Category Archives: Relationships

Impugning the Tooth Fairy, for shame!

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My youngest when he still believed in magic.
My youngest when he still believed in magic.

My relationship with the Tooth Fairy has been a long one, since I started having children when I was twenty and I still have an eleven-year-old at home. My daughter, who is 23, still has, the pink corduroy hand made sewing kit, with a maroon heart embroidered on the front, that she got from the Tooth Fairy when she lost her first tooth. The Tooth Fairy, at my domicile, has never been interested in mere coinage. Letters from her to my children, reminding them to be mindful of the earth and thanking them for their tooth, pictures, books, magic stones, and also somehow she manages to leave behind the deeply wished for items  they wanted. She really goes all out at our place, or at least she did. Sometimes, currency was used, and my children were left wondering about the identity of such a whimsical and unpredictable being. Since the Tooth Fairy and I share a common love of and profound delight in the wonders of the world, this was always a good thing.

At our house, there is also the dynamic of two radically different people who are married to each other and parenting together. You have me, the very spiritual, Jewish Mama, Lay Leader for her congregation, care-giver of people (both those living and in need and those who have died and preparing them for burial). I’m a loud, good food cookin’ and lovin’, friend of angels and fairies, wild woman. Then you have the taciturn logical, paragon of sobriety (my husband). Throw in a Tooth Fairy and it gets complicated.

So, our youngest had started to question the existence of my friend. This prompted the conversation with me that the Tooth Fairy is fairly sensitive and tends to stop visiting once her existence is questioned. That statement was met with the reassurance from my youngest that “I still believe in her, Mom.” But, mom could tell this wasn’t really true. Yet, there was just an edge of doubt in his voice, and perhaps of hope in my heart, that he really wasn’t quite sure. He hadn’t completely 100 percent moved into the daddy zone.

In case you haven’t figured this out yet, Daddy doesn’t believe in the Tooth Fairy.

Even though Daddy doesn’t believe in her, he occasionally has had to fill in for her over the years. Daddy has had to take on Tooth Fairy duty when Mommy fell asleep before she could be hosted. For me the Tooth Fairy and I dance together and exist simultaneously in the same body on those magical nights when a tooth has been placed under a pillow.

So, it was one of those nights, recently. Mommy was asleep; Daddy was on call for Tooth Fairy duty. In the morning, Ethan came into our room and informed me that the Tooth Fairy forgot to come by. Daddy responded to this announcement with a reminder that since we had just come through the pass near Bend, Oregon, full of snow with lots of stops to put on and take off our chains, the day before, that perhaps the Tooth Fairy was delayed due to having to put “chains on her wings.” Mommy gave Daddy a gentle whack under the covers, but Ethan seemed to accept this explanation.

So, things were all set for the Tooth Fairy to visit the following night. Ethan was having trouble falling asleep and Mommy again nodded off before she could do her rounds. So, the task unfortunately fell to Daddy again. In the morning, our son entered our bedroom groggy and befuddled. “Mom, I’m really confused, about the Tooth Fairy.” “Why, honey?” “Well, yesterday she forgot to come and this morning there is some money under my pillow but the tooth is still there, the Tooth Fairy doesn’t make sense.”

“Hmmm, that is strange. Well, perhaps her bag had a hole in it or something. Let’s try again tonight.” My son went to the bathroom and I turned to my hubby and said to him. “HELLO!!!! IT’S A TRANSACTION, MONEY FOR TOOTH!”

Before we could continue our conversation, our son reappeared and my beloved husband said: “Well, this is Humboldt County, perhaps our Tooth Fairy wasn’t flying on all-four cylinders last night.” At this point I got out of bed and forcefully, just shy of shouting said: “I can’t believe you would impugn the Tooth Fairy in that way!” My husband is cracking up and our son has a quizzical expression on his face. So, I start laughing too. Alas, the Tooth Fairy probably won’t ever visit our home again after this incident. Perhaps, I’ll get lucky and have grandchildren who lose their teeth while visiting, something I will be praying for from now until then.

The other important detail you need to understand this story is that unlike most of Humboldt County, we don’t partake of anything that could negatively impact our functionality as parents. I have no problem with medical marijuana use and even recreational use if it is legal and regulated and not for children or adolescents. Marijuana is not healthy for developing brains or for pregnant women.

We’re a pretty squeaky clean operation here, much to my wild woman frustration sometimes. I don’t ever want my parenting to be impaired. Even though we choose to fly/parent sober, sometimes we forget certain important details like remembering to take the tooth BEFORE you deposit the payload under the pillow.

