Lean into the sukkah

For many years now, Sukkot has been my favorite holiday. Partially, it’s a fun and challenging opportunity to host. I also have great memories of autumn soups and my father’s puffy vest.

So, what is the point of this holiday, and how can we live out its message?

Right after we got married, Laura and I moved to Boston, where we stayed with a relative before moving into our own place. We had a small bedroom to ourselves, and the rest of the home was shared with family. We were grateful to have a temporary place to stay while we searched in our for our new home. After a few months, we found a place of our own, with room to stretch out in our own spaces. Six years later, we returned to Chicago and were granted the opportunity to live in the spacious Base Loop, where we can easily host sprawling and spirited Shabbat dinners.

And yet, sometimes, I find myself wondering about those early days, when we were living on top of each other, stuffed into our little temporary bedroom, before we had the ability to spread out; when we really only had each other. Rav Shagar teaches that this is the essence of what it means to leave our homes and go into the sukkah. It is an opportunity to travel back in time to the early days, when we lived in a single room, cramped, yet full of love and optimism for the future.

As we have–and continue to–slowly come out of this difficult pandemic, we spread our wings a bit. For those of us with partners, roommates, pets, spouses, and families, we have been living on top of each other. In many ways, not the ideal living situation. And yet, I wonder if we will come to miss just a little bit of that as we get further from it. “Remember when it was just us?” “Remember when we could only hang out with each other and it forced us to really get to know each other?” While we will of course never wish to return to the circumstances that brought us into those living situations, I can’t but wonder if we won’t miss the closeness it brought to one another, inside our homes.

As we prepare for the holiday of Sukkot, my biggest tip is to lean into the humble nature of the sukkah. To the extent that it is safe, squeeze people in there. Don’t worry about knocking elbows and having to constantly shuffle around when people wash hands or get up for any reason. Let us embrace the momentary intimacy of closeness, with each other and with our guests, packed into our tight, beautiful, temporary walls.

As part of Metro Chicago Hillel, Rav Ezra Balser and his wife Laura run Base Loop out of their home in the West Loop neighborhood of Chicago.