objects

I'm an over-eater. I'm not fat, but I eat like I have an extra twenty feet of intestine. I realize that a lot of what I eat isn't for hunger, but anxiety. Food is soothing, whether in a stressful social situation, with family, or both. Sometimes we eat because we're hungry and sometimes we eat because we're just scared.

You can get wrapped up in food and consumption, like insulation from the cold - as though some amount of possessions will ward off trouble. Some people can't wait for the newest flat screen, while others shop constantly for small trinkets. I daydream about old video games. And we get bored with almost all of it. Isn't there something more important?

When asked to recall an item that she considered sacred, a good friend named her breath. In the past year, she moved, went to another friend's funeral and then was robbed twice. After that, she says, it didn't pay to put much faith in physical objects. But her breath, she said, would always be there. Friends and cherished possessions come and go, but her breath would be hers until the day she died.

I'm not telling you to sell everything you own and go off to Alaska, although I've always wanted to cycle through Denali. Judaism is opposed to monkish behavior. It is important to have food, shelter, friends and family. And that means living a life with a certain amount of material goods, even enough to give some to charity. All of this requires what George Carlin calls "stuff". Even so, be realistic about what you need.

In the end, you can't take it with you. A Jewish burial shroud has no pockets. Besides our flesh and bones, all we really have is our breath. Even these things, sacred as they are, will one day end. And no amount of plastic toys will stop that. So try not to get caught up in the buying and eating and collecting of stuff - don't waste the time, and breath, that you have.