Buckeye Season

It’s Buckeye Season, that time from Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, to the time when all of the leaves have crinkled off the trees and lay pulverized under feet and in the streets. Buckeyes on the trees and underfoot peek slyly out of their husks, begging to be gathered. And so we did gather them, and the gathering became our annual ritual.

“Ohio Buckeyes,” © J. Stephen Conn, CC BY-NC 2.0

The congregation I attended was housed in the Hebrew Institute of Pittsburgh, an edifice built in the 1950s, resembling an L-shaped, two-story junior high school. Classrooms bordered the exterior of each hallway, four long hallways. Only the first floor front hall, parallel to Forbes Avenue, was off limits because that one ran along the length of the auditorium where the prayer services were being held. My friends and I were inattentive at times to the lengthy prayer services that started around 8:30 a.m. and ended short of noon on a regular Shabbos, and even as late as 1:30 to 2:00 p.m. on the holidays themselves. The moment the officiant paused for “the speech,” kids fled the room. We knew some “cranky old man” would come out and shush us if we got too wild, so we fled outdoors or scattered to the other three hallways.

“Buckeyes Ready to Fall,” © Sean Benham, CC BY-ND 2.0

Across Forbes Avenue, and a bit past the corner, a large buckeye tree towered over the curb. Buckeyes are also known as horse chestnuts and are the state tree of Ohio. In September, timed perfectly for the holidays, the buckeyes ripened in their husks and dropped to the ground. The spiky husks could be manipulated with the sides or toes of our shiny holiday shoes to free the captive nuts. My fingers remember the prickles of the sharp pods I couldn’t avoid touching. In the mid-1960s our dresses were still relatively long, knee-length at least. That was enough fabric to fill with a good collection of shiny and slightly sticky buckeyes. Our skirts billowed with a mahogany, nut-brown, and coffee-colored fortune.

Buckeyes entertained us in myriad ways. Buckeye games could be played outdoors.”⁽¹⁾ Flicked like marbles, tossed at targets, and used to provoke other kids, buckeyes were all purpose fun. Once back in the building, the second floor above the forbidden hallway became a dark bowling alley. Those scavenged treasures caromed off the walls and skittered down the terrazzo floors. They rolled on the bathroom tiles. They were launched as missiles and stuffed down the unwary child’s shirt collar. My BFF even ventured into the sanctuary and lined them up on the edge of the platform where the adults led the services! I suppose she felt daring because her father was the President, so in her mind she could not possibly get in trouble.

But kids age and after a few years we no longer rolled buckeyes in the hallways and pelted our adversaries. We were too “mature” for those childish pursuits and we girls found better ways to avoid “the speech”… like flirting with boys. I still visited the buckeye tree, however, and always pocketed a few.

Even as a young adult, I visited the buckeye tree in the fall and selected a few beauties. They warmed in my palm and slid together in a satisfying way. They reminded me of those happy childhood activities, but I stayed in the prayer services, even through the dreaded “speech.” On Rosh Hashanah it is customary to symbolically cast off our sins by going to a body of water, reciting some verses, and sprinkling a few bread morsels into the water in the tashlich ritual. In those years, we collected our buckeyes and rolled them down the steep hill of Darlington Road in a tashlich-style ceremony. Gales of laughter and the sensation of our hearts lifting in frivolity followed the buckeyes down the asphalt. Their abandonment released our mirth and enhanced the holiday season.

Beautiful towering flowers in the spring yield shiny buckeyes in the fall. “Aesculus hippocastanum (Horse-chestnut),” © Plant Image Library, CC BY-SA 2.0

Another year I collected enough buckeyes to make long strings to decorate my home’s sukkah, the temporary outdoor dwelling we use for the eight-day Sukkos/Sukkot festival. Many people decorate their sukkas with fruit, gourds, and beautiful pictures. I took my drill and created an assembly line. Drill, string, push them down the cord, drill more. My sukkah boasted those happy strands of buckeyes for many years.

Even after I moved away from Pittsburgh to areas lacking buckeye trees, my friend remembered me during buckeye season. She mailed me a buckeye care package! I kept a few on my desk for a few years. In a burst of creativity last year, I used them in an art project celebrating nature which I donated to a charity auction. I hope the bidder was amazed and entertained by them as much as I was.

Buckeye season is a state of mind requiring only some buckeyes, or even photos of buckeyes, to evoke the pleasantness. These nuts are poisonous to humans so don’t eat them! But oh! they’ve nourished my soul for years. My BFF and I still play buckeye games and talk buckeye talk. Fifty years have passed since we filled our skirts with the brown treasures. That old tree is gone, but when I go back to Pittsburgh, I know the location of another one to visit. Today we laugh together about rolling buckeyes during prayer services, and it keeps us young and silly. I’m looking forward to celebrating buckeye season for a long time. We’re never too old for fun!

