Saturday, November 08, 2008

Woody Allen Shabbat


I can only describe this past Shabbat as feeling like we had walked into a Woody Allen movie. Our Rabbi is in Israel for the month and so we decided to do a little shul hopping. For our first Shabbat away from our own shul, we chose to go to the shul of the other Rabbi who performed our wedding service.

We had just walked through the door and I turn as I can hear someone coming in behind me. Who is it? Why it's my therapist of course. It was surprise to see her there and it felt a little odd, but we took it in stride - we did the formal introductions of our respective spouses and then I didn't speak to her the rest of the evening.

Then we head towards the sanctuary and a woman enters and PHD whispers to me, "That's M". M was PHD's girlfriend many years ago. They dated for over 7 years but obviously things didn't work out. She came over to us and said congratulations on the wedding and we exchanged pleasantries and she went on her way - or so I thought. She actually spent the entire service giving me a dirty look. Talk about feeling uncomfortable.

All I could think to myself was, "What next?" I shouldn't have thought that. Next was my physician. The one I have been avoiding because I have physician-phobia.

So let's re-cap...
1) My therapist
2) PHD's ex-girlfriend
3) My physician
4) The Rabbi who performed our marriage and did our pre-marital counseling

How much more Woody Allen could it have been? I guess that will teach us to leave the comfort of our own shul!

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Nice and humorous way of presenting something which must have been a bit hard on you.

mother in israel said...

LOL. Sounds like you weathered it well.

Leora said...

Maybe you can at least feel good about your therapist having been there. You can dedicate at least two sessions to discussing all the discomforts! My.

What's up with the physician phobia? Sounds like it could be an interesting post...if you are ready.

The girlfriend one alone would bother me for a week, at least.

Kol Ra'ash Gadol said...

I hope the physician was at least not your ob/gyn.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, I had to sit behind my GYN at a play called "I love you, you're perfect, now change" which had heavy discussions of sex...I was extremely uncomfortable. But hey, now you know right? I take it this one has been placed on the "uh...NO" list :)

... Is the Window to Our Soul said...

So I am going to assume that WON'T be the shul you decide to join.

orieyenta said...

Ilana - It was hard but it seemed perfect to look back and laugh about it.

MII - I just kept smiling the whole time. I must have looked a bit odd.

Leora - Saw her yesterday and we giggled about it. Physician phobia - it just always seems like they find something bad when I go so I guess I'd rather not go! Probably not one of my smarter choices in life.

KRG - Ha Ha. No it wasn't that doctor. If it was, I definitely would have been looking around the corners for Woody Allen!

SS - Sounds like your comfort level was close to mine!

ITWTOS - You are right - we could never leave our shul and join this one!

torontopearl said...

I used to reference Woody Allen films whenever offbeat things happened to me; Woody Allen was replaced with "This is like a Seinfeld script."

Anonymous said...

I guess it could have been more Woody Allen if: you and PHD talked and argued the whole time about the X, leading the Rabbi who performed your wedding to give you dirty looks while the whole congregation shh'd you, causing your therapist to say you really need to schedule another appointment and your doc to say he'll prescribe some xanax anytime.