Chaviva's husband can't return to the US for months

[DGayle]

Xcel is the gas company where I live. Is she in Colorado?

Yes. kvetchingeditor.com/p/about.html

[lawfulevil]

{L_MESSAGE_HIDDEN}:

I don't know about living within an eruv, but her rent still sounds ludicrously high. Our (4/2) house was in 80013, just off Mansfield between Buckley and Tower. My ex-husband still lives there. We divorced on very good terms and discuss all kinds of things that would be too personal for "friends", like money, so I know that the current mortgage is a bit less than her rent. It used to be somewhat (~150/mo) higher, but rates have improved and he refinanced last November since he's no longer upside-down.

And then she wants to hire help? Maybe this is just my atheism talking, but the idea of claiming destitution while looking for staff is simply astonishing. It just strikes me as incredibly arrogant. But basically I don't understand why Chaviva, a convert, couldn't maintain a lesser level of observance during a family crisis. Surely caring for one's children is the most important goal?

[August]

In fairness, if you're shomer Shabbos, which I assume she is, your real estate options are usually severely limited by things like proximity to a synagogue, being located within an eruv (so you can carry on Shabbat, push a stroller and do a handful of other things that you'd basically be stuck at home without, if you're parenting a kid solo), et cetera. So even if that's high for Denver, there may not be other options that are both cheaper and meet the family's religious needs. Honestly, that's the only part of this whole fiasco that actually makes some degree of sense to me.

When the choice is between one brand of fairytale and another brand, and one brand allows you to feed your child, only a mentally ill person chooses to not feed the child.

Also, you don't have to live inside the string.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/lifestyle/20 ... story.html

[LucySnowe]

I'll snark on Chaviva for a lot of things (including tweeting a complaint to US Airways that the person she spoke to on the phone when she was booking her flights didn't ask her whether she wanted a special meal, so she forgot to order a kosher meal), but I won't snark on her for being a convert. I don't see how that has the slightest impact on whether she should or shouldn't dial down her observance. She's Jewish.

I feel that a hell of a lot of Orthodox observance is rules lawyering, which is one of the many reasons I'm never going to join the BT squad, but that's my private opinion and not a judgment on anyone.

There are definitely ways to override rules if circumstances warrant (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pikuach_nefesh). Maybe she should consult a sympathetic rabbi.

[OddlyAmused]

{L_MESSAGE_HIDDEN}:

I don't know about living within an eruv, but her rent still sounds ludicrously high. Our (4/2) house was in 80013, just off Mansfield between Buckley and Tower. My ex-husband still lives there. We divorced on very good terms and discuss all kinds of things that would be too personal for "friends", like money, so I know that the current mortgage is a bit less than her rent. It used to be somewhat (~150/mo) higher, but rates have improved and he refinanced last November since he's no longer upside-down.

And then she wants to hire help? Maybe this is just my atheism talking, but the idea of claiming destitution while looking for staff is simply astonishing. It just strikes me as incredibly arrogant. But basically I don't understand why Chaviva, a convert, couldn't maintain a lesser level of observance during a family crisis. Surely caring for one's children is the most important goal?

{L_MESSAGE_HIDDEN}:

Her rent really doesn't seem that high to me. I'm in the University area, and most 2 bedroom places I've seen are $1,100 +. Looking at the map she posted, I'm assuming she's in Glendale or close to it. A quick Zillow search is giving me results between $895 and $1,700. So I find that plausible.

I don't really understand the not being able to carry one's children thing, but most of the rules don't make sense to me.

[August]

{L_MESSAGE_HIDDEN}:

Her rent really doesn't seem that high to me. I'm in the University area, and most 2 bedroom places I've seen are $1,100 +. Looking at the map she posted, I'm assuming she's in Glendale or close to it. A quick Zillow search is giving me results between $895 and $1,700. So I find that plausible.

I don't really understand the not being able to carry one's children thing, but most of the rules don't make sense to me.

It makes sense when you remember it's the results of generation upon generation of OCD people being encouraged in their disorder rather than discouraged.

[stonefruit]

I was particularly fond of (read: no not at all) the post where she confessed, in a throwaway line, to having *thrown her shoes at a TSA agent*.

Dude. DUDE. Not smart, not a good look.