We are also veterans of raising two children who survived growing up where being offered a joint whenever they were in town was a regular occurrence. We have prepared our youngest the same way we did the other two. We have armed our children with our stories, and experiences from the past.

If I start talking about the past now, this will turn into a huge tome. Suffice it to say, that I stopped doing drugs, even though I never did that much, when I was 18. I realized then that I didn’t need the drugs to feel the way the drugs made me feel. I walk around all the time in awe, very sensitized and in love with everyone, without help from any outside substances. Perhaps in the future, when I am an old woman, rocking to and fro, I’ll venture into those waters again.

"I Beleave that everything has Fealings." Portrait of Nicole, age 10, with her original artwork, by Helen Redman, 1974
“I Beleave that everything has Fealings.” Portrait of Nicole, age 10, with her original artwork, by Helen Redman, 1974

Our older children navigated the local territory pretty well. We trust our youngest, despite this recent Tooth Fairy impugning incident, will also make the right choices for himself. We will be there for him, despite of, or because of the fact that we live in this idyllic county. We will be fully present to facilitate the next few intense years of our son’s life as he journeys into puberty and beyond. He will probably be navigating them minus a belief in whimsical childhood things, much to my dismay. He can’t really get away too easily from the Giant Whimsical Thing he lives with though………………me!

Nicole (a.k.a. Mommy or Giant Whimsical Thing) lives in Bayside and channels the Tooth Fairy on occasion. She hopes your experiences with wonder never cease, regardless of your relationship with the Tooth Fairy, who visits Humboldt County, unimpaired in her full glory wherever she is invited. Just so you know, Fairies don’t need any kind of drugs; they’re like Mommy, already in an altered state, high on the nectar of the dew and the rays of sunshine or raindrops and the magic of the planet.

 

Nicole and Shadow 1983 by Helen Redman. This portrait of me ws done by my mother and shows my essential relationship with nature, magic and light and dark
Nicole and Shadow 1983 by Helen Redman. This portrait of me ws done by my mother and shows my essential relationship with nature, magic and light and dark

Just Being Frank, Opinion Column for the Arcata Eye: Impugning the Tooth Fairy, for Shame!!!! was originally published by Nicole Barchilon Frank on June 2, 2008. It has been slightly amended from the original here. Nicole’s children are now, as of this blog posting, ages 30, 28 and 18.

Ode to Ethan on this, his day of birth, January 20th

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while you swam inside me
we called you Mowgli
we watched and waited for you
as you leapt and turned under
the surface of my being
and we welcomed you
with delight and love

18 Years ago, Ethan came into the world. This is him with his father's hands.
birthing you was not so
gentle, easy or graceful
but you yourself have been and are
gentle, easy, graceful
and more, so much, much more
now as you leap and fall
from silks unfolding, as you race
around the court and aim yourself
at the ball or the sound on the piano keys
I wonder can I marvel any more
than I already and constantly do
at who you are

Ethan and his Mommy, summer of 1997
there is no limit to wonder
when you open your heart
and you stretch me further
and more all the time
you nourish everything parched or worn
in me with your warmth
your kindness, your devotion
and your essence

Ethan and his Mommy's Trike
May the face of Holiness
continue to shine on you, through
you, and around you and may you
feel the presence of Holiness
like you feel my love, both
are yours forever and both
come from the same place where you
also come from

Ethan's baby Quilt, made by Nicole Barchilon Frank

Swim and leap about my
youngest sprout
I’m so, so glad you are here
I want to shout it out
Yay for Ethan, Yay for Ethan
Yay for You!

My big boy!
My big boy!

 

 

This poem was originally written on Ethan’s 17th birthday last year. Today, he is 18! I’m off to the store to get the raspberries for his birthday breakfast crêpes, that recipe will be coming soon!

Vows, Wow! Meaningful Kavanah (Intention) coupled with Holy Energy-Watch Out!

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Nicole's Open Heart and Hands, in front of my sister Paula's grave marker.
My Open Heart and Hands, in front of my sister Paula’s, zichrona l’vracha’s, grave marker. 

Today, while cleaning through the piles of boxes and corners of my home that I need to get through before I go away, I came upon the original vow I made on January 21, 2008. I have been crying reading through my notes about this vow on scratch paper, tucked into one of my journals.

I do not speak in detail or much about the folks I have parented, cared for or held in tenuous and troubling and complex times. There are privacy issues and also, a deep desire to remain anonymous in my giving, which seems not possible, since so many folks have been involved in these adventures of mine. It’s different though when talking about things in a public context.

