第4章
Heritage and Celebration: Reimagining Ancient Traditions
Passover was one of the few Jewish holidays my family consistently celebrated. My grandparents would visit from New York, and my mother would prepare a traditional Seder with special plates and our chosen Haggadah. Despite its dark Old Testament narrative of slavery and plagues, Passover maintains a positive, festive atmosphere. My mother particularly loved singing "Dayenu," appreciating its message of gratitude rather than its religious content.
Easter and Passover share spring timing but follow different calendars. Originally celebrated together since Christianity emerged from Judaism, they were separated at the Council of Nicaea in 325 CE. My mother and I decorated Easter eggs annually alongside our Passover preparations-a tradition I saw as artistic celebration of spring renewal rather than Christian symbolism. Eggs have featured in creation myths across cultures for millennia.
Our Seders are different now-more casual than those of my childhood with wedding china and suits. Most couples attending are "mixed marriages" of secular partners from different religious backgrounds, all eager to mark seasonal changes. Beyond Judaism and Christianity, many cultures celebrate spring. Pre-Islamic Persian Zoroastrians celebrate Nowruz (New Year), which features egg-dyeing and continues in modern Iran despite religious restrictions. Egypt's Sham El-Nessim dates back to 2700 BCE, moved to Easter Monday during Christian times, and maintains egg decorating traditions.
My childhood fascination with Greek myths taught me that religions come and go, and that gods like Zeus weren't presented as historical fact but as beliefs people once held. The story of Persephone particularly moved me, explaining seasonal cycles through maternal grief and rebirth. My mother created "Blossom Day" just for me, celebrating the first dogwood blooms-teaching me celebrations could be invented around what matters most.
The winter solstice marks our darkest hour and the turning point toward light and hope. This pivotal moment cries out to be celebrated across cultures, explaining why Christmas has such universal appeal beyond its religious origins. Christmas's popularity extends far beyond Christian communities. In Japan, despite being predominantly Shinto, Tokyo's Ginza district displays elaborate Christmas decorations. Immigrants from non-Christian countries often embrace Christmas as an American cultural holiday rather than a religious one.
Christmas's December 25th date has no biblical basis-Jesus's actual birth date remains unknown, with scholars suggesting various seasons. The December celebration was established three centuries after Jesus's life when Roman church leaders strategically co-opted existing winter solstice celebrations. Before Christianity, Romans celebrated Dies Natalis Solis Invicti ("Birthday of the Unconquerable Sun") on December 25th, and earlier still, Saturnalia honored Saturn with gift-giving and social role reversals.
第5章
Growth and Transformation: Life's Passages
How often when we're small do we hear relatives marvel at how much we've grown? It took me years to understand this bewilderment, until I witnessed friends' babies transform into adolescents while I wasn't looking. It feels like magic, something supernatural.
But "supernatural" is problematic-it means "beyond nature," yet what we call supernatural is often less compelling than nature itself. The real magic lies in what we do understand-like puberty, the transformation that inspired werewolf myths across millennia. This natural process, where humans suddenly sprout hair in unexpected places and develop wild, uncontrollable urges, mirrors these ancient legends perfectly.
This transition from childhood to reproductive capability has inspired elaborate coming-of-age rituals across cultures: Amish rumspringa, Apache dawn dances, Maasai circumcision ceremonies, Amazonian ant gloves, Japanese seijin shiki, Mormon missions, Jewish bar and bat mitzvahs. Though dressed differently by cultural norms, each celebrates the same biological milestone-sexual maturity and the continuation of our species.
My own coming-of-age began at twelve with my first period. My mother somehow knew immediately, congratulating me as if something lucky had happened-unlike her own experience, where her mother had slapped her face following an unfortunate Jewish custom.
My deeper transition came years later during an impromptu psychedelic experience. What began as joyful frolicking devolved into an existential crisis as I confronted mortality, cosmic insignificance, and the universe's inevitable end. I wept through the night, convinced I'd permanently lost my joy for life. For months afterward, I carried this existential ennui until gradually, my perspective shifted. I reconnected with what my parents had taught me-that being alive is astonishing and beautiful, that life's finite nature makes it precious. Facing my deepest fears about existence freed me from cognitive dissonance and marked my true passage into womanhood.
For years I wondered why the connection between the moon and menstrual cycles wasn't more widely discussed. It seemed poetic that our bodies would link to that distant rock, creating a beautiful story to share with daughters. But my research revealed no scientific proof of correlation between lunar phases and menstruation, despite both being approximately 28 days long. This coincidence had intoxicated me with the human need to draw connections and recognize patterns.
