Historically, I have celebrated Shavuot in several different ways: from attending an ice cream social in shul, to learning the whole night, to picking out a special flower-filled outfit to match. But honestly? After spending seven weeks carefully counting from Pesach to Shavuot, the holiday itself feels like a bit of a letdown. After seven weeks of anticipation, of looking forward to the holiday, there’s literally nothing to it. All we have are a few minhagim (customs); staying up all night learning Torah, eating dairy meals, and flowers. And Erev Shavuot (the eve of the holiday) itself? Well that’s a whole other story. 

Erev Shavuot begins with a trip to the grocery store for last minute essentials. Braving the pre-chag chaos in Israel is a unique experience. The aisles are crowded, every checkout line is miles long and everyone is fighting for the last ingredient for cheesecake. I’m thankful we got the last pack of cream cheese. After the crazy dash of shopping, fighting the entire time with the broken front stroller wheel, I pretty much fled home to finish the cooking in time. There was no gan (preschool) so I wasn’t just cooking, I was juggling two kids, trying to find a job for one while making sure the other was ok with me standing for so long without picking her up. I did whatever I could with one hand, working with an assistant that refused the task I gave her just as I started on something else. It’s almost surprising that I managed to peel the potatoes. After all that cooking, I entirely miscounted how many meals we had, so ended up eating the same thing for all four meals. Oops.  

And as for staying up all night learning? I did read a few chapters of the book I’ve been reading on and off for about four years, but after a full week and a chaotic mad dash to make chag on time, we ended up going to bed a good deal earlier than we ordinarily would. 

So our visions of the holiday didn’t really pan out the way we expected. Each day we were holding our breath and hoping our bored toddler wouldn’t melt down. It really didn’t feel like so much of a holiday, just a really hard day of taking care of two young kids. But then it hit me that this is the stage of life we are in, and maybe that’s all that’s expected of me. Maybe I don’t need the picture perfect holiday with a tablescape adorned in flowers and an all-night learning session. Maybe it’s ok to have the cheesecake alone while working on raising kids. 

In the end, we didn’t need anything specific for this special day, because just like our Torah was given to everyone, in every stage of life, that’s how we live it. The Torah life isn’t just for the elite. Torah is for everyone, no matter where you are, what life stage you’re at, there is always room in the Torah for you. So maybe our holiday wasn’t perfect. Maybe we didn’t make it to shul, I missed the women’s later Megillah reading and we were at our wits ends of parenting a bored toddler who melted down at the drop of a hat. But this life, raising children, parenthood, it’s what the Torah is all about. Passing down the mesorah to our kids. No matter how messy, no matter how coated in bamba and wiped we are at the end of the day after wrangling our kids into their pjs. Hashem is always there waiting for us, exactly as we are. And when they sing along as we say the shema before bed, we know they’re listening and that we’re doing something right. 

In the end, our toddler didn’t even end up liking the cheesecake.