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Sep
16
Last year George Bush, this year? Bob Ney?
Filed Under Politics | 2 Comments
Tonight starts the period before Yom Kippur when Jews start to ask for forgiveness. This time of the year is referred to as Selichot.
I’ve never observed Selichot before but will do so for the first time this evening. First, I’ll participate in Havdallah, which is the closing of the Sabbath, or Shabbat. Then, I’ll be watching the short documentary, The Tribe, at my synagogue. After the movie, there will be a discussion with other congregants and clergy (of course I most look forward to that, and there’ll be food there – of course! It’s a Jewish holiday – how can there not be food?). Then, at 11pm, we will begin Selichot.
After reading this, I know why Selichot starts so late. I remember when I first heard about it, I was spending time in the devout section of the Old City of Jerusalem and I remember the Yeshiva girls (orthodox kids) getting ready for a midnight service – it was Selichot. I went to bed, using the excuse that I was a Reform Jew and didn’t observe Selichot.
No longer. I was drawn in by the movie (I love Peter Coyote’s voice) and the prospect of having a nice long evening with the SO alone.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 8:20 pm September 16th, 2006 in Politics | 2 Comments
Print This Post
Sep
16
Reason #53 to VOTE NO on ISSUE 3
Filed Under Politics | Comments Off
Because you could end up like soon to be former U.S. Congressman Bob Ney.
From the Plain Dealer’s Open blog:
Ney agreed to plead guilty to two felony counts, with the Justice Department recommending that he serve 27 months in prison. The charges otherwise would bring a maximum 10-year sentence and $500,000 fine.
Yet, as he used a plea agreement to finally end his claims of innocence, the once-popular Republican from Ohio’s 18th Congressional District remained out of sight. He entered an undisclosed treatment center for alcoholism, and he and his attorneys said alcohol dependency was a factor in his crimes.
“I am not making any excuses, and I take full responsibility for my actions,” Ney, 52, said in a statement released by his office. “Over the years I have worked to help others, but now I am the one that needs help.”
Oh, that’s the part about his addiction to alcohol. Sorry.
Here’s the part about how connections to gambling accelerated Ney’s downfall, also from the Plain Dealer (on the Open site):
Ney’s plea agreement contained a new revelation: He accepted thousands of dollars’ worth of gambling chips from a foreign businessman.
Ney and staff members flew to London in February and August 2003 to meet with the man. He is not named in court papers but has been identified in published reports as Fouad al-Zayat, whose company wanted to sell airplane parts to Iran.
According to the Justice Department, Ney agreed to help the man get the necessary approvals to sell U.S.-made airplanes and parts in a foreign country. Ney also agreed to help the man get a visa to visit the United States.
The man gave Ney and staffers who were not named in the documents thousands of dollars’ worth of casino chips. Ney kept some and gambled the rest, cashing in his winnings and leaving with more than $50,000, Justice officials said.
He hid the windfall, in part by having an aide carry $5,000 worth of British pounds through customs. Ney reported in a financial disclosure that he “won” $34,000 in a game of chance.
Do we really want to create more opportunities for more elected officials to become more like Bob Ney?
Vote No on Issue 3.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 6:52 pm September 16th, 2006 in Politics | Comments Off
Print This Post
Sep
16
Okay – so, I come back from synagogue, have a blazing conversation over thousands of miles of telephone line trying to convince someone to be forceful and what do I find when I open the Plain Dealer?
Wow.
Except this time? You know what I thought?
PUT ME IN COACH! I’m ready. I mean, how bad could it be? I already know how they’re writing about this woman I know I wouldn’t vote for. And I know I’d vote for myself.
Of course, there is the little matter of being on the inactive attorney list.
And the little matter of only being in court once – ever (it was small claims and I won by getting a judge to overturn a magistrate’s horrifically legally wrong decision). Though I did win an appellate case when I was of counsel, but the opinion isn’t under my name, it got listed as “Zion” instead of “Zimon.”
But come on! The PD has endorsed lawyers with no criminal experience before and I’m sure they will again. I mean, what does an endorsement really hinge on anyway?