第6章
Reflection and Growth: Learning from Mistakes
Alexander Pope wrote that admitting one's wrongs demonstrates growing wisdom. As a child, Maruja occasionally took me to church on Sundays during our travels. I loved the experience-dancing in the aisles despite it not being that kind of service, enjoying the grand architecture and friendly, well-dressed people. I became curious about the small rooms where people entered one by one after the main service, and Maruja explained in Spanish that people were confessing their sins to a priest.
I initially dreaded the idea of telling a stranger about my tantrums, but I recognize that confession serves a purpose. Acknowledging mistakes, making amends, and improving ourselves offers evolutionary advantages. Ritual purification exists across religions, though I believe our bodies' earthly functions are sacred rather than dirty. Our real flaw is our cruelty to one another-our original sin requiring atonement.
Various religions formalize atonement differently: Catholic confession, Jewish Yom Kippur with its chest-pounding and apologies, Hindu Prayascitta with its range of penances, Islamic Istighfar at dawn, Buddhist meditation for karmic redemption. Even pre-colonial indigenous Americans practiced confession rituals, as did ancient Chinese kings who took responsibility for natural disasters.
Non-religious institutions like Alcoholics Anonymous and therapy also incorporate confession. Science itself demands error correction-being wrong and admitting it is central to progress. My father once noted how scientists, when presented with good arguments, will change their minds completely. My mother suggested March 4th would make an excellent secular day of atonement-a day to "march forth" into personal and philosophical growth.
The contrast between feast and fast forms a fundamental rhythm in human spiritual traditions, connecting us to our ancestors' experiences of abundance and scarcity. Growing up with privilege, I never experienced hunger like my ancestors-including my great-grandparents who starved during the Russian Revolution. As an adult, I've adopted Yom Kippur fasting as a personal ritual, though in a reformed way that omits other traditional restrictions. This annual fast serves as meditation on how fortunate I am compared to millions throughout history who considered hunger normal.
第7章
Independence and Critical Thinking: The Revolutionary Spirit
Independence days spring from the same human impulses that fuel scientific discovery-an unwillingness to accept authority on blind faith and the question: "Why are things as they are?" They celebrate our ability to evolve figuratively through political revolutions.
While volunteering as a tutor in New York, I met a fifteen-year-old Orthodox Jewish boy who sought knowledge beyond his closed religious community. Despite being taught the world was 6,000 years old, he innately questioned this belief and eagerly absorbed secular history. His revolutionary spirit-questioning authority and seeking truth independently-embodied the heart of national independence movements.
For those in democracies, voting is our sacred ritual-the equivalent of religious holidays in a civic religion. But participation is required daily through critical thinking. True patriotism means using critical thinking to create a more perfect union. If an idea cannot stand up to scrutiny, it should be discarded-that's both the way of scientific discovery and the pathway toward a better society.
National remembrances like Bastille Day, Juneteenth, and Pride Month commemorate uprisings against injustice, showing that acknowledging the need for progress is itself an act of patriotism. Teaching our children to question preconceptions is the true ritual of independence. Let our independence days become appointed times to break free from the monarchies of "just the way things are" and recognize that history is always written by the victors.
My parents' approach to knowledge was revelatory. When I asked who was right about death-Maruja with her heaven or my parents with their "sleep forever"-they enthusiastically replied in unison: "Nobody knows!" This taught me that uncertainty is real and nothing to fear. Though not a scientist by profession, I inherited science as a worldview. My parents explained complex concepts clearly at dinner, treating me with intellectual respect. They celebrated my questions, especially those they couldn't answer, reaching for our Encyclopedia Britannica to discover together.
第8章
Marking Time: Anniversaries, Birthdays, and Life's Milestones
Anniversaries and birthdays mark our position relative to the sun-we're in the same place we were when the event happened, though the entire solar system has moved through the galaxy. This astronomical connection provides a sense of coordinates in the vast universe.
Throughout history, we've commemorated births, deaths, and significant events on their annual cycles. From ancient celebrations of powerful figures to modern birthday parties that trickled down from aristocracy to common people between Victorian times and the 1950s, these rituals help us mark time's passage.
While English lacks a concise word for "death day," Yiddish offers "yahrzeit"-when Jews light special 24-hour candles to commemorate deceased loved ones. Unlike birthday candles blown out immediately, these continue burning, like dead stars that appear to twinkle after they're gone. This small light gives the appearance that the departed aren't completely gone.
