Sylvia Spector, 1912-2012 Aunt Sylvia, sister of our father Bernard Duhan, was a familiar member of our nuclear family. But through…
Category: Love
Meaningful Vacation
Driving the Vegas Strip. Facades. Costumes. False advertising. Traffic. We inch past a man in an Elvis costume. He stands…
Holy, Holy, Holy Mom
During the Shabbat morning prayer service, I’m not always praying. To clarify: When I’m leading Shabbat morning services, I am…
Mom's Closet
Friday afternoon in Queens, New York. Dave and I agreed we wouldn’t go to Mom’s empty house alone. You can’t…
Shadow Side
Nothing in life is perfect. Nothing good is all good. Every positive choice, every wonderful character trait, casts its small…
Forgiveness: Five Stages
Rosh Hashanah is followed by the aseret yemei teshuvah, ten days of repentance and return. Our sages recommend that we…
High Holyday Inspiration
Dogs, missionaries, drifters, munchkins, the mentally ill: all these have helped me better understand our high holyday liturgy. Here are five…
Dream Themes
Dream researcher John Allen Hobson wrote in 1977 that a dream is “a mental experience, occuring in sleep, which is…