May 18, 2010 | 8:14 pm

self Discovery is But A Blintz Away

Posted by Chava Tombosky

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It is said that the Jewish calendar is like a cyclical rotating sphere. As we circulate through time every holiday we experience the same original energies permeating in the present as was there in the past of that momentous occasion where the holiday originated.  This year is no different. As we enter Shavuot, we can be sure the energies we have available to us are the same as they were 3300 years ago. 

This Shavuot, there is an even more significant energy that permeates in the air, for it is the 250th yartzheit of the revolutionist, philosopher, musician, poet, and righteous spiritual leader, Rabbi Israel Baal Shem Tov, otherwise known to the world as “The Baal Shem Tov”.  The Baal Shem Tov was a man who had decided the world was ready for the secrets of the Torah that had otherwise been kept for the elite learners of the Jewish community to be revealed in volume.  He is also known to the world as the very first Chassidic Master.

We have spent years trying to determine the secret to a happy life.  Even the constitution of the United States claims that every man has the right “to the pursuit of happiness”.  But with the failing economy, divorce rates up by fifty per cent, and the growing population taking anti depressants there is a very real question at hand which is, what can we do differently that will help us attain that pursuit of happiness we have all been promised?

The Baal Shem Tov was a wise man. He understood the secret to true self-discovery. He also understood that happiness is an inside job and that it takes a lifetime commitment of self -refinement and self- evaluation to receive everlasting happiness.  There is no quick fix, but if we find the time to evaluate what is working and what is not working in our lives than we can learn the art of how to have healthier relationships, happier lives, and meaningful existences. 

Shavuot marks the birth of the Torah, the blueprint of our lives that is meant to teach us the secrets to this quest.  However, I have met many who have been exposed to the Torah as a set of laws that can feel constricting and have claimed to hinder their own self- expression.  Self- expression is a vital tool into self- discovery.  The reason why I love studying Chassidic mysticism so much is because it gives wise and articulate wisdom into how to tap into our own individuality while not betraying our personal goals as a human being to pursue happiness without sacrificing relationships, our Higher Power, our work or our art.  It is the wisdom that gives us the light we need to maintain balance and serenity in an ever- confusing world. It is the secret to self -discovery.

On this night of Shavuot as we celebrate a time when humanity was graced with life’s blueprint, we can be sure the spirit of Chassidic revelation will grace our world as it did 250 years ago. May we merit to experience Judaism as it was intended, with the pursuit of self-discovery and happiness. May we have a very meaningful Shavuot, indeed.

As for me, I plan on spending Shavuot pursuing my happiness with a whopping slice of cheese cake followed by a good lesson on the principles of Chassidic philosophy that I am hoping will infuse me with so much inspiration, the cheesecake calories won’t even count. 

*For more information on Chassidic self-discovery go to my two favorite websites:
meaningfullife.com and yeshiva.net.

May 12, 2010 | 2:17 pm

Tweet’s Me

Posted by Chava Tombosky

This week I landed in T-mobile to get my phone fixed and a gentleman in his 60’s stood in line attempting to add text to his plan.  With fear and trepidation, he asked how much it would be to add the frightening new technology to his life.  He understood he needed to keep up with the all too quickly changing world if he was going to be hip. Or just plain involved.  A tinge of heartache throbbed in me as I felt his pain at the ignorance of this new way of communication.  I was also very amused. “Going text,” I said.  Poor guy rolled his eyes and responded, “I don’t really want to, I’m not sure how to, but I got no choice if I’m going to make it in my business.

Then it dawned on me, that the feeling of not understanding why things are the way they are or how things work could feel so distressing.  I am not afraid to admit that there are certain things I just don’t get at all.  I don’t get how e-coli can get into Romaine lettuce bags calling a massive recall. What are they doing- washing the lettuce on a raw chicken soaked chopping board and then vacuum packing the bacteria in air tight plastic?  (I’m also okay with the fact that I could be showing my cards of sheer ignorance at writing this claim- don’t judge me.)  What is a Playtex eighteen-hour bra? Does it shrivel up and expire at the eighteenth hour?  Maybe it is a proclamation that this bra is extraordinary because it has the ability to be worn for eighteen hours straight. 

