Shabbat Walking These Last 34 Years….
I looked for a picture of people walking to shul on shabbat, following up on Liore’s Eco-Eruv concept. No photos to be found, since no one takes pictures of people walking to shul, apparently. Why would they? Though it’s a normal, unexciting thing to do, it does yield important results.
I grew up in walking distance of my Reform temple in Fargo, ND. No one walked anywhere, except that as a sort of vestigal observance from my parents’ Jewish Brooklyn and St. Paul chilhoods, we did walk to Temple on Rosh Hashanah. I thought that was pretty cool, exotic almost, kind of tribal and arcane and mysterious. I went to Jewish summer camp where various Shabbat prohibitions were in force, but driving was irrelevant in a camp context. Only in adult life did I make the decision, with my husband, not to drive on Shabbat.
As a result, we have always lived in walking distance of our various synagogues, though we are not Orthodox. Occasionally I drive if I am going out alone on Friday night and I don’t feel safe walking by myself, but I have walked with my husband to morning Shabbat services for 34 years, in all seasons. Once we walked 7 miles to our niece’s bat mitzvah. We have at various times been very hot, very cold, and very wet; we are generally very happy to get home after our 1.1 mile walk. A few times, during snow storms with closed roads, we walked down the middle of the streets.
I have always considered this quality time – when our kids were little, there were many stages and strategies for accomplishing this distance. One was M&M walks – one M&M was doled out per street crossed. We told endless stories to keep them distracted and to avoid whining. Lots of piggy back rides, lots of “sites” along the way that still make me smile. I know where every flowering tree and bush will blossom, and we have carefully observed the gradual upgrading of our neigborhood, since we notice every paint job and newly cemented sidewalk. We even pass the police commissioner’s house and note his shiny black cars. None of this is remarkable, but if it weren’t for shabbat walks, I doubt I would know the ‘hood this initmately. It gives me a sense of connectedness that driving doesn’t match.
Way back before we were all talking about Peak Oil and global warming, Rabbi Arthur Waskow observed that being shomer shabbat and eschewing driving meant 1/7 less driving per week. I liked that idea, though resource reduction was not on my mind back then.
There was one exception to shabbat walking, in Salzberg, Germany, where we experienced the proverbial “free streetcar”. Halachically speaking, if a street car is free and stops at every stop, one can take it. Salzberg actually had such a conveyance. It was a great novelty for us, but it sure felt like cheating!
Now I think every Jewish community should promote walking. Unfortunately synagogues have tended to locate themselves on suburban thoroughfares, often without sidewalks. Hopefully synagogue planners will be more mindful that when they construct “synagogue sprawl” they also minimize any sense of community.
Any stories to share about your shabbat walking experiences?
I grew up in walking distance of my Reform temple in Fargo, ND. No one walked anywhere, except that as a sort of vestigal observance from my parents’ Jewish Brooklyn and St. Paul chilhoods, we did walk to Temple on Rosh Hashanah. I thought that was pretty cool, exotic almost, kind of tribal and arcane and mysterious. I went to Jewish summer camp where various Shabbat prohibitions were in force, but driving was irrelevant in a camp context. Only in adult life did I make the decision, with my husband, not to drive on Shabbat.
As a result, we have always lived in walking distance of our various synagogues, though we are not Orthodox. Occasionally I drive if I am going out alone on Friday night and I don’t feel safe walking by myself, but I have walked with my husband to morning Shabbat services for 34 years, in all seasons. Once we walked 7 miles to our niece’s bat mitzvah. We have at various times been very hot, very cold, and very wet; we are generally very happy to get home after our 1.1 mile walk. A few times, during snow storms with closed roads, we walked down the middle of the streets.
I have always considered this quality time – when our kids were little, there were many stages and strategies for accomplishing this distance. One was M&M walks – one M&M was doled out per street crossed. We told endless stories to keep them distracted and to avoid whining. Lots of piggy back rides, lots of “sites” along the way that still make me smile. I know where every flowering tree and bush will blossom, and we have carefully observed the gradual upgrading of our neigborhood, since we notice every paint job and newly cemented sidewalk. We even pass the police commissioner’s house and note his shiny black cars. None of this is remarkable, but if it weren’t for shabbat walks, I doubt I would know the ‘hood this initmately. It gives me a sense of connectedness that driving doesn’t match.
Way back before we were all talking about Peak Oil and global warming, Rabbi Arthur Waskow observed that being shomer shabbat and eschewing driving meant 1/7 less driving per week. I liked that idea, though resource reduction was not on my mind back then.
There was one exception to shabbat walking, in Salzberg, Germany, where we experienced the proverbial “free streetcar”. Halachically speaking, if a street car is free and stops at every stop, one can take it. Salzberg actually had such a conveyance. It was a great novelty for us, but it sure felt like cheating!
Now I think every Jewish community should promote walking. Unfortunately synagogues have tended to locate themselves on suburban thoroughfares, often without sidewalks. Hopefully synagogue planners will be more mindful that when they construct “synagogue sprawl” they also minimize any sense of community.
Any stories to share about your shabbat walking experiences?
Posted by in 20:54:45
It’s a tough one, b/c synagogues are locating themselves where they find their folks living–which is good, potentially, for walking, except that if Jews are living in places that are more spread out and where it’s just not possible to build a shul that most people can walk to b/c everyone is too far from everywhere…well, it may no longer be a possibility for the vast majority of communities. Or of Jews, since quality urban housing tends to be more expensive than suburban.
We are Shabbat walkers. My husband is a traditionalist Reconstructionist who maintains his membership in a havurah in which most of the members don’t keep kosher or do Shabbat aside from the times they come to davening. He would never drive on Shabbat, no matter the weather or occasion, except for one time when it was the only way to get to our nephew’s bar mitzvah, and then (as with me) he would drive only to shul. I have been driving more recently–again only to shul–b/c of ankle trouble, heat, and sometimes (if I’m totally honest) Shabbat morning lateness.
But our default is walking, and we would never want to live someplace where we could not walk to shul–or where people who walk to our shul couldn’t walk to our house. It’s a lifestyle thing as much as a halakhic thing. The walks with our children are precious. All of what you said, Betsy, about knowing your neighborhood more intimately is true: there is the house with the ever-expanding crazy garden, the wall where they can sit for a rest…And there is also the time spent: we often play 20 questions to pass the time. We also do a game from my father-in-law’s childhood of “run to the next tree/telephone pole, walk to the next one, run to the next one…” or say “if you’re too tired to walk, why don’t you run or skip” (which works surprisingly well). We have a designated spot on the way home (3/4 of the way home) where we do a “whining orchestra”: Each person gets a turn to share their whine, e.g. “I’m tired, I’m tired!”, “Why is so hot?”, “I can’t believe my oldest is going to college”, and then I say “1, 2, 3…” and we all whine simultaneously.
It also provides aimless time with the older kids, where we can talk about various things without it having to be An Official Conversation.
The time is precious, beyond measure really.
It also makes our kids, who are driven most places, also into walkers–who are just as likely to ask to walk to our local ice cream shop when I want to drive.
So true about quality time with kids….
Here’s a great memory.
Try Debbie Mowshowitz’s game. When you get to a red light with kids, sing “Bingo Bingo o my Jingo, Make that red light GREEN!” If it doesn’t work, repeat it louder. Magically, that will do it.