There was a time when I loved the Passover holiday. I don't really remember this time, but I believe my parents when they say that it happened. Sometimes it's hard to believe - after all, I could probably survive on pita and hummus year-round if I needed to. But today - after two nights of 5-hour seders at my parents' house - I do remember a couple of the reasons I so enjoy Passover and many other Jewish holidays throughout the year: ritual.
Ritual gets a bad rap when it gets interpreted as a meaningless practice that people do out of habit or without thought. But there's a lot to love in ritual and we got to indulge ourselves in just that this weekend.
Songs.
This is the holiday where we probably sing the most. And I'd like to clarify that it's not because we're excellent singers. The songs we sing are often sung by half the group at a time (the other half not recognizing whatever tune they're attempting) and no Passover seder would be complete without a popular American song set to new Passover-themed lyrics, like "Take Me Out of Egypt" (sung to the tune of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame").
These are the same songs we've sung every year, twice a year, for as long as I can remember. To this day, the songs still crack me up as we sing them and they always bring me back to the seders and Hebrew School classes of my childhood. I was incredibly lucky to be surrounded by such a warm family and community and every time we sit around our big table and sing these ridiculous songs, I'm reminded of that reality.
Matzah.
Oh, matzah, my cardboard-tasting friend. OK, I guess it's not that bad, but I still wouldn't eat it the rest of the year even if I could (which I actually could since grocery stores seem to not understand that we don't eat matzah year-round like any other food). There are all sorts of foods - including ones that I love - that I only eat on Passover: sweet raisin kugel, flourless chocolate cake, matzah latkes, just to name a few.
A friend asked me this year, if Passover is all about celebrating that we're no longer slaves in Egypt, why do we have to restrain ourselves from eating what we want (chametz)? I answered my oh-so-tradition-not-liturgy-based answer, that it's all about being grateful for what we have the rest of the year and marking this week as something special.
Perhaps I was specifically sensitive to the latter reason because my father started off the second seder by saying that, normally, we mark the difference between the holy (holiday) and mundane (rest of the week/year) but tonight we were marking the difference between the holy (Shabbat) and holy (Passover). The point is that we're extra lucky to have all this holiness and that the time we're in right now is special. The contrast is so important for recognizing when something is special and explains why I still live in New England even though I hate both winter and summer and wish it was spring/fall year-round.
My reasons for loving Passover when I was younger are different from those today. When I was younger, it was all about the Passover story and the search for the afikomen and the subsequent gifts. Today it's about the ritual - letting us be as silly as we always have been and recognizing what we have - yes, our family and our literal freedom - may be corny but it's pretty darn awesome anyway.
Photo credit: tomerlichtash