A) Who would want to wear a bra for eighteen hours straight?
B) Is this article of clothing made out of Titanium?

Why doesn’t driver’s Ed include a full on lesson on how the INSIDES of my car work?  “Miss, you’ll need new rotors and your pads are out, we’ll have to change ‘em. Nine hundred and eighteen bucks.”  Rotors? Pads? Does Playtex also make these? For all I know the mechanic could tell me there’s an alternate universe living under the hood of my car and I’d believe it.  Maybe if Playtex made these expensive parts, they would last longer.

Lastly, I don’t get twitter.  I don’t get the need to tweet. I don’t get why people want to know what I’m up to all day. I get why they want to know what I’m up to once a week, but all day- everyday?  Even I don’t want to know what I’m doing all day every day, let alone know what everyone else is doing all day everyday.  I am an official tweeter, but I have NO idea how to use it.  I only became a tweeter because like the guy in the T-mobile store, I had no choice if I was going to make it. 

I hear people following twitter are in the millions. We’ve become a voyeuristic society that depends on hearing about what other people are doing, consumed by other people’s lives so we don’t have to focus on our own.  So we don’t have to concentrate on our own failures. So we don’t have to look at our own realities that are sometimes disappointing, frustrating, upsetting- Dang-I gotta learn to Tweet. ‘Course that would mean me fitting this social dialogue into my day on top of BBM, IM, texting, phone calls, and live dialogue.  Which means, no time to learn auto mechanics or the origin of Escherichia coli.

Maybe I will take a Tweet course.  Maybe I’ll find a way to appreciate Playtex, and finally learn what’s under the hood of my car.  Maybe I’ll live my life in perfect ignorant bliss. Or maybe, I’ll text that guy from the T-mobile store and ask him.

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May 9, 2010 | 10:49 pm

Best Mother’s Day Meltdown- EVER

Posted by Chava Tombosky

Every Mother’s Day, for the past 13 years, I have woken up to a yummy omelette breakfast that is served to me in bed. My family brings cards to me, they shower me with love and I experience bliss.  This year I woke up quite late.  The house was quiet.  I heard no hustling or bustling in the kitchen. I started to think everyone had forgotten about me. Maybe the thirteen year streak was over. Maybe my kids were just too old for my Mother’s day breakfasts. For years my husband has been suspicious that I take these once a year phenomenons for granted. Maybe to some extent I have in the past.

Thoughts started racing in my head. Thoughts like, maybe it’s not so bad, I don’t need the calories….I’m okay with not eating breakfast.  Isn’t anybody coming?  Where is everyone?  Should I get up? But I can’t get up cause I could ruin the impending breakfast.  Then again, what if no one comes to my aid with eggs and toast?  Has everyone finally given up on this tradition?  Oh MY G-D, they have given up, of course they gave up.  Why would they want to continue?  At some point, I guess it had to stop.  This can’t go on every year till eternity.  I started to face the real fact that last year may have been the last year that I would ever experience the Tombosky Mother’s Day tradition.  After all, my eldest child is going into high school. Everything comes to an end eventually, right?

Cling, Clang, hammer- hammer?  Noise reminiscent of a family brawl can be heard from downstairs. 

Suddenly my daughter comes barreling into my room. 

“You’re up?” she asks.

“It’s nine thirty, so ya, I’m up.”

“Don’t get up. Stay in bed- for like at least another hour,” she replied.

Yes!  They didn’t forget after all!  After about an hour of some serious seven year old meltdowns coming from the kitchen because my youngest forgot his Mother’s Day gift in school, they arrived “punctually” with cold scrambled eggs, toast, cheese, and coffee.  It was without a doubt, the best cold eggs I have ever eaten in thirteen years of being a mommy. They even got me a card that sang “You’re unbelievable” and a beautiful frame with a picture of me and my kids highlighting my importance in a perfect Hallmark-like poem.  Thirteen years and still going strong…...this year, I most certainly did not take Mother’s day for granted.  And as was our tradition, my 13 year old finished my eggs, my middle daughter couldn’t stop kissing me, and my 7 year old son stormed out in tears over some hysterical meltdown. It was perfect.

