Dear Lab/Shul,
My father, Alan Bleyer, died two days before Passover in March 2021, and my mother, Eileen Bleyer, died just 20 months later in November 2022. Even before their deaths, I understood at some level that we Jews are blessed with a ritual container for grief that reflects its actual intensity and duration, as I wrote about in a recent essay for Tablet Magazine. It is something special in the Jewish tradition to acknowledge grief after the funeral is done: offering a framework in which mourners are communally recognized for nearly a year and offered a series of rituals to help find meaning and comfort at a time of personal devastation. What a gift.
I’m so grateful for Lab/Shul’s Kaddish Club, where I said Kaddish for my parents for two years among my fellow mourners who held each other through our mutual bereavement. It was like a light in the dark forest, giving some indication of where to put my next step when I couldn’t see anything in front of me. And I’m equally grateful for ReCollect, Lab/Shul’s reimagining of the seasonal Yizkor prayer, which offers us an opportunity to deeply remember and really commune with the memory of our loved ones—something I’m especially grateful for now that my spans of daily Kaddish are over. It’s fitting that we gather to do so during Passover, a holiday where we may acutely feel the absence of those we have lost—the spirit they once brought to the seder, the foods they prepared, the teachings they offered, the songs they sang. I hope you will join me, along with co-founder and ritual leader Naomi Less, and my fellow Kaddish Club Circle Holders, on April 29, both in person and online, for Lab/Shul’s ReCollect, where we will remember our loved ones, share stories, and lift their memories.
Shabbat Shalom with love,
Jennifer Bleyer
Lab/Shul Partner & Kaddish Club Circle Holder