Eh. Whatever, I’m probably several tens of thousands of dollars short for any election at this point. And I hate asking people for money.
Still, the thought was fun while it lasted, especially since I’ve harbored dreams of being a juvenile court judge since I was a teenager. Of course, that was when I lived in a state that appointed its judges and before I knew that there were states that elected them. Zimon is not Russo, or Corrigan, or Mcanything. Could be a problem.
PS Last fisking for today on the Russo piece: it says,
Russo, embroiled in a nasty divorce, has been battered by stories recounting a marijuana bust that got her fired from the county prosecutor’s office, accusations by a drug-dealing brother-in-law that she laundered his profits, and complaints from her stepchildren that she supplied them with booze and cigarettes.
Now come on. Is that really a fair portrayal? Who has really been doing the battering? Haven’t editors always taught to use active verbs rather than passive, like, instead of saying “Russo has been battered by recounting,” you would write, “The Plain Dealer battered Russo with recounting…”?
Someone had to do the battering and the recounting, yes?
By Jill Miller Zimon at 6:19 pm September 16th, 2006 in Politics | 3 Comments
Print This Post
Sep
16
Last year George Bush, this year? Bob Ney?
Filed Under Politics | 2 Comments
Tonight starts the period before Yom Kippur when Jews start to ask for forgiveness. This time of the year is referred to as Selichot.
I’ve never observed Selichot before but will do so for the first time this evening. First, I’ll participate in Havdallah, which is the closing of the Sabbath, or Shabbat. Then, I’ll be watching the short documentary, The Tribe, at my synagogue. After the movie, there will be a discussion with other congregants and clergy (of course I most look forward to that, and there’ll be food there – of course! It’s a Jewish holiday – how can there not be food?). Then, at 11pm, we will begin Selichot.
After reading this, I know why Selichot starts so late. I remember when I first heard about it, I was spending time in the devout section of the Old City of Jerusalem and I remember the Yeshiva girls (orthodox kids) getting ready for a midnight service – it was Selichot. I went to bed, using the excuse that I was a Reform Jew and didn’t observe Selichot.
No longer. I was drawn in by the movie (I love Peter Coyote’s voice) and the prospect of having a nice long evening with the SO alone.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 4:20 pm September 16th, 2006 in Politics | 2 Comments
Print This Post
Sep
16
Reason #53 to VOTE NO on ISSUE 3
Filed Under Politics | Comments Off
Because you could end up like soon to be former U.S. Congressman Bob Ney.
From the Plain Dealer’s Open blog:
Ney agreed to plead guilty to two felony counts, with the Justice Department recommending that he serve 27 months in prison. The charges otherwise would bring a maximum 10-year sentence and $500,000 fine.
Yet, as he used a plea agreement to finally end his claims of innocence, the once-popular Republican from Ohio’s 18th Congressional District remained out of sight. He entered an undisclosed treatment center for alcoholism, and he and his attorneys said alcohol dependency was a factor in his crimes.
“I am not making any excuses, and I take full responsibility for my actions,” Ney, 52, said in a statement released by his office. “Over the years I have worked to help others, but now I am the one that needs help.”
Oh, that’s the part about his addiction to alcohol. Sorry.
Here’s the part about how connections to gambling accelerated Ney’s downfall, also from the Plain Dealer (on the Open site):
Ney’s plea agreement contained a new revelation: He accepted thousands of dollars’ worth of gambling chips from a foreign businessman.
Ney and staff members flew to London in February and August 2003 to meet with the man. He is not named in court papers but has been identified in published reports as Fouad al-Zayat, whose company wanted to sell airplane parts to Iran.
According to the Justice Department, Ney agreed to help the man get the necessary approvals to sell U.S.-made airplanes and parts in a foreign country. Ney also agreed to help the man get a visa to visit the United States.
The man gave Ney and staffers who were not named in the documents thousands of dollars’ worth of casino chips. Ney kept some and gambled the rest, cashing in his winnings and leaving with more than $50,000, Justice officials said.
He hid the windfall, in part by having an aide carry $5,000 worth of British pounds through customs. Ney reported in a financial disclosure that he “won” $34,000 in a game of chance.
