The Good Old Days

Musings #64
August 16, 2004

The Good Old Days and
Chodesh Tov

I’m certainly old enough to mourn “the good old days” when things were “so much better.” Let’s start with dancing, and I’m not just talking about the hora. I’m referring to what was once known as “ballroom dancing.” That’s what we called it then, when people still danced as couples. Even in early “Rock ‘n’ Roll” couples were graceful, athletic and more alluring than anything seen today. I was around then, even on the dance floor, when dancers stopped holding hands and started to “twist.” And it’s no surprise that “The Twist” evolved into “The Jerk” with a serving of “Mashed Potatoes.” Now it’s much worse, “trance” when the individual dancers are oblivious to those around them, only entranced with themselves.

Jewish simcha, or wedding dances have also changed from comfortable reliably choreographed circles to each individual doing something that reminds me Martha Graham movements or the “improvisations” we did in the “Creative Modern Dance” I learned as a kid. Dancers seem to be meditating to their own tunes, rather than “l’same’ach chatan v’kallah,” “making it joyful for the bride and groom.”

Then, again, what can I expect from the products of modern education? Instead of learning to listen to the teacher and sitting facing the blackboard (ok, it’s generally green or white today) these kids sit around small tables in elementary school. They face each other with their backs to the teacher. The goal of these teaching methods is to provide individual attention, each child at his own pace. Yes, it does sound wonderful in theory, but… reading scores have been dropping ever since… and attention/concentration problems have been rising to epidemic proportions. The noise levels in those classrooms, as the pupils wait for the teacher, or ask their friends, or just play, makes concentrating worse than difficult.

The last straw, for me, was listening to one of Israel’s most veteran and professional choral groups on TV. After hearing them introduced, I looked forward to being serenaded by their well-known, beautiful harmonies. Maybe if I had been alert enough to notice that they were all clutching microphones, I wouldn’t have been so shocked. Instead of their unique, unified, blended sound being captured by a few well-placed microphones, the personal, handheld microphones amplified their individual imperfections. They sounded like a spontaneous shout-fest, rather than the well-trained and well-rehearsed group they have been for decades.

I have nothing against individualism, if it’s a personality trait, not an ideology. When people are educated to think of themselves first, the results are anarchy. When I was a gym teacher, I used to remind my students that when playing “catch,” the better one is the one who throws the ball in a way that the catcher can succeed in catching it. Ideally, the aim is to be sensitive to the abilities of others, to enable them to achieve their maximum potential.

In the days when dancing was together in a circle, the better dancers took the hands of the weaker and guided them. Today, those weaker dancers stand shyly on the sidelines, while the “stars” show off, oblivious to all others.

Jewish prayer is supposed to be in a group of at least ten men, a minyan. Individual meditation is not Jewish. We base our prayers on set texts. There is a leader who says the most important sections out loud. If someone cannot read it all, he or she can say: “Amen” following the leader’s prayer. The strong assists the weak. That is our religion, community, People.

Tonight begins the Jewish month of Elul, the month before Rosh Hashanah. This is the month in which we must prepare ourselves for G-d’s judgement. This is the time to take stock of our lives, to repent, since none of us are perfect. And those of us who are strong must help those who are weak.

Chodesh Tov,
Batya Medad

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