The two months before Pesach is an intense parenting/teaching time. Teachers fill every moment with projects and lessons to prepare their students for the two central holidays of Purim and Pesach. For parents, the month before Purim requires juggling and creativity to plan the costumes, calculate who will get what kind of shalach manos, and shuttle kids from party to party. The day of Purim itself is exhilarating and exhausting. Despite the hard work, I walked away this year feeling satisfied, like I was a real mom doing real chinuch (education).
The minute Purim ended, we went into full Pesach mode. The intensity continued and even grew as we scrubbed, shopped, and planned. The importance of the time superseded anything else – homework, bedtime, dinner; everything had to fit into the mitzvos of Pesach rather than the other way around. The Seder was, of course, an evening devoted to chinuch. And then we had trips to the zoo for the younger crew and trips to an escape room for the older kids. We baked together in the kitchen, listened to music when cleaning up, and spent the long Yom Tov afternoons playing games.
Yet, despite all that effort and time we put into the Yom Tov, it was over in a flash. It took a few hours to pack up the dishes, a few days to clear out the backlog of laundry, and now my house looks just like a plain old regular house. And it wasn’t like the change was gradual. We spent two-and-a-half months in dramatic and frenzied activity, and now its same-old-same-old. Not only are we back to regular life, but we don’t even have exciting weddings or music to add some extra spice.
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So now what? How do I transition from the “Super Mommy of the year” mode – juggling work, Yom Tov, and kids – to “regular me” mode? What should I try to put in my chinuch tool box for my children and students that can be best accomplished this time of year?
As I thought about this question, I realized that the mitzvos of the time may hold some answers. The main mitzvos of Pesach, the korban Pesach and the mitzva of teaching our children about yetzias Mitzrayim, originally were only supposed to happen on the first night. The Seder is meant to shake us up, to be exciting and new. At the Seder, if you ever wonder why something is being done, a safe answer is “so that the children will ask questions.” In a lot of ways, the Pesach Seder matches our generation’s expectations of what is the right way to do things. In surveys, Millennials confirm that they value “cool experiences” over things. Pesach and Purim are certainly experiences that can’t be described to those who have never lived through them. And it feels very satisfying to feel we are doing our best chinuch because it’s bold and different.
By the second night of Pesach, everything changes. We begin preparing to accept the Torah on Shavous. This work has no bells and whistles. It just requires counting the Omer, by days and by weeks, until we reach Shavuos. It can’t be done one day, be forgotten for three, and then get picked up again. The Omer needs to counted nightly. If we miss a day of counting, we can’t say a bracha because the mitzva is incomplete. Although each recitation seems routine and trivial, the consistency of the mitzva creates something far greater than the sum of its individual parts.
Although it seems simple, this counting is not trivial. It was by growing slowly over 49 days that the Jews in the Midbar transformed themselves from the lowest levels of impurity to the highest heights of purity. While leaving Egypt was dramatic and full of miracles, it was the internal work of the Jewish nation over time, day by day, that prepared them for greatness.
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So it is with parenting and teaching. The excitement and drama of Yomim Tovim are necessary. The mitzvos of the days of Purim and Pesach compel us to give our children and students those bright flashes of inspiration that come with bold actions. But these experiences are only the first steps in our journey with our students and children. Next comes the day by day, slow, steady work that builds us and our children toward greatness.
When I realized that I needed to transition from the dramatic to the consistent in my parenting and teaching, I had to figure out what slow and steady work looks like for a parent or a teacher.
For me, it’s being responsible and doing things that are boring because they are important. It’s laundry and dinner and school lunches and homework and bathrooms and brushing teeth. It’s bedtimes and screen time and saying no when it would be easier to say yes. It’s grading papers in the next day or two, handing them back quickly, greeting students at the door, making lesson plans, and paying attention to my students instead of schmoozing with colleagues. It’s work that is tedious, monotonous, unappreciated, and often disparaged.
These things that we would love to ignore are the step beyond the flashy and memorable moments, not the step below. By providing structure and stability for our children and students, we are setting the stage for their growth. A child can’t become an inspired individual if he or she is hungry, tired, or confused. Eventually, children can take on the responsibility for their own health, safety, and learning. Until they can, we are responsible to provide that structure for them, so they have an environment in which to grow.
If we think about it, the consequences of ignoring our day-to-day responsibilities are far worse than if we don’t provide the ultimate experiences around Purim and Peasach. What is the worst thing that can happen if we don’t do that adorable Haggadah project in school? Maybe, our reputation as the best-teacher-ever might get a beating, but not much else. But if we don’t give back tests in a timely manner, our students don’t know how to adjust their studying; they might be missing key content that everything else is based on; and we can’t adjust our teaching to fit our students’ needs. In one case, students are not having fun, in the other, they are not learning.
At home, if parents don’t have a shticky Pesach Seder activity, everyone survives. But if we don’t have bedtimes that are age appropriate, our children will be too tired to make friends, act kindly, or learn in school. Yes, we set aside routines for two months around Purim and Pesach, but now we can build on that momentum only through routines and consistency.
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Now, if these chores are so important, why do I feel so much guilt when writing about this? Why do I feel as though chores are so trivial or feel guilty for spending my Sundays doing them instead of enriching my children’s lives? To make matters worse, I’m always running across these cute magnets with lines like: “Your child won’t remember the sink full of dishes, but they will remember the time you spend with them.” How can I fight the urge to ignore the daily work that makes a house or classroom run when I get the message – whether internally or externally – that it’s a waste of time?
Once a year, we count the Omer. We stick to something day in and day out. We tell ourselves that doing something consistently and quietly is building our character. This helps me reframe my view of my responsibilities from burdens to growth opportunities. When I realize how important consistency is as a value, when I recognize that quiet acts of service are just as important as emotionally touching activities, I can prioritize my chores, even when something more interesting comes my way.
We are different kinds of people, yet we are all hearing the same message. If you are the kind of person who always has the Shabbos table set on Thursday night or prints your Rosh Hashana sheets before Shavuos, you may need to chill out and take a walk with your kids sometimes. If you are like me, always trying to stuff one more thing into my day to make it more meaningful, and then rushing home late because that thing didn’t actually fit in the schedule, it’s important, once a year, during sefira to remind myself that I’m an adult, I have responsibilities and they are important – perhaps more important than the inspiring and lofty thing I may want to do instead.
Yes, when there is a family bar mitzva, bedtimes will be delayed. Of course, cereal for dinner is okay after a hectic day running to doctors’ appointments and work. But that’s not every day or even every week. If it is, we need to think. During sefira, when there are no weddings and no Yomim Tovim, it’s a great time to think about what we can do so that our homes and classrooms will be less chaotic and more consistent.
Let’s say you feel guilty after reading this. (You’re Jewish, so that’s to be expected.) You realize you could probably stand to sweep the floor more often. You also need bedtime routines, breakfast routines, better grocery shopping lists, and menu planning. So much needs to change. It’s overwhelming. What then?
Sefiras HaOmer is pretty benign. We say a bracha and one line. No major changes necessary. Likewise, during this time, we don’t need to change everything at once. If we can find one small habit that can use an update and practice it for 49 days, things will change. No major pronouncements, no big dramatic overhauls. Slow and steady gets us where we want to go. And where we are going is pretty great. All this consistent work, a little bit at a time, is bringing us to be Hashem’s people standing at Har Sinai.
Have a good month!
Shira Hochheimer has been a Jewish educator of all ages from elementary to adults for close to 20 years. Before moving to Baltimore, she was a rebbetzin in Rochester, NY, and is the author of Eishes Chayil: Ancient Wisdom for Women of Today published by Mosaica Press.