Do we really want to create more opportunities for more elected officials to become more like Bob Ney?
Vote No on Issue 3.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 2:52 pm September 16th, 2006 in Politics | Comments Off
Print This Post
Sep
16
Okay – so, I come back from synagogue, have a blazing conversation over thousands of miles of telephone line trying to convince someone to be forceful and what do I find when I open the Plain Dealer?
Wow.
Except this time? You know what I thought?
PUT ME IN COACH! I’m ready. I mean, how bad could it be? I already know how they’re writing about this woman I know I wouldn’t vote for. And I know I’d vote for myself.
Of course, there is the little matter of being on the inactive attorney list.
And the little matter of only being in court once – ever (it was small claims and I won by getting a judge to overturn a magistrate’s horrifically legally wrong decision). Though I did win an appellate case when I was of counsel, but the opinion isn’t under my name, it got listed as “Zion” instead of “Zimon.”
But come on! The PD has endorsed lawyers with no criminal experience before and I’m sure they will again. I mean, what does an endorsement really hinge on anyway?
Eh. Whatever, I’m probably several tens of thousands of dollars short for any election at this point. And I hate asking people for money.
Still, the thought was fun while it lasted, especially since I’ve harbored dreams of being a juvenile court judge since I was a teenager. Of course, that was when I lived in a state that appointed its judges and before I knew that there were states that elected them. Zimon is not Russo, or Corrigan, or Mcanything. Could be a problem.
PS Last fisking for today on the Russo piece: it says,
Russo, embroiled in a nasty divorce, has been battered by stories recounting a marijuana bust that got her fired from the county prosecutor’s office, accusations by a drug-dealing brother-in-law that she laundered his profits, and complaints from her stepchildren that she supplied them with booze and cigarettes.
Now come on. Is that really a fair portrayal? Who has really been doing the battering? Haven’t editors always taught to use active verbs rather than passive, like, instead of saying “Russo has been battered by recounting,” you would write, “The Plain Dealer battered Russo with recounting…”?
Someone had to do the battering and the recounting, yes?
By Jill Miller Zimon at 2:19 pm September 16th, 2006 in Politics | 3 Comments
Print This Post
Sep
16
Last year George Bush, this year? Bob Ney?
Filed Under Politics | Comments Off
Tonight starts the period before Yom Kippur when Jews start to ask for forgiveness. This time of the year is referred to as Selichot.
I’ve never observed Selichot before but will do so for the first time this evening. First, I’ll participate in Havdallah, which is the closing of the Sabbath, or Shabbat. Then, I’ll be watching the short documentary, The Tribe, at my synagogue. After the movie, there will be a discussion with other congregants and clergy (of course I most look forward to that, and there’ll be food there – of course! It’s a Jewish holiday – how can there not be food?). Then, at 11pm, we will begin Selichot.
After reading this, I know why Selichot starts so late. I remember when I first heard about it, I was spending time in the devout section of the Old City of Jerusalem and I remember the Yeshiva girls (orthodox kids) getting ready for a midnight service – it was Selichot. I went to bed, using the excuse that I was a Reform Jew and didn’t observe Selichot.
No longer. I was drawn in by the movie (I love Peter Coyote’s voice) and the prospect of having a nice long evening with the SO alone.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 1:20 pm September 16th, 2006 in Politics | Comments Off
Print This Post
Sep
16
What do you want to be when you grow up
Filed Under Politics | 4 Comments
Here’s the speech I’m giving this morning, except that, so I don’t have to wear my glasses, which I only use for reading and computer work, I’m printing it out in super-large, bolded type. Ah, vanity. I’ve also added the more risque beginning and ending which I self-censored out of the one I’m giving in shul. I just knew the Rabbi would make me take it out and I wasn’t up for agitating. When you’re speaking for 13 people, you have to be respectful.
I’ve opted to wear the doily and not a hat, but thank you everyone for the feedback.
Good Shabbos to all.
Several years ago, a work colleague taught me about how, if you add two words to the end of your fortune cookie fortune, you could get a prediction about your love life.
