File: Life

Karen asked how the seder went last Thursday. Today's the last day of Passover, so here's my seder wrap-up.

We were lucky because some wonderfully cool people showed up. The table looked beautiful, especially because we used hand-painted plates (painted by yours truly and Matt), which was a nice touch.

As I was the only Jew, when putting together the Haggadah, I really mixed up. I wanted it to be accessible, fun, and meaningful. So, I started out with the Muppets. I found this great song online set to the Muppet show. "It's time to start the Seder..." It was so popular that it got requested at the end, too.

It was long, with people leaving around 12:15, but it awesome. Much singing, multiple plagues. I did a progressive approach. After we named the ancient plagues (which include blood and frogs), we named current plagues (AIDS, poverty). Then, we opened it up to plagues we're worried about (corporate greed was among them). It was nice. New additions to the seder plate: an orange and an olive. I thought that the orange signified the inclusion of women as Rabbis, but I read that it actually means the inclusion of all of those on the outside of Judaism, especially gays, lesbians, and transexuals. I think it also stands for those of us who chose intermarriage. The olive stands for peace in the middle east.

We told the Passover story, but we did it in our own way. There was a lot of joy at that table. And it was great. It wasn't mom's Seder, but it was the seder I've always wanted. I think we're going to make it a tradition to throw the second night seder every year.