I’ll be honest and put down here the journal entries and notes that led to my initial vow to take some space for myself. These initial notes and thought are some of the origins that led to this process of going away for a full year Sabbatical retreat. It has been a long time coming.

The Vow I made:

In full awareness of the mysterious flow of the Universe, the River of Sparkling Light from which and to which we all return and belong, I Shoshanah Adamah Cohen/Nicole Andrée Barchilon Frank vow to attend to the Garden of my Soul and the seeds I am planting there of:

~Time for Deepened Torah Practice: Hebrew Study, Meditations, Prayer-Practice, Study of Sacred Texts, Communion with the Holy One

~Time for Writing and Art Projects: Cookbook, Arcata Eye Articles, Whatever needs to be written or created by me

~Time for Attending to my Body: Exercise, Dancing, Yoga, Walking, Massage, Trip to Hot Springs

I choose to not be distracted or drawn towards the RED LIGHT needs of others for 90 days from:

The Full Moon of Shevat, Tu B’Shevat 5768, New Year of the Trees, January 21, 2008

to

The Full Moon of Nissan, Tu B’Nissan, Erev Pesach April 19, 2008

At which time, I will reassess this vow and decide if I am called to continue this process for another period of time.

I have been re-dedicating myself to this vow for various periods of time, since the original writing. It has transformed my world. It is and has been powerful. I have said “No” so much more than I ever used to, creating Gevurah boundaries to temper my Chesed nature. I’ve included my favorite chart of the Tree of Life, that describes these qualities.

Tree of Life by Cindy Gabriel, copyright 1992
Tree of Life by Cindy Gabriel, copyright 1992

Another excerpt from the journal entry is a poem I wrote to navigate some of this territory. I’ve posted it in the Poetry section. It’s called Hineyni-Here I Am

So, from vowing to take space and saying “No” consciously more and more, I have actually managed to create the environment I have been needing. It has been a long journey. I still visit folks who are ill and attend to lots of people in various situations and generally offer myself to a lot of people in need. What is most relevant, is that my time doing this has shifted and it was the vow I took that helped shape that change.

Taking vows in the Jewish tradition is a very serious thing. We are encouraged NOT to take or make vows. They are too easy to break, and when they are made with intention/kavanah, they are seen as obligations between oneself and the Holy One and whomever we are also making a promise/vow to.

On Kol Nidre, we specifically are forgiven, in advance for all vows we take. There are lots of reasons for this, but essentially for me, what resonates in this has to do with the fact that it is VERY hard to keep promises and vows and there is a built in understanding of our human nature implicit in the practice of Kol Nidre.

So, when I take a vow, I do so knowing it is a big deal. I do not make vows lightly and I endeavor not to break them. This in itself is a very big challenge and daily practice.

May your vow taking be real and meaningful and may you find ways to release yourself from vows that are no longer relevant for you and to strengthen and engage more with the ones that are most right for you.

Attending to my vow of keeping Shabbat, so that’s all for now! Shabbat Shalom!

Remembering Rabbi Aryeh Hirschfield, zt”l, of blessed memory, Crying a River of Tears

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My sweet and wonderful teacher, Rabbi Aryeh Hirschfield. Copyright 2010 The Rabbi Aryeh Hirschfield Legacy Trust
My sweet and wonderful teacher, Rabbi Aryeh Hirschfield. Copyright 2010 The Rabbi Aryeh Hirschfield Legacy Trust

The Source of Beauty

(Story told by Rabbi Aryeh Hirschfield as he remembered it from his teacher Reb Zalman Shachter-Shalomi zt”l, of blessed memory, retold by Nicole with permission from Rabbi Aryeh)

Once there was a man. He was one of those loose people that hang around street corners gabbing all day. One day, he was walking in the forest and there was a glen with a pond in it. The princess was just coming out from bathing in the pond. He saw her and she was very beautiful. He fell in love with her and so he hung around the palace waiting for her to come out again. Next time she went for a ride he stopped the wagon and said: “Hey, I love you. When will we be able to be together?” The princess took one look at him and said: “In the cemetery.”

He was a simple man, so he went to the cemetery to wait for her. “It’s not so easy for a princess to get away whenever she wants,” he figured to himself. “I guess whenever the coming is good she’ll be here.” He was waiting there one day, two days, getting along by a little begging, just hanging out in the cemetery. After a while he goes around looking at the gravestones and sees; this man lived to be very old, this lady died young, this one had a family, this one didn’t have a family, this one died in an accident. He started to ponder what things are all about. Every once in a while he would sit down and visualize what the princess looked like, so he wouldn’t forget why he was there.