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^{1. Buckeyes in the UK have been used for the game of conkers. “Roald Dahl was a big conker fan.” https://www.projectbritain.com/conkers.html, accessed October 1, 2020. ↩}

Hospital Wait

I wish I had my knitting with me.

I’m at a local hospital Emergency Department. My blood sugar has been wonky and I’m out of medication. [While this could become a screed about the state of medical insurance in the United States, I will refrain from explaining how it happens that I cannot get my meds.] I need to see a doc.

Emergency Department. © JustHavingFun

There are many service units here: Registration, Triage, Laboratory, Urgent care, Intermediate Care, Rapid Evaluation, etc. Monitors on the wall let you know what place you’re in. After my blood was drawn they estimated it would be 3 hours to see a doc. Well, they do need to analyze the samples….

I’m OK waiting. There’s wi-fi, and I have a phone charger so my weak battery problems won’t frustrate me in the absence of my knitting. I’m hungry, though, but they don’t want me to eat or drink. Writing is fine. So is listening to podcasts.

Waiting List. © JustHavingFun

Dang it! Why don’t l take my knitting with me everywhere, every time?

Fortunately I borrowed a phone charger so I don’t have to sit like a lump or watch a half-heard television show I have no interest in watching. Some people are doing nothing at all. How can people do that?

There’s an odd cross-section of humanity here. I am hot, but many patients sit wrapped in blankets. A two-year-old child runs into the Triage area and her father corrals her. She’s laughing now, but was shrieking a little while ago. Someone who looks like an older sister is braiding an African-American girl’s hair. The couple seated next to me pass a phone between them, playing a video game together.

Did I mention I potentially have a 3-hour wait?

I wish I had my knitting with me.

Postscript – Indeed it was a 3-hour wait, but there was also a 3-hour treatment & observation phase! Wouldn’t have been able to knit because an O2 sensor was attached to my index finger. Glad I found the Game Show Network and spent some time with Cash Cab, and Family Feud (oooh, love that Steve Harvey). “Survey says” … I’m tired and need to go to the pharmacy to get my prescription filled.

Happiness is My Choice, 12

Expanded, ballooned, swelled—that’s how my heart behaved when I heard the announcement. Increased, surged, rose—that’s how my joy reacted upon learning the news.

One of my oldest friend’s oldest daughter just got married! I held this child when she was four hours old and now she and her beloved stood under the chuppah/marriage canopy as her parents did before her. I danced and hugged. My heart was full.

“Bowl of Booties” by Lisa Bruce, used under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Other friends just became grandparents! The first grandchild, a girl, was born to their firstborn whose wedding I was privileged to attend last year. I delighted in the family’s joy at the wedding and blessed the new couple for a long, happy married life. Their well-being became my heart’s desire, their future as precious as that of my own children. Now the joy continues.

So why am I so happy some might wonder. Others might be jealous, blasé, or worse, bitter. I am grateful to have a heart that sings when others encounter happy tidings. Why not be happy for my friends? Their fortune, their gains, the fruition of their dreams does not detract from anything that is due to me. I am not losing anything or threatened.

Quite the contrary. The Creator wants us to be happy so He gives us opportunities to be happy. We need to recognize these opportunities and grab them with gusto! When we are happy with our own lot, the world looks brighter and everyone else’s good fortune rains upon us as well.

Ben Zoma says:
Who is rich?
The one who is appreciates what he has…
(Talmud—Avot 4:1)

Don’t I deserve happiness? Of course I do! That is the way Man is meant to live. Hashem gives me all I need; my needs will always be met. I know that everything coming to me will be provided… but sometimes it doesn’t feel that way. My wants are not always in concordance with my needs. I need shelter, clothing, nourishment, health. I have all that. Maybe I also want that vacation trip, a newer car,  relief from bills, and the ability to eat anything I want when I want without consequences. (The former three are within the realm of the possible and the latter is a pipe dream for sure!)

So how do I stand it—no, bask in it—when others around me “get” something and I don’t? Reframe the situation.

Others receive no gifts that are being withheld from me. Others get what they deserve. For whatever reason, I am not destined at this moment to receive that same gift. That doesn’t mean I will never have the new car or the means to go on vacation. I understand that if I do what I need to do in this world to be a kind, moral, and righteous person, I will be showered from Above with all that is coming to me.

Sharing joy in the blessings my friends experience enlivens me and wraps me in the surety that there is a Presence for Good in the universe. It binds me to my people. It creates good will. Sharing someone else’s happiness grows and grows. When we can view the world with eyes focused on the bounty available to us, we can only increase our own happiness and satisfaction with our lives.

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