I Survived a High Stress High Holidays Season

by Bev Schwartz

When I get too much on my plate, I usually end up overwhelmed, in front of the tv, binge watching something I've seen many times before, hoping the whole mess will magically disappear.

I had three big things on my plate:

• A very high stakes work demo and deadline.  The customer demo was scheduled on Yom Kippur.  I said absolutely not.  It got moved to the next week.
  
• Being part of the Hav community and living up to my commitments for the chaggim, which included preparing and leading a service and running and reporting on the Reverse Tashlich.
  
• The proposed Somerville City Charter was signed by the Governor on September 19th and would be on the November 4th ballot. Those of us who were involved with creating the charter now had to put together a campaign for the charter and get the word out to tens of thousands of voters in a month and a half.
  

Please, can I just turn on the tv, sink into the couch and not have to do any of this?

The work situation explained: The previous demo went well, and the government customer was pleased.  Great!  Until the next day, when the larger program that my project was a part of was cancelled.  Now the priority was documentation so that the customer could reproduce the demo without us, so they could find another funder.  I hate documentation.  And they wanted all the scripts we used for the demo, scripts that were never meant to be delivered, and were kind of, well, ugly.

Hop over to the High Holidays:  Time is running out to get the word out about Reverse Tashlich.  And time is running out for preparing my leading for 2nd night Rosh HaShannah.  Both involved writing, not my strong suit.

Hop over to the City Charter:  We had to create a campaign organization, create a mailer, write up documents explaining it, etc.  So much stuff out of my comfort zone.  And I was the one with the most intricate knowledge of the charter, so guess who had to write up materials to explain it.  Uggh, not my favorite thing.

Um, the tv is over there, calling my name...

A number of us were working on the documentation at work.  And I had people to read things over and help me.  I was not alone.

The volunteers for the charter campaign had a variety of skills, some of whom were experts in the things I didn't know how to do.  And 3 of us got together to discuss the mailer and literature.  I was not alone.

I came up with the idea of writing up the Reverse Tashlich description as if I was writing a cruise advertisement.  My wife thought that was hysterical and was happy to help.  I was not alone.

So with a stack of cruise line catalogs and the help of my wife, we came up with zingers like:

• In these Days of Awe, rather than throwing your nutritionally-deficient sins into a body of water, pick up your sins from the banks of the glorious Mystic River.
  
• Come see the natural beauty of the Mystic River teeming with human-corrupted waterfowl relaxing on trash-filled shores.
  
• We will gather at the sunlit river outlook opposite the rotary where the majestic Grand Union Boulevard meets the labyrinthine Great River Road.
  
• Our group will take a leisurely stroll westward to turn off on a scrub-lined trail across the street from Raymour & Flanigan, the crown jewel in our enviable collection of discount furniture stores in the glamorous Assembly district.
  
• Participate in the time-honored collection of colorful debris either on dry land where ancient peoples once walked, or along the inviting shore.
  
• After disposing of the river's timeless  treasures, we can tour charming streets to discover a tucked away quaint public restroom to restore ourselves to culturally-accepted cleanliness.
  

We were laughing so hard, the task became fun.  

And while I was still fretting about what to do with my service, I realized that I had been completely absorbed in humor, and that humor was what was helping me get through my challenges. And so humor became the theme of my service, not just reading my "ad" for Reverse Tashlich, but sharing fun pictures and stories from the times I've picked trash.  A reminder of how important humor is to endure challenging times.  The service was well-received.

And Reverse Tashlich?  We had 10 people show up, collected 7 bags of trash, and had a good time. And one of the younger members of the group landed a shark.

From left: Bev, Aliza, Merit, Doria, Shalom, Humphrey, Todd, Maya, with shark

And so back to work and endless documentation. And what to say about those ugly scripts?  I wrote in the official documentation, "You may be looking at this and saying, there's got to be a better way... You're right, there is.  These scripts were written for a different program with different needs.  It was easier to adapt the old scripts than write new scripts.  Don't tell me you've never done the same. ;)"  When the customers came, they commented on how much they liked my snarky documentation.  Humor helped me, but it also helped them read through the reams of documentation before they arrived.

And finally the charter.  One member of the group was great at coming up with some good lines and created a Golden Girls meme:

• Govern like it's no longer 1899!
  
• Sophia: "Picture it, Somerville. 1899. A city charter is written and no one knows it will remain the same document (with some revisions) until 2025."
  
• Dorothy: "Ma, tell them why they should vote yes."
  
• Rose: "As we say in St. Olaf, vote yes on Question 1!"
  

And I created a website.  Writing thousands of lines of html, css, and javascript... no problem.  Figuring out how to launch a website.  Uggh.  Quick google search and I'm at godaddy.com.  Find a domain name... yes-on-charter.info.  Someone commented that they couldn't believe that domain name was available.  "Hey," I said, "not only was it available, it was only $4."

Okay, I've got to share it.  https://yes-on-charter.info

And then I signed up to write this blog post. Writing, not my favorite thing.  Remember, keep it funny!

Keeping fingers crossed for November 4th...

Bev Schwartz is a long-time member of Havurat Shalom.