On the Road to Atlanta

Tuesday, February 28, 2006 1:40pm
I have not been able to blog lately as I have been preparing for a series of fundraising trips. At the moment I am on my way to Atlanta to speak to a group of Reform Rabbis and for a parlor meeting at the home of Amanda and Howard F., former Beth Shalom members and continuing friends of the shul. I am somewhere between Mobile and Montgomery, Monroeville I think, at a buffet at which I can eat almost nothing. Kashrut does complicate travel.

Much of last week and the weekend was devoted to finishing a DVD presentation I am calling “Katrina to Rita.” It features photos and video taken by various Beth Shalom members. I must have been sick the day they taught documentary film making at HUC, but I did my best. If anyone would like a copy of version 1.1 of the DVD (1.0 was my drash last Friday night and it was revised based on the comments I received) to show to potential donors to the Beth Shalom Renewal Fund, please email me (rabbiz@earthlink.net)

I will try to blog as this trip to Atlanta unfolds. Many thanks in advance to our friends Amanda and Howard F. and Adrienne B., another Beth Shalom expatriate in Atlanta.

My route thus far took me through the hurricane devastated areas of the Mississippi Gulf Coast. The real horrors are away from the interstate toward the Gulf, but the signs of Katrina’s passage are everywhere---blue roofs, fallen trees, the steel pylons of the giant casino billboards snapped in half, trailers. It was a relief to head north away from the Gulf to places beyond Katrina’s reach.