybe a recorder?), swaying rhythmically in their seat as the congregation began to sing psalms, and I couldn't help but think: "Is this 'The Prince of Egypt: Live'? Was the big blue genie in Aladdin a Member of the Tribe? Why on earth are we praising G-D with a snake-charmer?" Hearing a live band while singing a prayer for Sabbath peace seems a bit oxymoronic to me.

Worst of all, the rabbi focused his d'var torah on silence, urging everyone in the shul to find a way to set aside the noise of their week. "Put aside technology for a moment," he advised us, his voice booming ironically from the microphone. He said that his hope for all of us this week would be that we would truly find Sabbath peace in that moment of silence... It was a beautiful thought, until, seconds later, the band picked up where it left off.

I am so sick of all of this hypocrisy -- be it from journalists, Jews, or otherwise. I may not always know what I want, or how to do something best. I may not always make the right decisions. I am not always on time, and I don't always know the answer. I'm not the richest, or the skinniest, or the bravest. But I know what's important to me. I know what I value. I know who my loved ones are, and I know my hopes and dreams. I am who I am, and I don't pretend to be anyone else.

A bird does not sing because it has an answer.
It sings because it has a song.
-Joan Anglund

High hopes

When you are down,
lift your head off the ground -
there's a lot to be learned,
so look around!

I've been a Phillies fan since I was a little girl. "Fan" actually doesn't seem like a strong enough word to describe my love for my team...

When I was four, I announced to my mother that I was married. Naturally, she was curious about who her "son-in-law" might be. My dad had the Phillies game on, and I pointed at the TV with glee: "That's him!" To my mother's horror, the TV camera had zoomed in on the husky bearded catcher, spitting tobacco as he squatted behind home plate. (I swear, my taste in men has improved since then. I'm more of a Chase Utley girl now.) Several months later, while in the bath, I told my mother that we'd divorced. "He was a smoker," I informed her sadly, shaking my little four-year-old head so seriously that the scene would've been believable if I hadn't been surrounded by rubber duckies.

I guess you could say I've had a penchant for storytelling since I was young, too. Now, of course, my stories are much more fact-based. I had a long week of grad school, full of tough editing choices, emotionally draining group projects and intense classes...

But it was worth it. I'm figuring out what I want, what I know, and remembering who I am. It took a little venting to friends, and a couple servings of dessert, but I'm back in the game now.

The Phillies won tonight, too, with "Doc" Halladay pitching the first post-season no-hitter since the 1950s.

We've got high apple-pie-in-the-sky hopes...

Here I am

"I found your old diary."

My mom was visiting me for my birthday, sharing girl talk and gourmet food with me to ring in my 22nd year.

"Um, what?"

Apparently, I'd given my childhood diary -- with Simba emblazoned on the front, I might add -- to my mom a long time ago. Oh, the silly choices that a high school girl will make in order to have more room for make-up in an old desk drawer... My mom laughed as she recalled what she'd found when she carefully turned the pages, which were stiff with glue from movie tickets and restaurant napkin rings that I'd pasted in as mementos.

Basically, every year, I wrote one entry. "Dear Diary, I am so sorry that I haven't written in you in sooo long," I would begin. Each entry was a time capsule, a seven-, eight-, or nine-year-old's idea of a year in review. I shared about the boys I liked at the moment, the classes I'd loved, and the adventures I'd had, promising to write again soon... only to fail miserably. Reportedly, one year, I even offered to name my diary, like a teenage boy naming his first car, hoping that personification might help to guilt me into logging my secrets more often.

I promise not to name my blog. And I promise not to offer any lame excuses about why all was quiet on the western front here this summer. I'm not even going to apologize.

You see, every time a friend or family member asked me why I hadn't blogged in a while this summer, I lamented that nothing exciting had happened to me. "What would I write about? I just sit at a desk all day," I constantly insisted. This is true. I did, in fact, slouch in front of a computer screen all summer. My summer internship taught me a lot. I know now that I need windows -- or, at least, that SAD can strike in the summer if you're inside all day. I know now that my hunch about not having the stomach for hard news was right-on. Telling tough stories is important; reporting on gut-wrenching crimes has its purpose. But it's not for me. I need joy. I need interaction.

I needed to learn about new media in a less sedentary, more innovative way. And grad school has granted me that opportunity. There is life beyond my computer screen, and experiencing it doesn't have to mean choosing a new career. It just means that I have to listen to my gut. I am a great reporter. I have a weirdly fierce love for women's lifestyle magazines. And I need to hold strong to that.

Or, as Mufasa would say, I just need to remember who I am.

I cherish my loved ones more than words can express. I bake when I'm stressed; I make a mean batch of cookies. I did, in fact, do a lot of cool things this summer -- sometimes even in the vicinity of my poorly-lit office. I love a good story, and I think everyone has one. I'm a New Yorker. I'm a daughter. I'm a friend. I'm a perfectionist. I'm a writer. I live every day with the goal of learning something new, and laughing along the way. I couldn't be prouder to be part of the young Jewish community. I believe in love. I believe in the power of my pen (or my keyboard?). I believe in beauty, and music, and prayer, and peace. My name is Rachel Liane Slaff, and this is next chapter of my life.

A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer. It sings because it has a song. - Joan Anglund