A lesson in nuances of tolerance, recognition

I don't like to be pain in the neck. It's not a good thing.

But, as a Jewish public school parent looking back on the High Holidays, I have a few thoughts.

First, and I rarely say this: My heart goes out to the people who run the Hillsborough County School District. They are in a no-win situation when it comes to religious observance.

I'll even forgive the occasional use of the term "Judeo-Christian," which the rabbis taught me is a complete oxymoron because Judaism is so different from Christianity, especially when it comes to proselytizing.

The real question to ask is: How do they respect my right as a religious minority without compromising the already daunting process of education?

For the first time in my life, I sent my son — fresh from bar mitzvah — to school on Yom Kippur.

I did it because he had been sick for three or four days since the school year began. We had him tested for swine flu (negative). He ran high fevers. He had a hacking cough. And he was struggling to make up the missed class work. I couldn't justify keeping him out another day.

So how was his day? Pretty good, except for second period, when his math class was pre-empted by a presentation about a magazine sale fundraiser.

My son was annoyed. He doesn't want to sell magazines, and why should he have to? He was also insulted by the promise of prizes, and the guilt trip about the school needing the money.

Of course, not all kids felt the same way. Our carpool buddy acknowledged that he appreciated the chance to skip class.

All in all, not a big deal. And if there were any Jewish kids in that second-period class who were absent, they didn't miss a thing.

My daughter, meanwhile, took the day off and went to synagogue with me. She's not super-spiritual, but neither am I, so I didn't question her motives. We called her school to inform that she would not be there, and we explained why.

When we returned home, there was a message on our answering machine, saying she had "an unexcused absence."

I called the school and punched zero furiously to talk to a live person. The student operators kept trying to switch me to voice mail. I was in no mood. On the holiest day of my people's year, I sat there punching zero.

After 15 minutes, a live person told me what had happened. So many kids had taken the day off for Yom Kippur that the attendance secretary had not been able to stop all those outgoing calls, and that's why we got the phone message as we arrived home from services.

The woman, I have to say, was extremely apologetic and promised to clear my daughter's record.

Problem solved.

My grandmother, may she rest in peace, had a simple policy for her family. Stay home on the major holidays, even if they don't matter to you, she said. If you go to work or school, you make it that much harder for Jews who want to observe.

I often wonder if the times in which she lived were easier or harder. I know she struggled, caring for a dying husband and then raising two children on her own on a bank clerk's salary.

By all appearances, my people have advanced socially and muscled our way politically to a place where discrimination should never be a concern.

Many of us spent this week looking back and wondering if we had made the right decisions. We will do the same as the Christmas season approaches. We will wonder at what point being Jewish becomes a simple matter of not being Christian. We will imagine being Muslim or Jehovah's Witness or of any faith whose essence is usurped by a constant, nagging otherness.

My childhood High Holiday memories are of leaves changing colors, family gathering together and, I'll be honest, not having to get up early for school.

Swap the pretty colors for magazine sales and robo-calls.

Still, it could be a lot worse.

Marlene Sokol can be reached at (813) 909-4602 or sokol@stpimes.com.