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May 3, 2010 | 2:22 pm

“If I “wore” not a writer….”

Posted by Chava Tombosky

My relationship with writing is a tumultuous one filled with love, hate, conflict, and an urge to purge with words on a daily basis. I first knew I was a writer when I was five and I wrote this poem (with the help of my father):

There was a red rose that bloomed in the garden
Its leaves wore its clothes
But the frost made it harden
Then one day,
The rose fell away.
No one saw its beauty
No one saw its day.

Notice the word “wore” in the second line is a pun. 

When I was 12, I wrote an essay entitled “Why I like Shabbos”.  I wanted it to be “Why I like Shabbat”, but it was my father’s suggestion to keep it Jewish-y and authentic for more impact. The essay was written for a county contest entitled “The meaning of Prejudice”.  I won first place- in the county.  When I was a teenager I wrote short stories. For six years I kept my stories in a notebook and on the eve of my high school graduation, I gave the book filled with my stories from the time I was 12 to my dad, my gesture to him, for encouraging me to write my first poem. 

When I was in my twenties and raising my babies, I wrote children’s stories with a Seussical quality that never did get published. I sent them to several different publishers and got lovely responses but they were not looking to publish stories that rhymed at the time.  I guess back in the nineties, rhyming was out.

By the time I had reached my thirty’s I began writing screenplays, my blog, songs, webisodes, musicals and finally my memoir.  My husband thought it was silly to write a memoir at the age of 34. “Who writes a memoir in their thirty’s,” he said.  “Isn’t a memoir your life story? You haven’t lived it in full yet.” Funny how everyone in their thirty’s are writing memoirs from Sara Silverman, to Augusten Burroughs, to Shalom Auslander. It’s become an epidemic. I of course, have read ALL of them.  According to the dictionary, a memoir is an account of the personal experiences of an author. So with that definition, pretty much anyone writing a Facebook status or tweeting their experiences are writing their memoir on a daily basis. 

I believe that in your life you have to look at the experiences and people that have surrounded you to figure out your life’s mission.  I have frequently struggled to admit that I am a writer.  It’s a solitary life.  It’s not glamorous at all.  Getting paid to do it is really hard. And although I like coffee shops, until a few years ago when Coffee Bean got it in their head to get comfy chairs, I was pretty annoyed by them.  Plus what do you do when you have to pee and your laptop is not being watched by anyone?  Do you stop your work and go home, interrupting the perfect momentum, or do you go to the bathroom and ask a perfect stranger to watch your $1000 piece of equipment that has every thought you’ve ever had in it?  I guess I could work at home, but the quiet is painful. 

For most writers, writing chooses them. Ask any writer, and they’ll tell you, I never would have chosen this, it chose me!  So last week, I was thinking, maybe I’m not a writer after all. For the past six months I haven’t been writing as often as I should. I let things go, I haven’t been regimented. Planning my son’s Bar Mitzvah and helping my sister through home school got me so invested that my writing went to the way side. Okay those are just my excuses; maybe I was just burnt out.  Another thing writers like to do, make up LOTS of excuses. Facebook, excuse.  Email, excuse.  Phone call, great excuse.  Having to pee in Coffee Bean with no one to watch your laptop….the best excuse.

I got it in my head that I needed a job.  A job away from writing, something different that I could use my gift of gab, and my whimsical persuasion for. Suddenly sitting in an office seemed really appealing.  I was beginning to envy my friends who do this responsible sort of work.  I could get paid for my efforts. I could afford stuff. Who doesn’t want more stuff? Basically I just wanted to get dressed every day in heels.