[Mama Mia]

I don't think it's unusual for mortgage payments in relatively low cost areas to be significantly lower than rents. That's kind of the goal. People buy rental properties in order to derive some income from them. So ideally mortgage, taxes, upkeep, property management, insurance, etc. and a profit are all going to be included in the rental price.

[shedemei]

{L_MESSAGE_HIDDEN}:

And then she wants to hire help? Maybe this is just my atheism talking, but the idea of claiming destitution while looking for staff is simply astonishing. It just strikes me as incredibly arrogant. But basically I don't understand why Chaviva, a convert[ crisis. Surely caring for one's children is the most important goal?

{L_MESSAGE_HIDDEN}:

I'm not sure why this is hidden, because Chaviva has an account here.

/b], couldn't maintain a lesser level of observance during a family

Anyway, Orthodox Judaism is a legalistic religion in which scholars have spent thousands of years building "fences" (gederim) around laws so that it's harder to get into a situation where you might break a law. Then they built fences around fences, and it's fences all the way down. My personal opinion is that all of these scholars were bored and desperate to make some kind of new contribution in the area of laws based on a book thousands of years old, and making things more restrictive was the only way to do it.

From the very stringent Chabad sect: chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/77897/jewish/Baby-and-Toddler-Care-on-Shabbat.htm (scroll down to "Walks")

This site has a more technical discussion:

hirhurim.blogspot.com/2004/03/bialystoker-controversy.html

My summarized understanding of the article on hirhurim, with my commentary in italics.

The rabbi's commentary under discussion states:

* Carrying a child who cannot walk is forbidden, because they are legally considered a stationary object as relates to this specific law.

* Carrying a child who can walk is rabbinically forbidden but not a biblical restriction, so there's room to be lenient. (I believe it's discouraged, though, and if you do it people will probably judge you.)

* A child is legally considered to be a "non-critical sick person" until the age of nine. As such, if they have a meltdown you can carry them.

* However, it's not good to follow these leniencies or technical points (because legalism). So you shouldn't do it on purpose (l'chatchila) but if someone is seen carrying their child they shouldn't be criticized, because it's less of a problem to do it accidentally or without intending to do it but it happened anyway (b'dieved).

So, Chaviva could probably do it but people would probably judge the hell out of her, especially as she was criticized and considered "off the derech" when she publicly had an understandably emotionally rough time and religious crisis after her divorce several years ago.

For some reason quotes are put around URLs when they're inside the hidden box, even though I'm not typing them that way.

[Mama Mia]

WOW :shock: I had no idea there were 4 million minuscule regulations on caring for a baby . That article was mind blowing. What do you do with a screaming baby if you can't carry it?

[Idolatry]

WOW :shock: I had no idea there were 4 million minuscule regulations on caring for a baby . That article was mind blowing. What do you do with a screaming baby if you can't carry it?

I know I would just break immigration rules instead. They're just suggestions.

[shedemei]

WOW :shock: I had no idea there were 4 million minuscule regulations on caring for a baby . That article was mind blowing. What do you do with a screaming baby if you can't carry it?

I get the impression that many mothers simply do not go outside the home during shabbat to avoid these problems until their kids are old enough.

[shedemei]

I know I would just break immigration rules instead. They're just suggestions.

Huh? The article discusses the religious rules, not immigration. Even if both parents are home all the rules apply (and I doubt they're more manageable).

[happy atheist]

Huh? The article discusses the religious rules, not immigration. Even if both parents are home all the rules apply (and I doubt they're more manageable).

But the whole thread is about them fucking up with immigration law. So apparently that's cool in their worldview, but carrying a baby isn't.

[anjulibai]

Wait...you can't carry a baby on Shabbos? Huh? Like outside, or at all?

[shedemei]

But the whole thread is about them fucking up with immigration law. So apparently that's cool in their worldview, but carrying a baby isn't.

I was specifically confused because it sounded to me like Idolatry (great name!) was commenting on that Chabad rulebook, which wasn't about immigration at all.

I wouldn't paint all Orthodox Jews with Chaviva's brush. She strikes me as living in a fantasy land all of her own in which difficulties in her life are always because of someone else.

Not that there aren't segments of OJ that thumb their noses at things like welfare fraud and probably would immigration law if they encountered it.

[FaustianSlip]

When the choice is between one brand of fairytale and another brand, and one brand allows you to feed your child, only a mentally ill person chooses to not feed the child.