Days go by. They bring people to the cemetery to bury them and he always watches, hangs around and eats. Nothing else is happening at the cemetery, so he watches the people who come to visit the graves. He sees people crying and hears people saying things like, “She was so pretty when she was young,” or “He was such a handsome man,” and all the other things people would say.

Weeks go by. One day he starts asking himself the question, “What is it that I have fallen in love with in the princess? If it is her physical beauty, that is very nice, but it keeps changing.” He realized that the beauty of outer forms is only one phase of beauty. There was nothing else to do in the cemetery but hang around and think and think. He was thinking about what beauty is all about, and he realized that beauty comes in so many ways that somewhere there must be the source of beauty. What could the source of beauty be? So, he kept on thinking.

Months go by. He realizes that the source of beauty must be The Holy One. Then he starts to think how beautiful The Holy One must be. All the visions of beauty he had ever seen passed before his mind’s eye. He realized how many forms beauty has. Then he started to ponder: “Maybe there is beauty without form.”

People saw this guy hanging around the cemetery sitting and thinking, so they started bringing him food so he wouldn’t have to go begging in the city. Word got out that there was a holy man sitting in the cemetery. He was still waiting for the princess but the people didn’t know that. They thought that if he’s sitting in the cemetery he must be a holy man. What else would he be doing there? People start to come and talk to him saying, “You know, I’ve got such and such troubles. What do you advise?” He would give his opinion or say, “I’ll think about it, come back some other day.” He started giving people blessings and the blessings worked.

Meanwhile the princess had gotten married, but she didn’t have any children. She tried doctors and this and that and nothing worked. One day someone said, “Listen, that holy man in the cemetery is doing great things.” She goes to the cemetery and asks the holy man for his blessing to have children.

One look at her and he recognizes the princess. “I want to thank you,” he says. “It was your beauty and your guidance that sent me to the cemetery in the first place, and since I’ve been here I’ve gotten to know many great things. If there is any merit in anything I’ve done I want that merit to be transformed into a child for you.” That’s how he blessed her.

A little while later, people saw he was sitting in very deep meditation, so they didn’t want to bother him. A few days went by and he didn’t come out of his meditation and all the food they brought was still there. The food started rotting and the flies started eating it, and soon the people saw that the flies were eating the man’s eyes too. He had died while he was contemplating the source of beauty without form.

The Raishit Chochma said that you can see from this story that one can learn from loving a woman or a man to come to the love of The Divine.

“Raising an Awareness of Awe”

“….Given that ‘the beginning of wisdom is the fear of heaven’ (Psalms: 111:10), and fear of heaven results from humility, we might expect the paradigm to begin with humility and end with wisdom. Yet Maharal is adamant that we consider a different paradigm, in which humility, and the dveykut attendant upon it, constitute the ultimate goal. Interpreting ‘Raishit Chochma Yirat Hashem’, he equates raishit with that which is primary,[1] so that fear of heaven is above wisdom both spiritually and ontologically. On the mishnah in Avot discussing the mutual interdependence of these values, Maharal further delineates the supremacy of Yirat Shamayim over Chochmah” ~ Yael Wieselberg from his paper: The Place of Yirat Shamayim in Moral Development: The Pedagogical Approach of the Maharal of Prague By Yael Wieselberg

[1] Netiv Yirat Hashem’, Chapter 1, pages 54-55.

This story was originally published in the Temple Beth El newsletter in April of 2000. It was submitted by me after asking Rabbi Aryeh, of blessed memory, if my version worked for him and was close enough to his telling.

Hanukkah Grinchyness and Cozy Christmas Musings

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Hanukkah candles burning so beautifully. Picture by Nymiah Eliyahu
Hanukkah candles burning so beautifully. Picture by Nymiah Eliyahu

This is an older piece, from my Just Being Frank Column in the Arcata Eye. It was originally published on December 7th, 2004. It is still relevant. This post is an edited version of that original. My youngest son is no longer seven, he’s almost eighteen! I hope you will appreciate these thoughts and perhaps understand a little more about what being Jewish is like at this time of year.

This is normally a very hard time of year for a more observant Jewish person. The Christmas hype and buying craze is so intense. Everywhere I go, from the doctor’s office to the bank to the grocery store I am confronted with my difference. It’s not so terrible to be different. It’s mildly irritating when folks perceive me as a “Scrooge” because I don’t have “Christmas Spirit.” The hardest thing this year, so far, was my seven-year-old son asking if we could do Christmas too, since it was cozier than Hannukah. These were his words. He actually said, “Christmas is cozy.”