So my friend suggested I take a job interview for an up and coming manufacturing company as a salesperson. I was really excited about the thought of convincing people to buy face products. It was an easy sell. All I had to do was schmooze a bunch of Dermatologists to buy a regimen of skin care that they could put their own private labels on. I’m picturing myself sauntering into a Doctor’s office and chilling with the receptionist. I’m picturing lunch dates. I’m picturing free moisturizer! Plus I get to go to the shows and try hundreds of samples.  This seemed like a great gig. 

I drive down to the warehouse, which is deep in the valley. No one was wearing heels there.  Let’s just say that the “Office” on TV was more dressed up than this one.  It wasn’t a tall building on Wilshire Blvd or Century City. It was a warehouse. In the Valley. Near other warehouses.  The sales manager who was interviewing me asked for a resume, which I did not bring. Mostly because, I don’t do résumé’s, and I don’t do work. Well not conventional work at least.  I’m a writer! (Was a writer)?  So I put my best sales person thing on. I can do sales. I’ve done sales.  I’ve sold tons of stuff. I’ve sold diamonds, costume jewelry, Amway, (don’t judge me), Hairpieces, I even once sold hats and Styrofoam heads for wig wearers.  I can do this job. Easy as pie. Then they ask me, “Can you use a computer? What about making websites?” Sure I can use a computer, I can’t make websites, but I can use Final Cut, oh and I-movie. Do you guys need a movie?  I can do that. Not exactly what they were looking for.  Final Draft? 

Despite the fact that I didn’t pass the regional sales manager’s test because I didn’t touch, smell or feel the product he subtly left on his desk, they offered me the job. I was ecstatic, despite my inability to have a track record of working in corporate America for Neutrogena, Bristol Meyers, or Dove for umpteen years. What was this awesome job? Turned out it was a telemarketing position. It required me to sit in a chair for 8 hours with a headset making calls to Dermatologists. There would be no lunch dates, no chilling with the receptionist, just me in my flats sitting in a cubicle while calling people with a script (that I didn’t even write!). 

I drove home and pondered this position. The money was decent. The people were so nice.  I so wanted to want to do this. I so wanted to be able to do this. I so wanted to picture myself doing this. But all I kept thinking was, maybe if I took this position it would give me great material for a really decent pilot. 

Then I remembered “The Office”.  Damn Greg Daniels, who already had the audacity to create that show.

And so, I’m sitting in Coffee Bean writing this article, with my journal opened, my memoir awaiting, and my script half written with yet another scene listening to some guy sitting next to me who is pitching his book idea to a publisher. 

I just hope I won’t have to pee. 

**I do want to thank my friend for the referral, and for the company taking the time to interview me.  I really wanted to want this. I really really wanted to want this. But writing chooses you.  Like a sick life sentence, it chooses you.

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April 27, 2010 | 12:31 pm

Choking On Victory

Posted by Chava Tombosky

“Choke up on the bat, throw the barrel, stick it in the mud, don’t heave your chest, use your arms, keep your eye on the ball.” 

This is the frequent rhetoric being thrown at my seven year old as he reaches the plate ready to hurl the ball with a bat.  Who is that competitive female sitting in the bleachers spouting these plays called his mother?  I don’t even recognize her. I’ve become a Spartan matriarch who has tossed her seven-year old to the wolves dressed like children in baseball uniforms.  Since the beginning of the season, the Marlins wearing the jade jerseys have lost repeatedly. We have been on the receiving end of disappointment, crying fits, and disenchanted expectations hoping for a game that would promise excitement, a sense of accomplishment, a feeling of achievement, a sense of victory for G-d’s sake!  And that was just from the parents.

We have been dishing out hundreds of dollars on extra coaching.  We have driven miles and miles in California bumper-to- bumper traffic for extra practice.  We have suffered through an unthinkable amount of excessive wasteful calories on snow cones, corn dogs, and French fries each Sunday and have put on weight, and anxiety hoping to witness one lousy victory. Just one win, that’s all the kids (I) ever wanted.  Do you know what its like to sit in the bleachers with gloating parents?