Also, you don't have to live inside the string.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/lifestyle/20 ... story.html

First of all, I'm not Orthodox, so don't get nasty with me for something I don't even follow- I was explaining that from a purely economic standpoint, having a home inside the eruv, as a rule, costs more (as discussed in the article just posted). Secondly, taking that tone is both unnecessary and pretty much guaranteed not to convince anyone religious that they should listen to anything you have to say about their beliefs or practices. It fulfills pretty much every negative stereotype about arrogant, know-all atheists. I don't expect you to care much about that, but if your goal is to convince Chaviva or anyone else who might be reading this that they should just chuck it all and stop being religious, the above approach is just going to drive them away. I have also seen little indication that either Chaviva or her child are going without food.

And no, you don't have to live inside the eruv, but I for one would question the wisdom of forcing a one-year-old, as in the article you posted, to walk as much as a mile every week to get to synagogue. But then, the rules that exempt women from attending synagogue on Shabbat exist for this very reason- the presumption is that they have young children and need to stay at home to care for them. I can understand feeling isolated in a situation where you can never to go shul because you can't carry your kid or push a stroller to get there, but even if she doesn't know any non-Jews who might help her out (which I would argue is of dubious halachic validity and presents a number of other, unpleasant implications), surely she must know other Jews in her neighborhood? Other Jews with young children, even? How hard would it be to work out some kind of arrangement with a friend or neighbor to swap weeks watching the kids, for instance, which will allow the parents to go to synagogue?

And this brings me to my major issue with Chaviva: in the time I've read her blog off and on, she's made a wide and diverse range of terrible choices that, quite frankly, have nothing to do with her religious practices. She frames them in those terms in an attempt to justify them, but what it really seems to boil down to is that she's all over the damn place and gets these ideas of what she "has" to have or do into her head that have little basis in reality, let alone in Jewish law. But when things go south, as they always seem to, it's everyone else's fault- the meanies at USCIS, who won't let her family flout immigration law, us horrible people at FJ, who are reading and discussing the drama she herself puts all over the internet, the terrible people who objected to her dating a non-Jew, and on and on.

My mother used to say that if you have problems getting along with every other person you meet, and you're the only constant in those situations, then maybe you need to look at yourself and see if you're the problem.

[FaustianSlip]

Wait...you can't carry a baby on Shabbos? Huh? Like outside, or at all?

You can't carry a baby off of your own property, unless you live inside an eruv, because you can't carry anything outside of an eruv- house keys, your prayer shawl, an umbrella, anything. I'm not an expert, because I'm not shomer Shabbos, but I expect that there is an exception for carrying necessary medications, but other than that, nothing.

[anjulibai]

You can't carry a baby off of your own property, unless you live inside an eruv, because you can't carry anything outside of an eruv- house keys, your prayer shawl, an umbrella, anything. I'm not an expert, because I'm not shomer Shabbos, but I expect that there is an exception for carrying necessary medications, but other than that, nothing.

Okay, that makes more sense. I think if I were Orthodox with a small child or baby, i just wouldn't leave the house on Shabbos.

[August]

Okay, that makes more sense. I think if I were Orthodox with a small child or baby, i just wouldn't leave the house on Shabbos.

Or just not be Orthodox.

[LucySnowe]

Or just not be Orthodox.

Yes, we get it.

anjulibai - basically, as FaustianSlip has already referred to, women are exempt from most obligations which have to be done at a specific time. Here's some background/detail:

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jso ... ments.html

It's one of the issues a lot of Jewish women (I'm one of them) have with this level of observance, because it's biologically-based gender roles with a lot of rhetoric about how women and men are separate but equal. The fact that, as the article notes, Orthodox Judaism refuses to let women do some of the positive mitzvot (such as wearing a tallis) even when they want to, and that men thank God for not making them women whereas women thank God for making them as they are, among other things, means that it's impossible for me to accept that line of argument. (Many women do accept it, of course. It's difficult for me to understand, but it's their choice, not mine.)

[FaustianSlip]

Okay, that makes more sense. I think if I were Orthodox with a small child or baby, i just wouldn't leave the house on Shabbos.

