Shana Tova

Well, I wrote a nice long post earlier this afternoon about what I did today, but then Firefox crashed, and I lost it. Oh well. The meat of the matter was that I got my hair cut by a man named Jamie Starr in the middle of Oktoberfest today in Harvard Square. Diego, the most expensive salon in the Square, was giving $25 haircuts to benefit the Red Cross, and as I needed one anyway and because it was so cheap, I went ahead and did it.

But the more interesting story of today just happened. I just tried, again, to go see Carmen at the A.R.T. with my friend Amy, but, like last time, they were sold out. As a result, instead of being in a theater just now, I was in my room, reading for my class tomorrow. There was a knock at the door, so I put down my book and got up from my red leather armchair to see who it was.

When I opened the door, I saw that the young man standing before me wasn’t anyone I knew. But UC (student government) elections are over, I thought to myself. Who is this guy?. “Are you Margaret?” he asked. I said I was, and he handed me a booklet. “Shana Tova! (A Good Year!)” he said, and left.

I looked at what was in my hands, and I laughed: Harvard Hillel’s booklet High Holidays at Harvard, with two honey sticks taped to it. Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, begins tomorrow evening. Now, I have plenty of Jewish friends, and I have been known to go to Hillel for dinner on occasion, but I’m not Jewish myself. What’s strange is that this isn’t the first time someone has assumed that I am. A few weeks ago, at the upperclassmen activities fair, a girl came up to HRG&SP and asked me, “Is this the Jewish table?” Weird.

Shana Tova, y’all.