Well on Sunday, I became a gloating parent.  Marlin parents were screaming with excitement upon learning we were in the lead. We dropped our snow cones and kvelled with glee.  Noticing the parents of the opposite team clearly tormented, as we had been the weeks before didn’t stop us from reveling in our newfound victory. “Mendy, that’s my Mendy…!” One of the parents shouted as he came around the bend sliding into home.  Even my own kid made it to home several times.  No longer did (I) our boys hold their heads low contemplating on their failures and wallowing in their own self-pity. They were on top of the world. The coach even lit up like a little schoolboy telling the parents he would be celebrating with a large salad (vs. the small one he eats).  High fives were being tossed, a round of hugs rippled through the crowd.  Texts and phone calls scattered throughout the parent body.

It was the bottom of the 6th inning, when we clearly had won.  But its little league, which means the other team could still play through the last inning even though there would be no way to catch up since little league’s rules are you cannot score more than five points in an inning.  The score was 11 to 4. At that point one of the Marlin parents said….”We won, what’s the point?”  And our opponent’s coach responded with, “We never tell the kids what the score is, we like to see them play for the fun of it.” 

That day we had a 2nd game back to back with the same team we had smeared after our obnoxious arrogant victory. The same team who ironically had the same losing streak as us throughout the whole season.

We lost the 2nd game. 

Good thing we didn’t tell the kids what the score was since the Marlin parent motto is- “play for the fun of it.”

 

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April 19, 2010 | 2:03 am

Mump’d

Posted by Chava Tombosky

The table is set for Shabbat with the crystal and china.  Even got out the pressed cloth napkins for my special guests.  I made a killer meal.  It’s one hour before dinner and I’ve managed to carve out a little “me” time. I took a shower and fell asleep only to be woken by a raging 7 year old banging on my door causing my entire bedroom to shake like a San Francisco 7.2.  Now I’m angry. No one likes it when I’m angry. I hurl out of bed and am ready to attack this little creature that somehow claims to have come out of my body at birth.  When I open the door, there he is crying, with a very enflamed ear and huge glands that look like golf balls.  Now I’m in a panic. Plus I have guilt, but more importantly, panic.

Normally, I don’t get into a panic over such symptoms, but my nephew just got diagnosed with the infamous Mumps. So I’m thinking, my kid surely has the mumps.  Sure he got the vaccine, but you never know, I mean, the mumps are bad. And even vaccines don’t always kill them.  My nephew got the vaccine. He got the mumps.  (He was exposed to them from a kid who never got the vaccine from New York. My nephew is only three, so he hadn’t gotten the second booster yet.)

So I did the one thing I have never ever done.  I called my dear friend, whom I set the table with crystal and china and even the pressed cloth napkins and told her that I had to cancel our dinner plans because my kid has the mumps! I texted a few other friends with the news, as well as my one friend who’s kid is in Meir’s class who I know never got the vaccine.  Now I got her worrying all Shabbat thinking her kid is surely going to get the mumps too.

That night my husband went to Synagogue and he mentioned to his Shul buddy that we cancelled our guests cause our kid has the mumps. 

“Really?”  My husband’s shul buddy says.  “The mumps, eh?  What are you gonna say when you don’t want us over, your kid has the black plague?”

Well now this whole thing is out of control.  I rush to get my kid some advil, and I even manage to get our pediatrician, a nice M.O.T (member of the tribe, aka Jew) to show up at his office on Shabbat morning for us.

I walk my kid over there, and in sheer panic, and listless anxiety and apprehensive trepidation, I get the news….

My kid has an ear infection.

So now I gotta get home and walk through the door and tell my family that I was wrong that my kid doesn’t have the mumps, that all it is, is an ear infection and that I cancelled on my guests whom I had served up bbq ribs, tasty chicken soup and a thirty dollar lemon meringue pie from Delice bakery (only the most expensive French pastry bakery in all of LA) for no reason whatsoever.

These are the same guests who were in the middle of getting haircuts just for me, when I called to cancel!  I have to backtrack, and remember every email, text and phone call I made so I don’t get all of Conejo Valley in a tizzy over a 35 year old disease that hasn’t seen the light of day since nineteen sixty something and all because when you’re a mother and you’ve worked hard on setting the table with china and crystal and even pressed cloth napkins and you finally fall asleep but are awoken by a screaming child, even you just might mistaken a simple ear infection for the mumps.