Likewise, I believe, that if you add three small words to the end of any existential-type question, you can learn more about yourself and Judaism.
The best example of this would be to take the question, What do you want to be when you grow up and add to the end, “as a Jew.” Thus making the question,
What do you want to be when you grow up – As a Jew?
As I look back at the last thirty years of my life, it’s obvious to me that it’s a question I’ve been asking – and trying to answer – for a long time.
I was raised as a Reform Jew and my parents provided for me to have the experiences a parent should offer a child whom they hope will love and observe Judaism. I went on Shabbatons and did Israeli dancing. I celebrated the Jewish holidays in the company of many relatives and attended religious school weekly. I went to Jewish overnight camp for six years. And I was bat mitzvahed and confirmed.
And, although it might sound as though I strayed when I chose to attend Georgetown University – a more than 60% Catholic school – it turned out that being among other people who lived and breathed a particular faith made me want to dig deeper into my own. And so I lived and worked in Israel for a year through the Sherut La’am program, learning Hebrew through an ulpan, living on a moshav and in a development town and on a Kibbutz.
Upon my return to the States, I taught in my reform synagogue’s religious school for three years. Three years after I moved to Cleveland, during Kol Nidre services, I met and fell in love with my husband, Jeff, a wonderful, Conservative Jew.
Soon after our youngest son’s bris, my family and I joined B’nai Yish Shrune.
And then I joined the education committee. And I spoke up. A lot.
Three years into that work, I got a letter asking me if I wanted to be a Marcus Leadership Institute Fellow.
That letter threw me for a loop. Sure, I’d come a long way from the hippy shul of my youth that held services in a converted barn. But leadership? In a conservative congregation? Me?
I called past president and steering committee member, Jan Moskowitz. I said, you’ve got the wrong person. He said, no, we don’t.
I met with Rabbi Weiss after one of the first Marcus classes. I said, you’ve got the wrong person. And he said, no, we don’t.
Looking back now on their insistence, I believe the existential meaning was: Grow up, already! You’ve done all the requisite things. No one but you worries about whether or not it’s enough. So, grow up.
And into leadership.
And the Marcus program has provided the education to help me do that.
Through thoughtful and thorough presentations given by local and nationwide experts on organizational behavior, leadership and communication, we learned about the strengths and pitfalls of different leadership styles. Sometimes conversation among the Fellows ourselves became the biggest lesson of an evening. Other times, enlightenment came from listening to this synagogue’s clergy and its leaders as they offered anecdotes that highlighted how to and, sometimes, how not to work through a problem.
And finally, for me, my mentor relationship with Hedy Milgrom, who has prodded me as well as listened to me, has been perhaps the most instructive, comforting and hopefully enduring element of the Marcus Institute because of how I see in her such a unique example of a leader.
So, after nearly twenty-four months of involvement, what have we gained?
The knowledge base I’ve developed through the Marcus Institute is like an intense dose of medicine that, over time, makes it’s impact. Only two evenings ago, during a synagogue committee meeting, I reframed a discussion that had pitted several position against one another. I refocused our talk onto the common interest shared by those positions – a technique I learned several months ago during a Marcus session.
Of course, many of us you see here, listed in the program, you may think, are already leaders, because they come from families of synagogue leaders or have taken on and succeeded in other roles important to leading this shul in the 21st century. Maybe you even feel that way yourself – about either your efforts here in the shul or in your other areas of influence.
But this lesson, too, I take from my time in the Marcus Institute: no matter how many people we’ve managed or fired or trained or advised, we don’t ever stop wondering what we will be when we grow up – as a leader, or as a Jew.
It’s been more than two years now since I received my invitation to be a Marcus fellow, and was told that I wasn’t the wrong person for the program. And I am deeply humbled to be on our synagogue’s board of trustees and work with some of the most dedicated, loyal and sincere Jews, and individuals, I’ve ever met.
The Marcus Institute, through its implementation by Rabbi Weiss, the steering committee and my fellow graduates, allowed me, allowed all of us, to consider what we want to be when we grow up as Jews. Without any pressure about what we should be, or have to be, or need to be. But with respect for what we already were and how to help us be the best we can be – as people, as Jews, and for this synagogue.
