Friday night, I was in synagogue with Kat and only Kat. Kat is almost always at family services because she is the assistant for the children�s choir. It�s Kat, the director, and mainly children (mainly girls) under ten singing for the congregation. They only sing part of the service and then they come join their families. The tunes used for the prayers are more folk tune than at the regular service to encourage the kids to join in.

Usually, Mr. Philately comes to services too but he is the technical director for the middle school play and needed to be at their performance. Day is still not comfortable at synagogue and was not with us. I wish I could say I enjoyed the service but the verbal, word part of it did not do much for me. Our junior rabbi is re-writing the family service with four to eight year olds in mind and I am far from eight and even farther from four. Worse, her writing suffered from what Kat would call �puppies and rainbows� syndrome. Did you know that God loves �rainbows and smiles?� Perhaps so but that seems quite a reduction of the power of God and a picture of God that few self-respecting boys of that age would relate to.

But I digress. The point was not the English (which was generally stilted) but the singing. For me, absent a thoughtful sermon (which I�ve never known to occur at a family service), the point is often the singing. Singing prayers is usually special. When the choir joins their parents, I get to sing next to Kat and it�s even more special. Singing prayers next to Kat is a joy. Kat is one of those rare people who hears music in chords. She often bursts into spontaneous harmony and, because our voices are so close in sound, the effect is wonderful�as long as I am not so startled that I forget to hold the melody.

What was special this time was her hearing of chords became contagious. Me, who can hold my part in a chorus but never can write my part, suddenly wrote my own part. Suddenly, it was me, Kat, and the woman who was leading prayers in three part harmony. It was an unexpected gift. It was startling. In its own small way, it was a very small miracle. I had it for a moment and then it was gone. But I had it.

My days of standing there and singing next to Kat are numbered. Family services, with lots of opportunities for group singing, occur only on the first Friday of the month. Other Friday night services come with the adult choir, an unfortunately tuned bunch who frown on additions to their attempts at harmony. And next year Kat will be gone most of the school year and not available for family services.

There are three more family services left with Kat. Three more chances to sing with abandon and with all the joy my Chassidic ancestors would have had. Three more chances to commence praying certain in the knowledge that I have no idea what will happen.

After Kat leaves, prayer will still be worthwhile, but I may have to work to make it as much of an adventure. My spontaneous harmony will have to be with the cosmos, not my daughter. But maybe I�ll find another adventure.

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