 

 

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April 12, 2010 | 11:20 pm

Science Fair Hell- Redo

Posted by Chava Tombosky

Yesterday’s blog was all about my beef with science fairs today and while I was growing up and how much I hated them to the point that I decided to do the unconventional by proving in my 11th grade science fair project that science fairs were a waste of time and that all the parents did the projects for the children anyway thereby not accomplishing anything worthwhile.  The essay was inspired by my own children’s science fair project that is due in two weeks.  Our house is covered with glue sticks, poster boards and letter stencils. 

For the past three months that I have been blogging, I have been well received.  Most of my essays are met with praise and with applaud. Either that, or utter silence. But, I have yet to have experienced a person who has taken the time to criticize my work….. until today.

A friend and colleague who will rename nameless (Seth Menachem) who is a fellow writer, blogger, filmmaker, actor wrote this about yesterday’s essay:

“Nice one… but I thought you’d tell the story of how you fought the system and won… or lost.  The school just decided to bring back the science fair?  And, you don’t bring it back around with your son… how are you doing things differently now that you’re the parent?  I felt like there were a few things going on there and they got combined and never followed through.  You open with a story of your son’s science fair project, you tell of what an expense they are, you tell of how you were the queen of science fairs but don’t make mention of who you FELT as the queen.  You also talk about how parents are the ones who make all the kids projects - did they make yours?  And then when you think it will come around to your son it never does.”

At first I was annoyed.  (a particular six letter word came to mind unbefitting for a Rebbetzin to utter.)  Then I started rationalizing some of the commentary. 

Rationalizations like….  Look buddy, I just spent two weeks slaving in my kitchen for Passover.  I made 6 roasts, 12 kugels, 10 loaves of gefilte, 9 different homemade salads and dips, 1 chocolate cake that flopped, another that worked, two trays of strawberry ice cream that never did amount to much which I threw out wasting sixteen dollars and seventy cents on strawberries and eggs, a chocolate mousse, chicken soup, vegetable soup, a roasted lamb and a total of 16 chickens.  I went through 2 rolls of heavy-duty foil covering my entire kitchen and 6 rolls of contact paper. Do you know how hard it is to use contact paper? 

I served 24 meals and a total of 300 mouths over the course of 8 days.  I didn’t have time to write one article and I finally made time to sit and write something that is funny, relevant and entertaining with glue and glitter trapped under my fingernails- SO DON’T MESS WITH ME.

BUT

Then I started to re-read the essay. And I pondered Seth’s commentary.  I obsessed over it in fact because….He was right. 

I slacked off. I got overconfident and lazy.  I was so excited about finally getting my groove back enough to write something, anything, I never took the time to truly give it my all. And so, while I sit and eat crow, I have decided for the sake of good writing, to attempt this essay once again.  Here is the new un-lazy version.

And to Seth Menachem, I hate when you are right.  For those interested in viewing Seth’s blog go to:  http://www.lifeadvicefromoldpeople.com/

But be sure to rip him apart if he slacks off too.

Science Fair Hell Part 2:

The time has come where my children are scheduled for yet ANOTHER science fair.  Another hundred bucks at Michael’s spent. Another series of fighting with them to tackle their boards with colored paper, graphs, and photos.  It’s like a dank black dark cloud hovers over our home until April 28th when the project is due.

When will this end, WHEN??

When I was in eleventh grade I was in a private school that had science fairs each year. After 10 years of fairs, 20 backboards, and thousands of dollars in supplies I decided to buck the system with the very skill these fairs had instilled in me.

The hypothesis? 

“I believe I can prove through analysis, graphs, charts, and careful statistics that years of science fair is indeed not only a waste of time and has taught me nothing except how to torment the next generation, clip art supply coupons and invest in trophy companies leading me to believe it should be cancelled for all eternity.”

