OK, here is my synopsis of the whole weekend. I wanted to include Beorn's speech that he made Saturday night at the main ceremony, but he didn't bring home the hard copy and my rabbi has not gotten around to emailing it to me. He and Beorn composed it together on his computer, so I have no copy of it myself until it's sent to me.
Friday Night:
Wow, how do you relate a life affirming experience so others can experience it? I don’t truly think I can, so I’ll just describe the details and hope to share a little of the joy we experienced through the descriptions.
I spent the week prepping the food for the meal at the shul (temple) and baking the cakes for the dessert buffet at the Commons Room in my apartment complex. And I still ran out of time. If it wasn’t for some very generous neighbors and congregation members, I truly think I would have collapsed from worry about it not getting done.
By Friday evening, I still had two additional cakes to bake and frost, the fondue to assemble in the crockpot so it could just be put into the crockpot insert and turned on, and the trifle to assemble. I had to leave it, and hurry home to shower and change.
At 8:30 PM we met 12 out of town relatives and close friends at the Lubavtich Jewish Center for Kabbalat Shabbes services and dinner with 300 UF students afterwards. Beorn didn’t do anything at this service or dinner, but the rabbi made a big deal about it being his Bar Mitzvah weekend and being called up to the Torah for the first time the next day, and our guests appreciated it.
We had our first aspie moment when a UF student came to our table to congratulate Beorn. It turns out he was one of Beorn’s bunk counselors at camp this summer, and he is a new freshman at UF this Fall.
He offered to shake Beorn’s hand and wished him Mazel Tov, and Beorn replied by saying, “What are you doing here? This table is for invited guests only.” Argh!
Unfortunately, I was halfway down the table and didn’t hear this exchange. Beorn told me about it later.
Dinner was the wonderful four course meal the Rebbetzin always prepares, from salad and gefilte fish, through chicken matzah ball soup and stuffed cabbage and noodle kugel. Dessert was parve tiramisu, yummm.
Unfortunately Craig never made it. I have heard from others what happened, but am still waiting to hear from him. I hope all is well.
Dinner ended around 11:30 PM, and I really felt we couldn’t hang out and visit that much as we had a very busy and intense day the next morning. So we all gave each other hugs and kisses and returned home or to the hotel.
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