Kol Nidre

Yom Kippur begins tonight, and my plan is to spend the day cleaning and getting my home and life in order so I can go into the holiday concentrating on the reason for the holiday. I love that our new year falls in autumn with the start of school. It always felt like the holidays were fortuitously positioned as a space to get your life in order before classes kicked into high gear.

We went down to one shul membership this year. For many years, we belonged to two shuls, but we left one, so we’re down to one. It doesn’t quite feel correct to say that we switched shuls, but we’re back with old friends and old services, albeit via Zoom.

The thing I’m looking forward to most tonight is something that I have no clue will happen. For many years, our shul had this gorgeous melody for “Adon Olam,” that is only used this one time each year. It’s not a common tune, and I’ve never heard it anywhere else, so my only chance to hear everyone sing it is this one night per year. (Admittedly, the man who brought the tune to our shul made me a recording of it years ago, so I can technically listen to a single person singing it any time I want, but this is the only time to hear everyone singing it together.)

I have no clue if they still use it, and it’s the final song in the service. But it’s a good kind of anticipation, sprinkled with hope, that I’ll hear it tonight.