It is with enormous gratitude that I now express my honor and pleasure and honest desire to apply the learning I’ve gained through the Marcus Institute to answer and demonstrate to this congregation what I want to be when I grow up as a Jew. Because I know that the leadership learning process spurred by the institute has prepared all of us to do just that.
Oh – the two words?
“In bed.”
By Jill Miller Zimon at 12:58 pm September 16th, 2006 in Politics | 4 Comments
Print This Post
Sep
16
Reason #53 to VOTE NO on ISSUE 3
Filed Under Politics | Comments Off
Because you could end up like soon to be former U.S. Congressman Bob Ney.
From the Plain Dealer’s Open blog:
Ney agreed to plead guilty to two felony counts, with the Justice Department recommending that he serve 27 months in prison. The charges otherwise would bring a maximum 10-year sentence and $500,000 fine.
Yet, as he used a plea agreement to finally end his claims of innocence, the once-popular Republican from Ohio’s 18th Congressional District remained out of sight. He entered an undisclosed treatment center for alcoholism, and he and his attorneys said alcohol dependency was a factor in his crimes.
“I am not making any excuses, and I take full responsibility for my actions,” Ney, 52, said in a statement released by his office. “Over the years I have worked to help others, but now I am the one that needs help.”
Oh, that’s the part about his addiction to alcohol. Sorry.
Here’s the part about how connections to gambling accelerated Ney’s downfall, also from the Plain Dealer (on the Open site):
Ney’s plea agreement contained a new revelation: He accepted thousands of dollars’ worth of gambling chips from a foreign businessman.
Ney and staff members flew to London in February and August 2003 to meet with the man. He is not named in court papers but has been identified in published reports as Fouad al-Zayat, whose company wanted to sell airplane parts to Iran.
According to the Justice Department, Ney agreed to help the man get the necessary approvals to sell U.S.-made airplanes and parts in a foreign country. Ney also agreed to help the man get a visa to visit the United States.
The man gave Ney and staffers who were not named in the documents thousands of dollars’ worth of casino chips. Ney kept some and gambled the rest, cashing in his winnings and leaving with more than $50,000, Justice officials said.
He hid the windfall, in part by having an aide carry $5,000 worth of British pounds through customs. Ney reported in a financial disclosure that he “won” $34,000 in a game of chance.
Do we really want to create more opportunities for more elected officials to become more like Bob Ney?
Vote No on Issue 3.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 11:52 am September 16th, 2006 in Politics | Comments Off
Print This Post
Sep
16
Addicted to Russo, Day 4 (with one day off in between)
Filed Under Politics | Comments Off
Okay – so, I come back from synagogue, have a blazing conversation over thousands of miles of telephone line trying to convince someone to be forceful and what do I find when I open the Plain Dealer?
Wow.
Except this time? You know what I thought?
PUT ME IN COACH! I’m ready. I mean, how bad could it be? I already know how they’re writing about this woman I know I wouldn’t vote for. And I know I’d vote for myself.
Of course, there is the little matter of being on the inactive attorney list.
And the little matter of only being in court once – ever (it was small claims and I won by getting a judge to overturn a magistrate’s horrifically legally wrong decision). Though I did win an appellate case when I was of counsel, but the opinion isn’t under my name, it got listed as “Zion” instead of “Zimon.”
But come on! The PD has endorsed lawyers with no criminal experience before and I’m sure they will again. I mean, what does an endorsement really hinge on anyway?
Eh. Whatever, I’m probably several tens of thousands of dollars short for any election at this point. And I hate asking people for money.
Still, the thought was fun while it lasted, especially since I’ve harbored dreams of being a juvenile court judge since I was a teenager. Of course, that was when I lived in a state that appointed its judges and before I knew that there were states that elected them. Zimon is not Russo, or Corrigan, or Mcanything. Could be a problem.
PS Last fisking for today on the Russo piece: it says,
Russo, embroiled in a nasty divorce, has been battered by stories recounting a marijuana bust that got her fired from the county prosecutor’s office, accusations by a drug-dealing brother-in-law that she laundered his profits, and complaints from her stepchildren that she supplied them with booze and cigarettes.