That's how a lot of people handle it, or at least women, because they're exempt from any requirement to attend synagogue, anyway. That said, spending every Shabbos alone in your house, unable to leave, turn on the TV, et cetera because you can't carry your kid anywhere can be extremely isolating, even if you know that intellectually, you're not required to go to synagogue or socialize or whatever. I do understand the desire to go to shul, even if it's not an obligation to do so.

But again, this is where any understanding I have of Chaviva's (self-inflicted) situation breaks down, because I keep finding myself asking, "Where is her community?" One of the things you constantly hear about the Orthodox community is how closely-knit it tends to be, and how people will frequently go out of their way to help one another out. Now, it's possible that Denver just has an Orthodox community that's not especially warm or helpful, but I find that a bit hard to believe.

I don't really see what's stopping Chaviva from, say, asking around to see if someone within the eruv might be willing to extend Shabbos hospitality and put her and the kid up overnight once in a while, just to give them a chance to go to shul. It's a huge mitzvah to do something like that, and even in my Conservative community back in the States, if someone is struggling, people will really make an effort to help them out, either by inviting them over for meals, bringing by food, whatever the case might be. It seems really strange to me that people in her community, who presumably know at least the basics of her whole situation (given that she's posting it all over the internet) aren't making any kind of offers to help her out. Unless she alienated everyone when she said unflattering things about them after the whole thing where her marriage broke up and she was dating a non-Jew.

[anjulibai]

Thabks for the info about Orthodox biefs. I know some things but not in delth.

And it does seem like this is something the community woukd help out with. I have always heard Orthodox Jews are very supportive of each other, so why can't Chaviva find help within the community?

[Mama Mia]

That's how a lot of people handle it, or at least women, because they're exempt from any requirement to attend synagogue, anyway. That said, spending every Shabbos alone in your house, unable to leave, turn on the TV, et cetera because you can't carry your kid anywhere can be extremely isolating, even if you know that intellectually, you're not required to go to synagogue or socialize or whatever. I do understand the desire to go to shul, even if it's not an obligation to do so.

But again, this is where any understanding I have of Chaviva's (self-inflicted) situation breaks down, because I keep finding myself asking, "Where is her community?" One of the things you constantly hear about the Orthodox community is how closely-knit it tends to be, and how people will frequently go out of their way to help one another out. Now, it's possible that Denver just has an Orthodox community that's not especially warm or helpful, but I find that a bit hard to believe.

I don't really see what's stopping Chaviva from, say, asking around to see if someone within the eruv might be willing to extend Shabbos hospitality and put her and the kid up overnight once in a while, just to give them a chance to go to shul. It's a huge mitzvah to do something like that, and even in my Conservative community back in the States, if someone is struggling, people will really make an effort to help them out, either by inviting them over for meals, bringing by food, whatever the case might be. It seems really strange to me that people in her community, who presumably know at least the basics of her whole situation (given that she's posting it all over the internet) aren't making any kind of offers to help her out. Unless she alienated everyone when she said unflattering things about them after the whole thing where her marriage broke up and she was dating a non-Jew.

Yeah, I was thinking maybe Denver just doesn't have a large Orthodox community, but a quick google shows there really does seem to be a pretty extensive community there. Becoming more involved with them seems like it really might help with some of her problems. If she could temporarily house share with another mother of young children in similar circumstances it seems like it could make a big difference financially, practically and emotionally. Or maybe there is an oelderly couple who could use part-time help with cooking and cleaning in exchange for a room?

[FaustianSlip]

Thabks for the info about Orthodox biefs. I know some things but not in delth.

And it does seem like this is something the community woukd help out with. I have always heard Orthodox Jews are very supportive of each other, so why can't Chaviva find help within the community?

My suspicion is that previously, she's had some run-ins with the Denver Jewish community, and that may be causing some people to keep their distance. I could be remembering wrongly, but I think the last time Chaviva was living in Denver was immediately following her divorce, and she gradually slipped away from Orthodoxy and wound up dating a non-Jew. When word got out, and some community members called her on it (not just because religious Jews aren't supposed to get romantic with non-Jews, but because that was conduct that could cast doubt on both her conversion and other conversions that her rabbi and beit din performed), she was pretty nasty about it and said some... undiplomatic things about the community there. All of this was on her public blog and other social media, of course, which is the only reason I know about any of it. I was a little surprised that she went back to Denver, honestly, because my impression had been that there was some bad blood there between her and other people in the community. But that could explain why no one is rushing to try and give her a hand now.