The Jewish Connection

What is the "Jewish Connection?" Do you know who I know? Probably.

Last Friday night, I went to Shabbat dinner at Y’s apartment- my second Shabbat in a month- and it was awesome. I met a couple new people, and saw some new jew friends from the Shabbat I had previously attended. Now that I’ve hung out with a couple of these people, I feel like I’m making some real friends and not just the kind on Facebook. And they’re not all guys! Chicks like me have a little trouble making decent girlfriends, but I met one girl who was very interested in my first blog post. She is a very kind person, and though she seems shy, she invited me to come to synagogue with her one Saturday.

(To be honest, I never went to synagogue on Saturdays when I was “growing up” Jewish) So I’d like to go and see if this tradition is something I’d be into. It’s people like this girl that make any community stronger. To embrace a fellow comrade and invite them to a regular happening purely because of your faith is not uncommon.; to me, however, it reminds me of other religions I may have mocked at one point previously. I see a future post in the works.

Anyway, this brings up my theory of the Jewish Connection. In St. Louis, growing up Jewish means that we all know the same 95 Jewish kids from our days in school- be it Hebrew school or k-12. I hardly knew anyone, even Y, when I showed up to that first Shabbat dinner, but it turns out, we all know (or are related to) the same group of people, the same community. Since we all know the same 95 kids, jumping into conversations like old friends isn’t hard to do.

Funny enough, “Jewish Connection” is what I would say to my friend Josh when I needed a favor. And he’d do the same. We were the only Jewish kids at our high school, but had known each other since we were six years old thanks to Sunday school. Thanks to that bond we shared growing up, I took pride in helping out a fellow Semite. Come to think of it, I still haven’t been able to find him a girlfriend and he called “jewish connection” on that a while ago.

Next time, I promise to blog about something more lighthearted. Something St. Louis. I do plan on going to synagogue to check it out, so I’ll keep you dutiful readers posted. Until then, back to work! I wish I could call “Jewish Connection” at work. It would make my corporate slavery position much easier…