Now come on. Is that really a fair portrayal? Who has really been doing the battering? Haven’t editors always taught to use active verbs rather than passive, like, instead of saying “Russo has been battered by recounting,” you would write, “The Plain Dealer battered Russo with recounting…”?
Someone had to do the battering and the recounting, yes?
By Jill Miller Zimon at 11:19 am September 16th, 2006 in Politics | Comments Off
Print This Post
Sep
16
What do you want to be when you grow up
Filed Under Politics | 2 Comments
Here’s the speech I’m giving this morning, except that, so I don’t have to wear my glasses, which I only use for reading and computer work, I’m printing it out in super-large, bolded type. Ah, vanity. I’ve also added the more risque beginning and ending which I self-censored out of the one I’m giving in shul. I just knew the Rabbi would make me take it out and I wasn’t up for agitating. When you’re speaking for 13 people, you have to be respectful.
I’ve opted to wear the doily and not a hat, but thank you everyone for the feedback.
Good Shabbos to all.
Several years ago, a work colleague taught me about how, if you add two words to the end of your fortune cookie fortune, you could get a prediction about your love life.
Likewise, I believe, that if you add three small words to the end of any existential-type question, you can learn more about yourself and Judaism.
The best example of this would be to take the question, What do you want to be when you grow up and add to the end, “as a Jew.” Thus making the question,
What do you want to be when you grow up – As a Jew?
As I look back at the last thirty years of my life, it’s obvious to me that it’s a question I’ve been asking – and trying to answer – for a long time.
I was raised as a Reform Jew and my parents provided for me to have the experiences a parent should offer a child whom they hope will love and observe Judaism. I went on Shabbatons and did Israeli dancing. I celebrated the Jewish holidays in the company of many relatives and attended religious school weekly. I went to Jewish overnight camp for six years. And I was bat mitzvahed and confirmed.
And, although it might sound as though I strayed when I chose to attend Georgetown University – a more than 60% Catholic school – it turned out that being among other people who lived and breathed a particular faith made me want to dig deeper into my own. And so I lived and worked in Israel for a year through the Sherut La’am program, learning Hebrew through an ulpan, living on a moshav and in a development town and on a Kibbutz.
Upon my return to the States, I taught in my reform synagogue’s religious school for three years. Three years after I moved to Cleveland, during Kol Nidre services, I met and fell in love with my husband, Jeff, a wonderful, Conservative Jew.
Soon after our youngest son’s bris, my family and I joined B’nai Yish Shrune.
And then I joined the education committee. And I spoke up. A lot.
Three years into that work, I got a letter asking me if I wanted to be a Marcus Leadership Institute Fellow.
That letter threw me for a loop. Sure, I’d come a long way from the hippy shul of my youth that held services in a converted barn. But leadership? In a conservative congregation? Me?
I called past president and steering committee member, Jan Moskowitz. I said, you’ve got the wrong person. He said, no, we don’t.
I met with Rabbi Weiss after one of the first Marcus classes. I said, you’ve got the wrong person. And he said, no, we don’t.
Looking back now on their insistence, I believe the existential meaning was: Grow up, already! You’ve done all the requisite things. No one but you worries about whether or not it’s enough. So, grow up.
And into leadership.
And the Marcus program has provided the education to help me do that.
Through thoughtful and thorough presentations given by local and nationwide experts on organizational behavior, leadership and communication, we learned about the strengths and pitfalls of different leadership styles. Sometimes conversation among the Fellows ourselves became the biggest lesson of an evening. Other times, enlightenment came from listening to this synagogue’s clergy and its leaders as they offered anecdotes that highlighted how to and, sometimes, how not to work through a problem.
And finally, for me, my mentor relationship with Hedy Milgrom, who has prodded me as well as listened to me, has been perhaps the most instructive, comforting and hopefully enduring element of the Marcus Institute because of how I see in her such a unique example of a leader.
So, after nearly twenty-four months of involvement, what have we gained?
