It’s been a hell of a year since we last met, and I mean that literally. As if the global issues I mentioned earlier weren’t overwhelming enough, I know many here have been challenged personally.
So I’d like to share how the wisdom I’ve gleaned from Temple HilMel — Hilary’s readings, our group discussions and my sermon preparations – equipped me to handle my life’s most vexing situation – the difficult relationship with my dad who passed away on August 17th.
For our Temple HilMel regulars, you may recall three readings about forgiveness that we’ve discussed on Yom Kippur. For others, come back for Yom Kippur!
In the first, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks encourages us to forgive because to hold resentment is like drinking poison while expecting someone else to die. The moral: don’t drink the poison.
In the second, Rabbi Brad Artson cites holocaust survivor Simon Weisenthal who was asked by his guards for forgiveness. He declined. The moral: some things are unforgivable.
The third by Rabbi David Wolpe strikes a middle-ground. The moral: you should never drink poison, but in forgiving someone, it’s reasonable to expect a change in their behavior. Absent change, adjust your expectations to avoid resentment.
It took a couple of years, but I finally figured out how to apply these lessons to my dad.
It’s hard to describe my sense of loss after he married his wife 36 years ago, adopting her narrative that his first family was a failure from which his second family needed insulation. And so I was excluded from everything that mattered to him.
I grew up adoring my father, and he adored and cultivated me. But in fighting their narrative, I further entrenched it, proving that I was a problem child from the failed marriage.
Two years ago, I finally broke free of the narrative.
Though not on speaking terms at the time, I’d heard he might have cancer. I was overwhelmed with guilt. How could I uphold the fifth commandment – honor your father and mother – without talking to my dad? If I couldn’t honor all that he gifted to me, what does that say about me, especially to my son? After all, doesn’t our tradition teach that we sew with our parents what we’ll reap from our children?
So I called my dad. He was elated, and I was relieved. Turns out, though 90 years old, whatever he had at the time was not life threatening. He asked me to put our disagreements behind us.
Here’s where Hilary’s forgiveness readings helped me achieve the serenity that comes from knowing how to fold ‘em when you can no longer hold ‘em.
As Rabbi Wolpe implies, when you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change. So I adopted two strategies. First, I began to think of my dad as my uncle, from whom one naturally expects less. Second, I began to act like a winsome student class president, which was the advice offered by a family therapist we’d all seen decades prior.
These changes worked, inspiring my sermon last year about forgiveness. In that sermon, I discussed when to have a long memory, like an elephant, and when to have a short memory, like goldfish – the happiest animals according to Ted Lasso because of their 10-second memory. I explained the distinction between long and short memory with this story:
Once upon a time, two friends found themselves lost while walking through the desert. Exasperated, they began arguing and one friend slapped the other. The one who got slapped said nothing but wrote in the sand, “today my best friend slapped me in the face.” Continuing their journey, they found an oasis and decided to bathe. The one who’d been slapped started to drown but was saved by his friend whereupon he etched into a stone, “Today my best friend saved my life.” The best friend asked, “when I slapped you, you wrote in the sand and now, you write on a stone, why?”
The friend replied: “When someone hurts us, we should write it down in sand where winds of forgiveness can erase it away. But when someone does something good for us, we must engrave it in stone where no wind can ever erase it.”
The sermon’s concluding words summarized the insights I’d gleaned in my relationship with my dad:
The truth is, everyone will disappoint you, so you must have a selective memory, especially when no apology is forthcoming. You don’t have to do the full goldfish. But you can change your memory so it doesn’t induce mind-numbing resentments that you harbor for an eternity. You can forgive, as did Jesus, believing “they know not what they do” and move on to a more comfortable status quo in your relationship. Expect less, then be pleasantly surprised when you receive more. Meanwhile, you’ve willed yourself to greater freedom and tranquility, changing the trajectory of your life and enabling you to become a blessing to the world.
This is the season of forgiveness, which doesn’t necessarily mean forgetting, but it does mean remembering differently to move on. So, know when to write your memories in sand, and when to etch them in stone.
In other words, know when to be goldfish and when to be elephants for memories not only shape our past, they mold our identities and chisel our futures.
Last May when my dad did receive a cancer diagnosis, I shared this sermon with him. He loved it, especially the boys in the desert story. I never got the apology for which I’d longed, but he did tell me how much he loved and was proud of me and my family.
That’s when becoming an elephant by recalling the father of my childhood helped me make peace with the father of my adulthood. I couldn’t be more grateful to have had him as my teacher, role model, champion and Dad.
As his condition deteriorated, I was the dutiful daughter, shuttling to/fro Denver (often with Zac and Zane in tow), taking him to treatments, feeding and keeping him company with my punditry (as he’d done when I little), sharing our correspondence from when I was a child, shopping and cooking for the stream of family and visitors who came to tell him what a blessing he’d been to them.
Meanwhile, I couldn’t help but notice what a blessing his wife and my half-sister and brother were. So, one night I shared this observation with his wife, apologizing for not accepting sooner that the decisions my dad had made in his life were right for him. She asked me to share my apology with my dad. Weakened to the point of exhaustion, he spoke with his eyes. I knew I’d done everything I possibly could to help him exit the world unburdened, which was my way of honoring my dad and, frankly, unburdening myself.
After he passed away, I thought the acrimony of the past had dissipated for his wife as well. But I was wrong.
Those ensuing days were among the most stressful of my life, requiring me to be a goldfish a lot, but giving me reasons to be an elephant as well. Not only had his wife decided that I wouldn’t be allowed to eulogize my father, she’d also initiated a legal matter requiring me to make a decision within ten days.
But as I noted earlier, we’re living in a moment of awesome miracles, and God reveals himself in the most unexpected ways.
Fortunately, cooler minds prevailed allowing me to deliver a eulogy. Despite the traumatic circumstances, writing it was surprisingly easy because I had learned to know when and how to be an elephant and a goldfish.
Best of all, God’s merciful hand showed up in the form of a limo driver who chased me down after the burial to tell me that he listens to a lot of eulogies, and mine was the best.
You can imagine my relief, exceeded later when two guardian angels who double as powerhouse attorneys rested on my shoulder to help me with the legal matter. They’re here tonight and I can’t thank them enough. Trust me, their names will be etched in stone, and forever on my heart.
These divine people exemplify Rabbi Jonathan Sack’s teaching that the world is a book in which our life is a chapter. Whether it inspires depends on our ability to make a blessing of our life by turning life into a blessing.
In closing, I want to express my profound gratitude for the opportunity to learn and grow in this Temple HilMel community, and for Hilary’s sage leadership.
So here’s to a new year in which we successfully navigate when to be elephants and goldfish, helping us create ever-widening ripples of goodness. May we all be inspired to live lives worthy of remembrance so that the world will be that much better because we have been in it.
And may you all be inscribed for blessings in the Book of Life. L’shana tova!
These remarks were made by Melanie Sturm on October 3, 2024 at Temple HilMel’s Rosh Hashanah service to inspire a spirit of forgiveness and renewal during the Jewish High Holidays.