Another Story

Okay, so today we were supposed to write a blog post about anything so I decided I would tell a story. So, that's what I'm going to do.

So as some of you may know, I had my Bar Mitzvah about a month ago.

Many think having a Bar Mitzvah is filled with joy and celebration and all good things. But it is not. Not at all. 

First things first, Bar Mitzvahs are extremely stressful. The months and months of preparation and the anticipation are dreadful, and the feeling that if you mess up, because you only have one Bar Mitzvah, its like the end of the world. Especially with a mother like mine, it made it much much worse.

The days leading up to my Bar Mitvzah were filled with accommodating family and friends (which was not the most pleasant experience) from near and far who came very far to see us chant from a 5000 year old scroll. Now learning the Torah and prepping for it for countless months is not the worst part. The worst part is the amount of butterflies in your stomach that you feel right before you go up to chant. Honestly, it like the butterfly population of the whole Eastern Seaboard flying around in your tummy. And it doesn't feel good.

Okay now, the day of. When you wake up, it hits you. In 12 its all going to over... I will be a man in 12 hours. That feeling is awful. So you shower, brush your teeth, use the facilities, get changed into your suit.

The suit that I wore on the day of my ceremony was a large piece of anxiety for me.

For a second here I am going to engage in a little ranting: Due to my odd growth patterns, I grew vertically before I grew horizontally. I was 5'6 and had VERY narrow shoulders. When I say narrow, I mean like so narrow that I didn't fit into any suits. You mat say that I am being dramatic, but I can assure you I am not exaggerating. Every, single store we went to, the suits were too large and made me look ridiculous.

Luckily, my beautiful mother (who has a much broader knowledge of suits than me) posed a solution.

We had found a suit that fit me vertically and had a color that I really liked.

So, we got it tailored to fit me and to quote Hadley Elizabeth Robbins, "You looked sexy."

Anyway, back to the actual day of my Bar Mitvzah.

Once I was ready I listened to my favorite motivational song, "Little Wonders" by Rob Thomas, specifically the first verse (go listen to it, you will quickly see how it applies to that situation).

I walk up to my temple (we live three blocks away from our temple) and then it all started.

I'm not going to bore you with the specifics of the ceremony, but I will shed light on some of the flaws of the ceremony.

Before you actually go to chant Torah, you sit for 45 minutes seething in your own sweat and body odor waiting for them to call you up to the Bima. Yet again, the anticipation is terrible.

Not only that but every single time I messed up a note or a syllable of the Torah, the Rabbi would correct me, and make me repeat the word again. It wasn't very noticeable, but Rabbi Marc was being extremely irritating.

Of course I rarely made a mistake, but still I think I am justified in my complaints.

The party I will skip over because to be perfectly honest I don't remember all that much due to my lack of sleep and withdrawal of adrenaline.

So you can most likely infer by now that I am not a fan of Bar MItzvahs.

And you'd say, "but it must be all worth it because you get money and the feeling of relief must be great!" but no. After my ceremony, I didn't feel different at all. I actually felt worse. The sudden drop of a adrenaline made me feel depressed. It was like going on withdrawal from speed (or so says my parents).  Not only that, but I am not allowed to spend my money. 

All in all, they suck. Its a trap!

Although my cynical ways may be very pessimistic, like my father who is a litigator, I speak the truth.