Tennis, bridge, and Judaism (oh my!)

This is kind of a silly observation, but I think I enjoy tennis and bridge because you are playing independently, but responding to a partner. In team sports, you only get to play one role; in individual sports, such as golf or bowling, you effectively play by yourself, and then just compare scores.  Boxing is similar to tennis and bridge, but winning is not just making your opponent lose. It's more a finesse than a bludgeoning.

In many ways, I see Judaism the same way.  It's not a team sport -- you can't delegate different aspects to different people -- but it's not an individual sport, either -- the community is an integral part of the process, and many of the experiences would be meaningless without them.  in fact, in Judaism, the most sacred prayers require a quorum of ten people just to say them!

How I interpret it, how I celebrate it, what I value -- this is all left to me, it all has to be reflected by me.  Sure there are plenty of books and guides, just as there are books and teachers on tennis and bridge, but it comes down to how I practice it.  That said, I can't practice it in a vacuum -- I need the community, and they influence me just as I influence them.

Fortunately, religion isn't going to become an Olympic sport any time soon, but I just thought it an interesting correlation between my current three favorite pasttimes.  I also noticed, not coincidentally, that all three are extremely complex, and that is part of their joy: how you are always facing new situations, and how you can always grow.

9/11

I didn't do anything for the 9/11 anniversary.  I didn't even watch anything on TV.  Honestly, I just wasn't that bothered.

But when I think about it, 9/11 probably had a profound effect on me.  Not watching the towers fall -- like most Americans, I watched that on television, eating breakfast, completely detached.  But immediately afterwards, it was really only the second time -- after with the Challenger disaster in 1986 -- that I'd truly felt "patriotism."

For me, the Challenger disaster was epitomised by Ronald Reagan's emotional tribute:

The future doesn't belong to the fainthearted; it belongs to the brave... We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and slipped the surly bonds of Earth to touch the face of God.

Unfortunately, we didn't have Ronald Reagan in 2001 to express the grief of the country.  Instead, we had George W. Bush. The same man who, just a year earlier, said these words:

America has never been united by blood or birth or soil. We are bound by ideals that move us beyond our backgrounds, lift us above our interests and teach us what it means to be citizens. (2000)

America has never been an empire. We may be the only great power in history that had the chance, and refused – preferring greatness to power and justice to glory. (1999)

American foreign policy must be more than the management of crisis. It must have a great and guiding goal: to turn this time of American influence into generations of democratic peace. (1999)

Now said these:

Whether we bring our enemies to justice or bring justice to our enemies, justice will be done.

Every nation in every region now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists

For me, Bush represented the morals and values of the nation, or at least gave voice to the intolerant, the ignorant, and the racist.  He wrapped political expediency in the name of God, and people swallowed it under the name of patriotism.  Instead of bringing the country together, 9/11 split it apart.  And the same countries who made moving speeches about solidariity, a month later condemned the US for invading Afghanistan.

But I didn't have to look far for a personal embodiment of the effects of 9/11.  My friend and co-worker from India, who moved me to tears the day after 9/11 because he wanted to give blood but didn't know how to do it in this country., a week later told me no longer left his house because of all the menacing glares he got from people. This was Los Angeles, not Alabama!

So I don't think I appreciated it at the time, but 9/11 was like falling in love only to be kicked in the stomach.  To feel patriotism only to watch your countrymen perform hate crimes, start wars, torture prisoners, and condemn one-third of the world population because of the acts of a handful of people.  Something in me died after 9/11, and when -- 5 years later -- I found myself with the opportunity to move anywhere, the US wasn't even on the list.

The rallying call for every ignorant redneck in the county is, "Love it or leave it!"  Well, I left it, in part because of America's response to 9/11.

Get your requests in

I have to make my charitable donations by 28 September, so let me know of any charity work you're doing this year that requires sponsorship. Thanks.

Some photos of me

How narcissistic is this?  I was playing around with Picassa's face recognition, and it automatically pulled up a bunch of photos of me, which was a bit freaky but kind of cool.