For more than a decade, we hosted 20-plus people to our first night seder every year and, even though people brought stuff to share, it was exhausting. I usually was useless the next day.
And then there was the year when I was so distracted, I put the brisket in the oven because there wasn't any more room left in the refrigerator, figuring I would turn on the oven to warm it about an hour before guests arrived. Then, my mind on a completely different track, I turned on the self-cleaning function of the oven. About 90 minutes later, I realized my mistake. The oven was locked, of course (because the self cleaning function goes to 800 degrees.
Just at that moment, the guests started arriving. Most of Type A personalities, each had an idea about what to do. Eventually we unplugged the oven, but the kitchen smelled like a tannery for days. Once I got the oven open (the next day), the brisket had the texture of shoe leather. Totally mortifying, but certainly one of my -- and my friends' -- most memorable seders.
Another food story. In the first years we were married, my mother-in-law brought the matzah ball soup 150 miles from her home in D.C. When she died, it became my job to make the matzah balls -- talk about a rite of passage. Well, I read the directions on the matzah meal box, looked at cookbooks (forget that stuff about using seltzer -- it doesn't make a difference), and for several years, served up matzah balls that were, shall we say, dense.
One year, they were so heavy, I threw out a whole batch and was planning to start from scratch all over again when I got a call from my rabbi who wanted to discuss some synagogue business and asked how my Passover prep was going.
"OK, except I can't seem to get the matzah balls right," said I.
"What, you don't use the mix?" said he.
Use the mix. Perfect every time.
When we moved out of our big house 10 years ago, different friends started hosting and these days, I'm responsible for bringing the matzah ball soup and the haggadah. What a joy to not have to set up or do the final clean up. I know that some people teach that frantic cleaning and cooking can be an integral part of the Pesach experience, but it's the rare person who doesn't feel it as more pressure than profound.
In my haggadah, we set aside not only a cup of wine for Elijah but also a cup of water for Miriam. Many years ago, I found this reading to go with it, but I'm not sure where I got it:
(Raise the goblet and say: )
This water we bless and drink in honor of all the women who stayed in the kitchen cooking and serving and never got to sit down and join in the seder.
This water we bless for all the women who invented the various traditions of food we cherish and enjoy today, passed on from kitchen to kitchen, from woman to woman.
This water we bless for all the women who were kept from the learning they craved, who could not learn and teach, who could not sing in shul, who could not preach what they burned to say.
This water we bless for all the women who are working now to renew Judaism and pass on a tradition made richer by their voices.
Candle-lighting
For many years, we set our seder table with seven candles of different colors, like a rainbow, and said a prayer adapted by this one from Arthur Waskow's Freedom Seder, which he has adapted to his new New Freedom Seder for the Earth
We are the generations/That stand between the fires.
Behind us is the flame and smoke/That rose from Auschwitz and from Hiroshima,
From the burning of our Towers/In jet fuel lit by rage,
From the torching of our forests for the sake of fast hamburger;
Before us is the nightmare of a Flood of Fire:
The scorching of our planet/From a flood of greenhouse gases,
Or the blazing of our cities/In thermonuclear fire/
Or the glare of gunfire/Exploding in our children.
It is our task to make from fire/Not an all-consuming blaze
But the light in which we see each other;
Each of us different,/All of us made in the image of God.
We light this fire to see more clearly
That the earth, the human race,/are not for burning.
We light this fire to see more clearly/The rainbow in our many-colored faces.
This year, I'm going to use an idea that I found in the Peeling a Pomegranate Haggadahby Ketzirah Carly Lesser ($5 for download).
She recommends providing a small light -- like a tea light -- for everyone at the seder to light his or her own and pray:
The lighting of candles is a sacred act in Jewish tradition. It is a simple act which denotes the creation of sacred space, the human soul, and light of the Divine all at once.
Nivarekh et Lev haOlam asher kidshanu bmitzvotav, vtzivanu l’hadlik ner shel yom tov Blessed is the Heart of the Universe who connects us through the act of lighting the festival candles.
May we open our hearts to the Heart of the Universe, and feeling the light of the Divine within all, know that we are one.
Creating sacred space is really what it's about.