Temple Drama

You know how some people say that the way you behave on Rosh Hashana is a reflection on how you will behave the rest of the year? Well...I may be spending this year really angry at mean old ladies.

Here's the backstory:

I paid to reserve a seat for Rosh Hashana for 2 reasons. Reason #1- so I can leave a sweater on my chair without it getting stolen. Reason #2- so I can come late and still have a place to sit.

So when I show up on the first day of Rosh Hashana, in the middle of services, I am quite surprised to find an older woman sitting in my seat. I didn't want to be disrespectful, so I played dumb counting the chair numbers outloud so the woman would clearly hear that I am seat #129. It didn't work. She looked away and continued praying without bothering to apologize or offer to move. So I uncomfortably mumble, "okay...I guess I'll find another seat..."

Though multiple people (including the Rabbi) gave me speeches about being a pushover and offered to put the woman in her place themselves, I wasn't about to embarrass an old woman in front of everyone on Rosh Hashana (even though she kept yelling at the kids and rolling her eyes in frustration at anyone who was irritating her.) I was going to be the bigger person.

I decided that instead of approaching her, I would simply wait until the services were over and then I'd leave my machzor on the chair for the next day. So you could imagine my surprise when I came at the end of services only to find that she had left a duffle bag on my chair. A duffle bag. Like she was moving in. Camping out. In. My. Seat. 

When I showed up the next day and she was in my seat again, I was surprised and frustrated all over. And when you aren't sitting in your reserved seat, you're sitting in someone elses'. So I had another whole day of playing musical chairs.

While I may be a so-called pushover (I think this just means I'm nice to people who don't deserve it), my friends aren't exactly the type to let this fly. At the end of services, a friend of mine (though I tried to convince her not to) marched right up to the woman and told her off (in a nice way of course) while the woman played dumb about not knowing it was my seat and how she wanted to sit next to her friend and yada yada yada.

Maybe G-d knows how much I love playing musical chairs. Or maybe this was a test of my patience or of my ability of giving people the benefit of the doubt. I don't know. But my mom always taught me to respect my elders (even if they don't appear to deserve it).

So although I may be the biggest pushover who's deathly scared of confrontation, at least my mom is proud of me.