Although I was not there, I understand that my grandson and a young girl who has been a close friend of his have decided they are going to get married. We like her a lot and think that they would make a fine couple. But before you congratulate me, I think you should know that my grandson is 5 and his girl friend is 4. My wife said that it will be a fun wedding. I told her that maybe it will but that if, for example, they marry when our grandson is 25, I will be 103 and she will be 99. Maybe not so fun.

That was probably the most interesting thing that happened during our Yom Kippur. Well, maybe equally interesting were my parking spaces. During the High Holidays, Adas Israel sets up an enormous tent in the parking lot to hold one of its three simultaneous services outdoors. When I say an enormous tent, there are apparently about 3000 seats inside the tent, and usually the crowd is overflowing. I am not sure why they do this every year, and I don’t find services in a tent very appealing, with potential temperature, precipitation and humidity issues, but it does put a lot less strain on the building itself; there are usually another 2,000 or so attending services inside. Adas always says that there are about 5,000 at the High Holiday services.

One thing that is obvious is that when they put this large tent on the parking lot, plus another tent for children to play in, and a lot of security apparatus, there is no room for cars. This means that the surrounding streets become clogged and parking hard to come by. One advantage Adas has it that is on the Metro Red Line, which is just about 2 blocks away (you only have to cross one street). But most people do find a place to park, although that place may be 1/2 mile away or more.

For Kol Nidre services, my daughter Michelle had a brilliant idea. Let’s go down early and have dinner at a Cleveland Park restaurant, rather than eating at home. Not only will it avoid cooking and rushing, but we should be able to get a good parking space. And she was right. I made 5:30 reservations at Dakshin Indique, on Connecticut Avenue just across from the Metro stop, and we got the parking space on Connecticut Ave closest (and I mean closest, I think – okay maybe there is one across the street a little closer) to Adas Israel. Mission accomplished.

Yesterday morning was trickier. We wanted to be there for the Torah service that began at 10:30. I dropped Edie off at the door, and then started my hunt. This would not be easy. I first realized that we had forgotten to bring her handicap parking placard, so I drove home to get it (we live less than 10 minutes away), and I then saw that that there were no parking places available on Connecticut Avenue south of Tilden Street, which is just about 1/2 mile from the synagogue. Not good enough, I decided.

I knew that daughter Hannah had parked on a street that looped behind the shops on the east side of Connecticut Avenue in Cleveland Park, which would probably be about a quarter of a mile. I tried there, but there was nothing. So I decided to go for broke, and drove back to the entry door at the synagogue.

Now Adas Israel is at a strange intersection where Porter and Quebec Streets sort of meet together just east of Connecticut Avenue, almost like at a fork in the road. While Porter Street is a major east-west street, Quebec Street actually reaches a dead end a little beyond Adas Israel and a large apartment development. There is parking on both sides of the street, but obviously, between Adas Israel and the apartments, it is very hard to find.

I drove to the dead end. Nothing. I made a u-turn and as I was coming back, lo and behold, right across the street from the entrance door to the synagogue, a parking space had opened up. Wow, I said, how is this possible. There were two security guards (two of a larger number serving Adas yesterday) there and one of them told me that I couldn’t park there. Someone had beat me to it, and was down the block making a u-turn (they wanted him to let traffic move) and they were holding it for him.

It was a large parking space (not sure what had been there), and I thought there might have been room for two (there probably wasn’t), and I asked if I could wait and see. They said “no”, again because of traffic, but if I went to the apartment entry ahead on the right and waited, they would hold the space if it looked like there would be room.

In the meantime, the car they were holding the original space for didn’t come back, and now the space was mine, but I had to wait until traffic cleared, back out of the apartment drive way, drive back to the open space, make a u-turn, and park. All handled smoothly. And I was the second car from the synagogue door – while there were 5000 people attending services.

I really appreciated the help the security guards gave me. As I walked to thevdoor, I heard one tell the other, “It’s nice when you can make someone happy.”

With this, you would probably think that I missed the Torah service. But no. When I entered, they were only on the third aliyah.

Mid-day, we left Adas and went home, joined by children and grand children. The plan was to leave home about 5:30 and trek back for the final neilah service that started at 6 and ended about 7:45. This would be one more search for parking. But at about 4, the rains started (the rains that were scheduled to fall for almost the next 36 hours) and it seemed like too much to try my luck again. Hannah and her family did return for neilah, but Edie, Michelle and I streamed the service from home (first time).

Because of this, we were not present when Izzy and his young friend announced their planned marriage. His 11 year old sister, Joan, I am told, said that – when he got older and really interested in girls – she would remind him that he already had made a commitment. Joan, by the way, for I think the first time, fasted the entire day, her own decision and without complaint.

It is autumn in Washington, 60 degrees and raining, and not expected to get much warmer today. Some of the leaves are beginning to turn. The High Holidays are behind us and Sukkot doesn’t start for another 4 days.

By the way (and to close), I thought the three sermons I heard at Adas Israel were fine, but not earth shattering. I didn’t read much more online, but I do want to call your attention to the Yom Kippur message of Congressman-to-be Brad Lander that he mailed out to his followers. I thought it was extremely thoughtful and well written. I am sure that there is some way that I can paste it on the blog, but I can not figure out how to do it. But it is wroth looking at, so if you want to see it, let me know and I will send it to you by email. Or you can look for it yourself.

Lander, as you probably know, is running for Congress on Manhattan and will probably (i.e., definitely) be elected in November. He is the former comptroller of New York City and a progressive, with carefully delineated views on Israel and its neighbors. He is also St. Louis born. His father was a friend, and his uncle my college roommate. When he first moved to Brooklyn about 35 (?) years ago, to take a job with a housing non-profit, his father had him call me up for advice (as that was my field). I remember telling him that he was going to work for a respectable organization, as far as I knew, and that the job sounded like a good one, but…..I told him if the job involved New York City or New York State politics, he would probably find himself a permanent outsider, young Midwesterner that he was. Shows what my advice is worth.