The knowledge base I’ve developed through the Marcus Institute is like an intense dose of medicine that, over time, makes it’s impact. Only two evenings ago, during a synagogue committee meeting, I reframed a discussion that had pitted several position against one another. I refocused our talk onto the common interest shared by those positions – a technique I learned several months ago during a Marcus session.
Of course, many of us you see here, listed in the program, you may think, are already leaders, because they come from families of synagogue leaders or have taken on and succeeded in other roles important to leading this shul in the 21st century. Maybe you even feel that way yourself – about either your efforts here in the shul or in your other areas of influence.
But this lesson, too, I take from my time in the Marcus Institute: no matter how many people we’ve managed or fired or trained or advised, we don’t ever stop wondering what we will be when we grow up – as a leader, or as a Jew.
It’s been more than two years now since I received my invitation to be a Marcus fellow, and was told that I wasn’t the wrong person for the program. And I am deeply humbled to be on our synagogue’s board of trustees and work with some of the most dedicated, loyal and sincere Jews, and individuals, I’ve ever met.
The Marcus Institute, through its implementation by Rabbi Weiss, the steering committee and my fellow graduates, allowed me, allowed all of us, to consider what we want to be when we grow up as Jews. Without any pressure about what we should be, or have to be, or need to be. But with respect for what we already were and how to help us be the best we can be – as people, as Jews, and for this synagogue.
It is with enormous gratitude that I now express my honor and pleasure and honest desire to apply the learning I’ve gained through the Marcus Institute to answer and demonstrate to this congregation what I want to be when I grow up as a Jew. Because I know that the leadership learning process spurred by the institute has prepared all of us to do just that.
Oh – the two words?
“In bed.”
By Jill Miller Zimon at 8:58 am September 16th, 2006 in Politics | 2 Comments
Print This Post
Sep
16
What do you want to be when you grow up
Filed Under Politics | Comments Off
Here’s the speech I’m giving this morning, except that, so I don’t have to wear my glasses, which I only use for reading and computer work, I’m printing it out in super-large, bolded type. Ah, vanity. I’ve also added the more risque beginning and ending which I self-censored out of the one I’m giving in shul. I just knew the Rabbi would make me take it out and I wasn’t up for agitating. When you’re speaking for 13 people, you have to be respectful.
I’ve opted to wear the doily and not a hat, but thank you everyone for the feedback.
Good Shabbos to all.
Several years ago, a work colleague taught me about how, if you add two words to the end of your fortune cookie fortune, you could get a prediction about your love life.
Likewise, I believe, that if you add three small words to the end of any existential-type question, you can learn more about yourself and Judaism.
The best example of this would be to take the question, What do you want to be when you grow up and add to the end, “as a Jew.” Thus making the question,
What do you want to be when you grow up – As a Jew?
As I look back at the last thirty years of my life, it’s obvious to me that it’s a question I’ve been asking – and trying to answer – for a long time.
I was raised as a Reform Jew and my parents provided for me to have the experiences a parent should offer a child whom they hope will love and observe Judaism. I went on Shabbatons and did Israeli dancing. I celebrated the Jewish holidays in the company of many relatives and attended religious school weekly. I went to Jewish overnight camp for six years. And I was bat mitzvahed and confirmed.
And, although it might sound as though I strayed when I chose to attend Georgetown University – a more than 60% Catholic school – it turned out that being among other people who lived and breathed a particular faith made me want to dig deeper into my own. And so I lived and worked in Israel for a year through the Sherut La’am program, learning Hebrew through an ulpan, living on a moshav and in a development town and on a Kibbutz.
Upon my return to the States, I taught in my reform synagogue’s religious school for three years. Three years after I moved to Cleveland, during Kol Nidre services, I met and fell in love with my husband, Jeff, a wonderful, Conservative Jew.
Soon after our youngest son’s bris, my family and I joined B’nai Yish Shrune.
And then I joined the education committee. And I spoke up. A lot.
Three years into that work, I got a letter asking me if I wanted to be a Marcus Leadership Institute Fellow.
That letter threw me for a loop. Sure, I’d come a long way from the hippy shul of my youth that held services in a converted barn. But leadership? In a conservative congregation? Me?
