Highmoon's Ponderings

To be honest, I normally do not like cleaning for Passover. It’s not that I mind the cleaning, it’s that for Passover it becomes very fastidious, since you have to make sure there is no chametz in the house, to the best of your ability. It’s that last part that we sometimes took too far, and ended up over-cleaning; it’s very nice to have a very clean house at the end, but during the already stressful time before Pesach, it’s just killer.

This year I’ve consciously striven to do better, to do the cleaning in a good mood. It’s been a bit of a struggle at times, I admit, but that fact that I’ve had my mind occupied with other, much more worrisome thoughts (like Mom being in the hospital) has made the cleaning and preparation almost therapeutic.

Today I had to brave the supermarket and the kosher market to get the last of our provisions for the holiday. This is an excercise in patience, let me tell you, and I am blessed that G-d granted me a good amount of it, but there are times when… Still, I went to the market, and I endured the craziness, but by the time I returned to my car with the groceries I was already close to going full-on grumpy. That’s when it dawned on me, like the proverbial ton of bricks.

In Exodus 12:6 (scroll down), it says, “And you shall keep it for inspection until the fourteenth day of this month, and the entire congregation of the community of Israel shall slaughter it in the afternoon.” This is in relation to the paschal lamb G-d commanded the Israelites to prepare for a sacrifice. But the Israelites had been ordered to take the lamb for themselves on the 10th, so why keep it around for 4 days? Rashi explains that G-d gave them these four days so that the Israelites would occupy themselves with the mitzvah (commandment) of examining the lamb for ritual perfection. In the merit of them occupying themselves this way, G-d could bring the redemption.

We don’t have the paschal sacrifice today, but I suddenly realized that this process of cleaning and buying and preparing for Pesach, with all the headaches and frustrations and so on, these are our equivalent of those 4 days, these our mitzvot through which we merit our redemption. Even if we aren’t up to par on our good deeds (and we all lack one way or another), this process gives us what we need to enter Passover with our heads held high and ready to be redeemed from Egypt.

It doesn’t make the cleaning go any faster, but it does give it meaning beyond having a clean house.

My wife and I are currently taking a Guitar Hero break from the last of the cleaning for Passover, which starts this Wednesday night. I have to admit, I’m proud of myself, as this year I have taken things well and in stride, as opposed to how I normally get for Passover cleaning (grumpy as hell).

Wednesday morning we’ll also have the opportunity to recite the blessing on the Sun (birkat hachamah), a blessing only recited once every 28 years, which is very exciting.

I hope to be able to write something that morning, but we’ll see. Now, back to cleaning.

I applied to, and was accepted into, the RPG Bloggers Network, a group of RPG bloggers who have banded together to help promote each others’ blogs, as well as exchange ideas and tips on being a better gamer and blogger. One of my other sites, The Gamer Traveler, is already part of the network, but I wanted to join with my personal blog because this is where I give free reign to general gaming thoughts (The Gamer Traveler is, as the name suggests, very focused). By joining the network, these posts (only those tagged RPG) will now be exposed to a bigger readership, and that hopefully will help to stimulate more conversations in response to whatever I post as well as promote the games I talk about (not necessarily always D&D) to a wider audience.

Frankly, I am also hoping that other non-D&D bloggers, especially those in the indie scene, will follow suit and consider joining as well. The network can only benefit from a wider influx of ideas about gaming, and there are some very stimulating posts going on in the indie blogging scene that would be of worth to many more gamers than are currently seeing them.

Drop by the RPG Bloggers Network and check out all the great blogs out there.