I was a supreme science fair genius in my day.  I had won first place for nine years in a row. I once made it to the county fair and won first place!  I was what they called “The Science Fair Queen.” 

Yes, I wanted that first place title to continue, but more than anything, I wanted to prove this fair was a waste of time, that parents did most of the work, that the competitive edge was sending our students into emotional collapse, and it needed to be stopped! Stopped I say!

Indeed my findings were correct. Most parents did do the projects for the kids. Even the Science Fair Queen was guilty.  Every year, by tradition it seemed, I never attempted to do one thing for the Fair until the night before when my meltdown would leave me drowning in my own snot and tears. In those days you couldn’t buy a backboard at Michael’s. Michael’s didn’t even exist. They had even more overpriced stores they called hobby shops that didn’t sell backboards either. The only place we were getting a backboard was at Home Depot, in the lumber department. You actually had to build one!  I am not nor will I ever be nor have I ever been a builder.  I can barely squeeze caulk out of a tube to reseal the bathtub. 

My father would yell at me for waiting till the last minute and there I would be begging for my parents to relieve me of my pain. To which my mother, the artist, would finally, after a good hard lecture and several “I told you so’s” would finally and valiantly come to my rescue with her golden hinges, screws and wood board.  She even built me a wooden plank that wrapped across the backboard and held my fancy title.  The very title she stenciled herself and glued herself.  The first year I kept this dirty little secret of forcing my parents to do the backboard, I was in the third grade.  That year I won first place. The project was entitled: “Malaria, Where Does It Come From?”  I even cheated further and went to the hobby store and bought one of those wooden mosquito models that was completely against the rules.  I told everyone I was so handy I not only built my own backboard but I even built my own mosquito. The teachers thought I was a genius.

This routine went on for 9 long years.  And every year I would win first place.  The fair that sent me to the county was on child development. I asked my younger siblings a bunch of random questions and had concluded that kids are different- BIG SURPRISE.  Truth is, I just made up half the answers cause my siblings were asleep the night before at 1 am when I started the project.

I was filled with guilt and remorse, but at the same time relished in the esteemed first place title.  I would literally arrive to Science fair night like a star with the administration rolling out the red carpet, parents glaring for their own lack of sleep and jealousy, and other kids hating me for winning year after year. Showing up to science fair night was like showing up to Oscar night for Meryl Streep.

The truth was, I was tired of the façade.  I also felt that the amount of money spent could have been put towards other innovative out of box projects like Film fairs, write your own book projects, create your own business enterprise schemes, record or write your own songs, create your own organization that benefits society. Anything could have been given to us through out the years that could have widened our horizons yet the teachers kept giving us the SAME exact annoying, G-d help us, uniform and uncreative irritating diorama backboard project year in and year out to tackle.  Hypothesis, conclusion, title , we get it.  Colored graphs, alright already. Optical illusions- been done a million times! 

I can promise you, I have NEVER once in my adult life ever needed to use a backboard .

No one has ever asked me for a graph.

The only optical illusion I now appreciate is the one my broken scale gives me that tells me I’m five pounds lighter.

So did my lucky streak continue to live on with my science fair “Queen” title? 

Not only did I win first place out of the whole school, the administration decided unanimously that science fair would be cancelled until further notice.  I was beyond thrilled and elated.  I had jacked the system, defied the odds, challenged mediocrity. 

The next year they instituted Torah fair instead.

Torah Fair is pretty much Science fair but without any scientific data whatsoever.  Torah fair is to Science fair what the Catholic Church is to Michael Angelo.  There is a backboard, a report and the only difference is that while Science Fair is judged on the best experiment, Torah Fair is judged on the best project visually and creatively.

I was not about to budge, quite yet.  I had my senior year to prove this nasty trick the administration tried to pull out of their brash pockets would not go down without a serious fight.  I insisted that if they were going to make a Torah Fair the only fair thing to do would be to allow the senior class to work in pairs. 

