Things get weird this time of year. Memories compete with current events in my life. I miss and even long for those significant loved ones with whom I shared this season, speaking about the past, preparing for now, reconsidering our interactions, laying out the future.
It’s not that my life is not full; it certainly is. It’s filled with people I love, and hope and fulfillment.
But somehow particularly now the past intrudes, as though a sliver of myself were pulling those shadows back into day to day reality as I live it now. It’s a time of nostalgia for what was and cannot be ever again, but also a time to recall and even to relive, to bring those gone from my life into the present again and appreciate how they made me what I am.
It’s as though the dialogue between us continues along the vector we started then, but lives still through my thoughts, actions and dreams. If we are the sum of our experiences, then they add to the processes of my life still, in a mysterious way, as though they never quite disappeared entirely, but speak to me daily as I see them reflected in thoughts and actions.
I am not acting for them, just with their influence as they lean over my shoulder and whisper in my ear: “Nothing ever quite dies entirely, so live with me and let me touch you still.
Rabbi Mark H. Levin is a native of Baltimore, Maryland. Graduated in 1971 from Boston University, magna cum laude with distinction in religion, Rabbi Levin received his Master of Arts in Hebrew letters from Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR) in 1974, his Certificate in Jewish Communal Studies in 1974(L.A.), and was ordained in 1976 (Cincinnati).
Most recently, Rabbi Levin completed his Doctorate of Hebrew Letters through HUC-JIR in New York in May, 2001, and his honorary Doctor of Divinity in 2001 in Cincinnati. He has been the congregational Pulpit Rabbi for Congregation Beth Torah since its inception in 1988 up until his retirement from this position in June 2014. In July 2014 he accepted the position of Beth Torah’s Founding Rabbi.
Rabbi Levin is the father of three children and grandfather of one child. He is married to the former Kacy Childs-Winston, the mother of Kyle and Seth Winston. Rabbi Levin serves on several local boards and writes religion columns for the Kansas City Star, and answers questions for the “Ask the Rabbi” service of the Union of Reform Judaism. To email Rabbi Levin, mlevin@beth-torah.org.
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