I called past president and steering committee member, Jan Moskowitz. I said, you’ve got the wrong person. He said, no, we don’t.
I met with Rabbi Weiss after one of the first Marcus classes. I said, you’ve got the wrong person. And he said, no, we don’t.
Looking back now on their insistence, I believe the existential meaning was: Grow up, already! You’ve done all the requisite things. No one but you worries about whether or not it’s enough. So, grow up.
And into leadership.
And the Marcus program has provided the education to help me do that.
Through thoughtful and thorough presentations given by local and nationwide experts on organizational behavior, leadership and communication, we learned about the strengths and pitfalls of different leadership styles. Sometimes conversation among the Fellows ourselves became the biggest lesson of an evening. Other times, enlightenment came from listening to this synagogue’s clergy and its leaders as they offered anecdotes that highlighted how to and, sometimes, how not to work through a problem.
And finally, for me, my mentor relationship with Hedy Milgrom, who has prodded me as well as listened to me, has been perhaps the most instructive, comforting and hopefully enduring element of the Marcus Institute because of how I see in her such a unique example of a leader.
So, after nearly twenty-four months of involvement, what have we gained?
The knowledge base I’ve developed through the Marcus Institute is like an intense dose of medicine that, over time, makes it’s impact. Only two evenings ago, during a synagogue committee meeting, I reframed a discussion that had pitted several position against one another. I refocused our talk onto the common interest shared by those positions – a technique I learned several months ago during a Marcus session.
Of course, many of us you see here, listed in the program, you may think, are already leaders, because they come from families of synagogue leaders or have taken on and succeeded in other roles important to leading this shul in the 21st century. Maybe you even feel that way yourself – about either your efforts here in the shul or in your other areas of influence.
But this lesson, too, I take from my time in the Marcus Institute: no matter how many people we’ve managed or fired or trained or advised, we don’t ever stop wondering what we will be when we grow up – as a leader, or as a Jew.
It’s been more than two years now since I received my invitation to be a Marcus fellow, and was told that I wasn’t the wrong person for the program. And I am deeply humbled to be on our synagogue’s board of trustees and work with some of the most dedicated, loyal and sincere Jews, and individuals, I’ve ever met.
The Marcus Institute, through its implementation by Rabbi Weiss, the steering committee and my fellow graduates, allowed me, allowed all of us, to consider what we want to be when we grow up as Jews. Without any pressure about what we should be, or have to be, or need to be. But with respect for what we already were and how to help us be the best we can be – as people, as Jews, and for this synagogue.
It is with enormous gratitude that I now express my honor and pleasure and honest desire to apply the learning I’ve gained through the Marcus Institute to answer and demonstrate to this congregation what I want to be when I grow up as a Jew. Because I know that the leadership learning process spurred by the institute has prepared all of us to do just that.
Oh – the two words?
“In bed.”
By Jill Miller Zimon at 5:58 am September 16th, 2006 in Politics | Comments Off
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Sep
16
Do not eat bagged spinach
Filed Under Politics | 5 Comments
From a news alert this evening:
Federal heath officials said Friday they’ve traced a nationwide E. coli outbreak to Natural Selection Foods, based in San Juan Bautista, Calif., which has agreed to recall its bagged spinach products.
The outbreak, in which bagged fresh spinach is the suspected source, has been confirmed in 20 states.Bagged spinach — the triple-washed, cello-packed kind sold by the hundreds of millions of pounds each year — is the suspected source of the bacterial outbreak, Food and Drug Administration officials said.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the states are: California, Connecticut, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, Nevada, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin and Wyoming. [emphasis mine]
The only reported fatality in the outbreak has come from Wisconsin.
The FDA warned people nationwide not to eat the spinach.
Washing won’t get rid of the E. coli bacteria, although thorough cooking can kill it. [my emphasis]
Supermarkets across the country have been pulling spinach from shelves. Consumers are tossing out the leafy green. In all, the bug is known to have sickened roughly 100 people, ages 3 to 84, the majority of them women.
Bummer. Guess it’s the frozen for a while.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 12:09 am September 16th, 2006 in Politics | 5 Comments
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