They relented after my complaining, and after I promised to impress them with the project of all projects. They knew my winning streak, and they respected me as their Queen, so they gave me their word we could work in “pairs.”  I also had one question- “Did the Torah fair project have a maximum size requirement?” To which, they responded, “No.”  I had them.

This time, I decided not to wait till the last minute.  I gathered my entire senior class (there were 7 of us) and day in and day out we made not just a banner, but the largest painting in the history of School projects.  We got a canvas the size of a two story building.  We painted the largest mural for weeks.  (Of course, I didn’t paint, cause I can’t draw, but I directed the hell out of this thing.)

It took three classes of high schoolers to drag this mega project through the doors of the auditorium before school started one early Tuesday morning. We got the janitors Julio and Michael, who were also my housekeeper’s brothers, and thereby very loyal to me to hang the project before the Principal pulled up to the school.

That day while all the kids were shlepping in their oversized heavy backboards made out of wood and peg board the seven of us nonchalantly strolled into class empty handed.  The administration took one look at us and asked- “Nu, where is your project girls?” 

The entire school crammed into the auditorium to view our mammoth size billboard poster hanging in the cafeteria. We didn’t get first place. In-fact, we weren’t judged at all that year because they had claimed we had broken the rules by not working in pairs. Seven is not a pair. That was the first year in my school career I didn’t walk home with a first place metal. It would have been my tenth trophy, but I couldn’t have felt better.

This year when my kids ask “mommy, why do we have science fair? What is the point to these fairs?” I will tell them the point to science and Torah fair is to teach you how to creatively impart messages to the world.  My message was I’m not gonna take it, I’m not going to be put into a box, and if I have to go down, I’ll go down with a fight.

‘Course my husband just wants my kids to learn what the speed of light is. He’s now in charge of fairs in our house and no, no one ever gets first place.

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April 11, 2010 | 6:21 pm

Science Fair Hell

Posted by Chava Tombosky

The time has come where my children are scheduled for yet ANOTHER science fair.  Another hundred bucks at Michael’s spent. Another series of fighting with them to tackle their boards with colored paper, graphs, and photos.  It’s like a dank black dark cloud hovers over our home until April 28th when the project is due.

When will this end, WHEN??

When I was in eleventh grade I was in a private school that had science fairs each year. After 10 years of fairs, 20 backboards, and thousands of dollars in supplies I decided to buck the system with the very skill these fairs had instilled in me.

The hypothesis? 

“I believe I can prove through analysis, graphs, charts, and careful statistics that years of science fair is indeed not only a waste of time and has taught me nothing except how to torment the next generation, clip art supply coupons and invest in trophy companies leading me to believe it should be cancelled for all eternity.”

I was a supreme science fair genius in my day.  I had won first place for nine years in a row. I once made it to the county fair and won first place!  I was what they called “The Science Fair Queen.” 

Yes, I wanted that first place title to continue, but more than anything, I wanted to prove this fair was a waste of time, that parents did most of the work, that the competitive edge was sending our students into emotional collapse, and it needed to be stopped! Stopped I say!

Indeed my findings were correct. Most parents did do the projects for the kids. The amount of money spent could have been put towards other innovative out of box projects like Film fairs, write your own book projects, create your own business enterprise schemes, record or write your own songs, create your own organization that benefits society. Anything could have been given to us through out the years that could have widened our horizons yet the teachers kept giving us the SAME exact annoying, G-d help us, uniform and uncreative irritating diorama backboard project year in and year out to tackle.  Hypothesis, conclusion, title , we get it.  Colored graphs, alright already. Optical illusions- been done a million times! 

I can promise you, I have NEVER once in my adult life ever needed to use a backboard .

No one has ever asked me for a graph.

The only optical illusion I now appreciate is the one my broken scale gives me that tells me I’m five pounds lighter.

So did my lucky streak continue to live on with my science fair “Queen” title? 

Not only did I win first place out of the whole school, the administration decided unanimously that science fair would be cancelled until further notice.  I was beyond thrilled and elated.  I had jacked the system, defied the odds, challenged mediocrity. 

The next year they instituted Torah fair instead.

 

 

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