When my 99-year-old grandfather Harry was dying, I hoped to tell him I was pregnant before he passed. But I got my period the day he slipped between life and death, and he died two days later. Months later, I discovered I was pregnant, with a due date of August 4-remarkably, the same date Jon and I had become romantically involved twelve years earlier. This coincidence felt meaningful, almost miraculous, making me deeply attached to that specific date.
Despite my scientific skepticism toward astrology, I found that pregnancy made birthdays suddenly feel more significant. We humans excel at pattern recognition-it's an evolutionary advantage that helps us bond and survive. This makes us "significance junkies," finding meaning in coincidences. When my daughter was born via emergency C-section on August 1, we named her Helena Chaya, honoring both my father (with a C name) and Grandpa Harry (with an H name). Birthdays celebrate survival-especially meaningful throughout history when infant mortality was high.
Even after death, technology allows us to time travel to loved ones. I can watch my father in Cosmos or find videos I never knew existed, like him being interviewed while holding me as a baby. His light still reaches me through technology, warming me during "the endless winter of his death." This feels luckier than past generations who couldn't see their departed loved ones again.
第9章
Building Community: Creating Bonds Through Shared Experience
The moon remains awe-inspiring and central to human experience. Before electricity, it dramatically shaped nightly life. Civilizations worldwide built their calendars around lunar cycles, which provided a rhythm to time-hence why "month" and "moon" are linguistically connected. The moon's waxing and waning are steady and mathematically predictable.
Despite humanity's dependence on it, menstruation has often been considered taboo, impure, and hazardous. Women from Nepal to Nigeria to North America's Yurok tribe have been exiled to separate structures during their periods, sometimes with fatal consequences. Various religious traditions impose restrictions-abstinence, no cooking, no worship attendance-followed by ritual cleansings like the Orthodox Jewish mikvah.
One of my life's greatest blessings has been my friendships, particularly with women. After returning to New York from London in 2009, I craved reconnection with friends I'd missed. I created the Ladies Dining Society, inviting eighteen women from various parts of my life, though only six showed up initially.
Our monthly ritual evolved beautifully-we dined, drank Dirty Janes, and discussed everything meaningful. The community I sought took shape as deep friendships bloomed between women who hadn't known each other before. I maintained meticulous spreadsheets tracking attendance and even my outfits, giving me an illusion of control while friends gradually moved away from New York.
For almost five years, we missed only three dinners. When I moved to Boston, friends in other cities created their own versions with different parameters. I initially gave rigid instructions but learned to let go as the tradition mutated to fit new circumstances. As Daniel Dennett wrote, cultural institutions require renewal and replication to persist. The Ladies Dining Society continues in various forms, proving that while traditions may fall away, new ones can always begin.
My parents' happy, romantic marriage reflected positively on the institution as a whole. They raised me to be skeptical but not cynical-especially about love. After my father died, I still wanted to be married, but the getting married part seemed more painful than joyful. At one wedding as Jon's date, I wept in the bathroom, imagining my own future ceremony without my dad walking me down the aisle. Jon held me and listened, tears streaming down his own face-for that and a million other reasons, I didn't hesitate when he proposed years later.
第10章
The Natural Wonder of Human Sexuality and Connection
Sex is miraculous-it literally makes people! As long as I live, I'll never stop being astounded by this. Like so much in nature, when described plainly, it sounds like magic. The ritual of sex fulfills many promises of religion: creation, transcendence, and a kind of afterlife through DNA. These are qualities usually ascribed to the divine, not the profoundly human.
What if instead of associating sex with sin and shame, we considered it part of nature's glory? If we seek beauty in our universe through science, we must shake off centuries of sexual shame. It's remarkable that sex and reproduction can be separate-a miracle almost equal to their connection. Countless people throughout history have enjoyed sex without reproduction, whether same-sex couples, post-menopausal people, or those using contraception.
Some theologies insist every orgasm must serve conception, but nature disagrees. Many species engage in same-sex relationships, oral sex, masturbation, and intercourse during pregnancy. Our fellow primates, bonobos, demonstrate there's clearly something wonderful about sex beyond passing on DNA.
Stephen Greenblatt argues that St. Augustine essentially invented our modern view of sex. Augustine was haunted by the connection between lust and loss of control, particularly regarding erections. What Augustine didn't understand is that this loss of control makes sex miraculous. Like other transcendent experiences-changing seasons, sunrises, falling in love-it's the surrender to nature that makes it sacred.
