Until October 27

I hadn't considered going to a synagogue for most of my life. 

I'm sure I thought about it a few times: the on-campus group (not Hillel) with which I had Pesach. I also thought about it when I had Shabbat with a friend every week in the early 2000s. (But I would have had to have sat in a different section alone.) 

Until October 27, 2018. 

That was the first time I really wanted to go. That day I felt the impact of the attack; I watched the news reports with terrific horror, and felt more than any time in my life that those were my people, and what a horror my friends here must be suffering. I wanted to go, if just to sit there and be with them. 

Looking back, I see that as a turning point. It was the first time I felt that I was part of this People, though I didn't have a framework for it then. It took me years to find the words. 

This gives me hope. There is always evil in this world, but my hope and true belief is that we can face it as a people, divided and united—One People.