Now mind you, we do not own a television. Our youngest son doesn’t watch television at home and is allowed an occasional ½ hour at the neighbor’s house or an occasional hour at his friend’s house if he’s visiting over there. So, his mainstream exposure results in an average of about three hours a month. This is a very reduced amount of cultural exposure impacting his seven-year-old brain. He goes to a small school where they do a lot less of the Santa stuff. Still, he thinks Christmas is cozy. We have a Jewish home and celebrate Jewish holidays in it. We participate in other folk’s celebrations from Eid al-Fitr celebrations connected to Ramadan to Losar the Tibetan New Year but not generally in our own home. We have never celebrated Christmas.

Channukah gets turned into an alternative Christmas by many Jewish parents in order to confront this image of coziness. Gift giving at Hannukah (it can be spelled and celebrated so many different ways) is very new. It’s the result of modern American Judaism needing to find some alternative for their children during a time that makes them feel different or less special.

“Jonathan Sarna, professor of American Jewish history at Brandeis University, explains that Jews used to exchange gifts only on Purim, but in the late 19th century there was a shift from Purim to Hanukkah. Christmas itself became magnified in the late 19th century when it became a national holiday in America. The Jewish custom shifted in imitation of Christmas, as its consumerism grew.”~Natasha Rosenstock

As a confident adult, my feelings of difference aren’t going to cause me any lack of sleep. For children it’s just not the same. And there’s the whole consumer present thing. I mean no disrespect to all the vendors and artisans whose livelihoods are dependent on the buying which folks do at this time of year. I’m delighted if folks buy local art, music, foodstuffs, crafts or other Humboldt County creations. Unfortunately most folks are shopping at Old Navy or massively stressing themselves, their credit cards and/or their families out.

In December of 2003, I was in a car accident when two twelve-year old girls thought it would be a good idea to go for a joy ride. They came out of their driveway late at night with no lights on, during a wet and rainy night. They struck me, and dented my car and also ran over a water main pipe. I was driving home from my gig on the Arcata Plaza teaching and singing Chanukah songs. It was a wet mess, but no one was injured. They did run away and drove off, leaving me to confront the police and the grandparents, in the rain and water spuming and sloshing side of the road.

So, this year being told Christmas is cozier than Channukah seems mild in comparison. I’m not the kind of parent that enforces her beliefs on her children or even on others or my spouse. I’m an equal opportunity believer. The only caveat to that is while your beliefs and mine do not have to be the same, I do not allow my children, or folks in my home, to engage in behavior that hurts others physically or emotionally. You’re just not welcome at my place if you need to insult others, condemn them to hell, or use racist, sexist, or homophobic language. While you might not be welcome in my home if you engaged in these behaviors, I’d still agree to meet you for tea somewhere else and try to understand you or work hard to find common ground with you.

I have engaged in a few common ground activities since my article about needing to interact with the “other.” My rabbi, Naomi Steinberg, five other congregants and myself sang at the Eureka Interfaith Fellowship’s Thanksgiving Sing. We were the only non-Christians there and we were welcomed, applauded, thanked and honored. It was a very beautiful evening of sharing with only a few hard moments for me personally. There was one song about having a thankful, joyful heart that was specifically thankful for “God’s burning justice.”

I’m not fond of burning justice; the two terms are oxymorons in my opinion. Burn and justice don’t really belong in conjunction with one another. Burning crosses on lawns, burning Jews, burning Iraqi children with American bombs, burning Vietnamese people with Napalm, burning our planet with toxic wastes, are just some forms of burning, I don’t associate with justice. Other than that one line in one song though, it was lovely. I was also invited into Arcata’s Pacific Coast High School (on the Arcata High campus) to talk about Judaism for two World Religion classes there. They want me back for their panel discussion with other folks from different religious paths. I am continuously moving along on this journey of dialoguing with people who see the world differently than I do.

These conversations are a kind of light kindling that resonates more closely with Channukah. It’s not about eight days of presents. It’s about finding something to be grateful for, some new light shed on an old problem and because we focus on it for eight days we get to see the light growing and hopefully end up a little wiser. Hanukkah is actually a very cozy holiday, full of family, food, friends and beautiful glowing candles. So, I invite you to kindle some light in your homes and in your hearts and shed some light on any places in your life that need more than just one candle’s worth of illumination.

~~~~byline ~~~~ Nicole Barchilon Frank, lives, loves, prays, struggles and is cozy in her home in Northern California and she is always looking for a way to make Hanukkah and the world cozier for all children.