Biologically, sex creates physical intoxicants in our bodies-dopamine for euphoria, oxytocin for bonding. These chemicals can be measured scientifically, yet the experience remains transcendent. Science shows us how nature equipped us for such joys.
Jon and I met in middle school but took years to realize we liked each other. We decided to marry at the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art on Cornell's campus-where my dad had taken me as a child and where his memorial service was held. Incredibly, the museum now featured a 12,000-light installation called "Cosmos" that evoked the depths of space, created as an homage to my father's work.
Our best rituals are performances about what we need or want most. Some traditions are obvious, like a kiss sealing the union. Others have ancient origins we've forgotten-like throwing rice for fertility. We incorporated elements from multiple traditions: standing under a Jewish chuppah, lighting a Christian unity candle, and breaking glass at the end. We also shared Plato's myth from Symposium about how humans were once whole beings split in two, with love being the call back to our original form.
第11章
Embracing Mortality: Finding Peace in Life's Impermanence
Autumn signals shortening days, cooling weather, changing leaves, and harvest time-all heralding the approach of darkness and death while reminding us to live fully. This narrative appears in harvest festivals and holidays where we find joy in terror, embracing the morbid with a kind of freedom.
As an adult, I love Halloween's break from societal norms, its Dionysian frenzy, and glimpses into strangers' fantasy alter egos. But as a child, I dreaded our school's peculiar custom of parading costumed children through an assisted living facility. While bringing joy to many residents, the experience confronted us with mortality as we encountered elderly people near life's end-petrifying both literally and figuratively. Only later did I realize this wasn't standard Halloween practice, though ironically, it connected more authentically to the holiday's origins than I knew.
The stars, particularly the Pleiades cluster, have influenced human imaginations and calendars across cultures. These seven hot blue stars, though over four hundred light-years away, have woven themselves into human traditions worldwide-from the Cayuga's dream-analyzing festival to the Tuareg's seasonal predictions, from Japanese "subaru" to Greek "Seven Sisters."
The Celts connected the Pleiades to harvest and mortality through Samhain, Halloween's ancestor, celebrated when these stars reached their highest point between the autumn equinox and winter solstice. Similar traditions evolved globally-Catholic All Souls' Day and Mexican Dia de los Muertos-all rituals where we face our fears of darkness and death.
On the first December 20 of Helena's life-the twenty-first anniversary of her grandfather Carl's death-we drove to Ithaca, her "ancestral home." The next day, we took Helena to the cemetery where I observe the Jewish tradition of placing stones on graves. I collect six small stones: for my dad, grandmothers Pearl and Rachel, grandfathers Sam and Harry, and a boy I loved in elementary school. Our family plot sits just outside the consecrated Jewish section-"Jewish adjacent"-which seems poetically perfect for us.
At my father's grave, visitors leave notes, marbles, Lego, and space-related objects-reminders that others still love him. I recall staring at his coffin with astonishment rather than sadness, unable to comprehend that my animated father was suddenly reduced to a body in a box. Years later, I asked Jon if he would be buried with me in our family plot, a romantic commitment that seemed beautiful despite my joking about sharing a coffin.
Our humanity may have begun when we started ritualizing death rather than abandoning our dead. Beyond burial, humans have developed countless ways to process mortality: cremation on public pyres, mummification in Indonesia where the dead are treated as merely sick, and secondary burial practices where bones are exhumed and cleaned years after death. I wish I had experienced more structured grieving rituals after my father died, rather than being given an antianxiety pill at his funeral.
Every loss reopens all previous losses-my grandfather's death reconnected me to my grandmother's passing, friends I'd lost, and ultimately back to my father. One of his last words to me was "I'm sorry," which I couldn't understand then but now recognize as his awareness that his absence would tarnish even my happiest future moments.
My parents taught me that life's impermanence makes it precious. Like the Taoist philosopher Zhuangzi who recognized his wife's death as part of nature's cycle while still feeling despair, I've learned to balance acceptance with grief. Standing at my father's grave with Helena, I realized he'll never be real to her-just as my grandfather Sam was never real to me-continuing an ancient chain of stories about loved ones we'll never meet, stretching back to the beginning of language itself.
Despite our mortality and the universe's eventual heat death, our brief existence in this vast cosmos is itself cause for celebration-we were here, we lived, and that alone matters.
