SHVAT MORE THAN HUMAN WORLD 1

I’m not sure how to label this month. 5784 is a leap year in the Jewish calendar, meaning that there are thirteen months total and 2 months of Adar. The purpose of the leap month is to keep the lunar calendar somewhat aligned with the solar calendar, to make sure that Pesach happens in the spring and the beginning of the dry season, and Sukkot in the Fall and the beginning of the rainy season. On a solar calendar, in the mid Atlantic, I’d label January as early winter, February as late winter and March as winter into spring. I’m not sure how well that would work in New England where March probably feels more like late winter and April as winter into spring, for instance and I’d be tempted to shrink the summer months.  This year, Shvat started on January 12th according to the Gregorian calendar.

I raise all this because while Sh’vat here remains the time of slow and cold, it’s actually the first beginnings of Spring in Israel where the almond trees blossom.  By us, I am looking for the dogwoods, redbuds and above all witch hazel to bloom to give us the harbinger that spring is coming.  And as I write this on the third of Shvat, none of that feels remotely close; we are still in the time of slow and cold.

There’s a change in the traditional recitation of the Amidah, the core prayer in Jewish services from the end of Sukkot until Pesach, reflecting the desire for rain and dryness in season.  We traditionally recite “mashiv haruach v’morid hagashem." May the winds blow and bring down rain.  I often change this to “mashiv haruach and morid hasheleg,” may the winds blow and bring down snow, because where we live in winter we are supposed to get snow and rain.  We haven’t had an inch of snow since January or March 2022 depending upon whether you look at Wilmington (March) or Philadelphia (January).  Now I’m no longer young enough or spry enough to go sledding or participate in snowball fights, so snow mostly means shoveling, but the utter lack of snow is another one of those telltale signs of a climate out of whack.  Now were there probably two year periods with no snow in preindustrial times?  Possibly, but what we all need to understand is that the reliable weather patterns upon which local agricultural cycles depend have become less reliable, and our agriculture thus less resilient.

The further we get into winter, the more our ancestors were eating down their stored food.  The Cherokee called February, which is the equivalent of either Shvat or Adar, the hungry moon.  We are waiting for Spring to come.  The days are getting longer, which is a relief, but the cold has settled in for a nice long visit. We are supposed to get down into the teens for much of the next week, which is about as cold as it usually gets for us. As we dwell with the cold, sitting around the fire in a slow time of the year, we get to reflect on the past year, we get to notice what is happening within us, because less is happening outside of us.

Of course, we can give into the busyness of our human world, all artificial lights and mechanical noises.  But winter is designed to be a time of quiet and slowness

QUESTIONS

• What is not happening in the more than human world or in your own life that should be happening, like snow falling in winter?

• What feels not quite in synch in your life?

• If you truly slowed down, what would you be dwelling with?