Eighty-six-year-old Sophia Loren stars in The Life Ahead, a Netflix movie I highly recommend. It’s not in the category of Gone With the Wind but it’s a powerful portrayal of an old Holocaust survivor (the Holocaust theme is barely included) who is alone, having overcome more than those days, including having made a living in the streets. A young boy, Mohammad, comes to live with her – at first, not a particularly pleasant experience for either – and they develop a very close relationship. It’s dubbed (annoying, but it works). It’s funny how I look at this almost nonagenarian and still see her as she was in Two Women. It’s pushing it but who can forget her in her heyday!

I said to Suzy after our Thanksgiving dinner that having only the three of us (we invited a friend who was widowed about a month before) wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. Funny thing is, we’ve heard the same thing from MANY people. We did Zoom with all our kids and grandkids which was nice…. ok, ok, I’m rationalizing! How wonderful it would have been to have everyone together as usual. Next year, please God.

This coming Friday at the usual hour of 7:30 we’ll be livestreaming* services. I’ll be zoomed in via Leslie’s magic. We’ll be using Mishkan Tefilla. I’ll be speaking about “And the Enemy was Jacob Himself,” about the struggle our patriarch had to survive his dysfunctional family and establish his own identity as a worthy link in our chain of tradition.

There will also be a service next Shabbat, December 11th, which is Shabbat Chanukah. Please have your Chanukiah/Menorah with you along with the Shabbat candles. It will be the second night so in addition to the Shamash you should have two candles placed right to left which, after the chanting of the blessings, are then kindled left to right (the actual day first followed by the previous ones)

. Again, if you’re interested in reading a selection in Hebrew or English, email me though for the December 4th service no readers are needed. New readers are more than welcome.