In Israel there is an expression: “Ad Achrai HaChagim” – which literally means “until after the major holidays” or after Simchat Torah when we greet people with the salutation: “Horef Tov/Good Winter” (Gut Vinter in Yiddish and German). It is after then that life returns to normal, school restarts, work can begin in earnest, and workmen begin to do their work. In reality, though, according to the Shulchan Aruch, the quintessential “beginning of winter” is 60 days later, after the date of our insertion of V’tayn tal u’mattar l’vracha. This late date for winter was set in ancient times to give the Jews of Babylon time to get home before the rains started. As Jews moved to faraway lands, this date was kept and this year it falls on December 5. So Ad Achrai HaChgim begins then! All this was in my mind (well, sort of) as I held a date between my fingers this past Rosh Hashana and recited: “ As we eat this date, may we date the New Year that is beginning as one of happiness and blessing, and peace for all… Blessed are Thou, Lord our God...” (de Sola Pool, Spanish and Portuguese Congregation Siddur). As we were blessed to sit around the table and pass around the simanim, I held up this date, and thought about my past, present and, be’ezrat Hashem, the future. In our family, in keeping with Spanish and Portuguese/Sephardic traditions, there are more simanim than just the proverbial apple and honey. The date, though, elicits different blessings as grandchildren get older: some get married and others are just entering the “dating” parsha. Holding up my date brought to mind one of my first dates. I had a very short dating life, as I was married the day before my 18th birthday – over a half century ago. There I sat in my best Shabbat outfit in the lobby of the Plaza Hotel in New York. Leaving the house had been no easy matter. I was then the eldest of seven children who ranged in age from 15 to 1. They were all waiting at the entrance of our apartment to get a glimpse of “The Guy.” I was standing there with coat and bag in hand ready to leave as he alighted from the elevator, having “run the gauntlet” of doormen and elevator man, anxious to report by housephone to my mom and dad. The CIA, KGB and Mossad would have been proud of them. The guy looked somewhat green as he stepped out of the elevator. Okay, we got through that and we were sitting in the Plaza lobby. In those days this YU girl and that Chaim Berlin guy could order plain vanilla ice cream there. Somehow it was deemed kosher. Anyway, there we sat as the waiter brought our small plates of “a scoop of plain vanilla, please,” when my date removes his tie clip – to the young and “tieless” populace, that is the clip that keeps a tie from flying about in the wind. Turns out the tie clip was a mini spoon. “What are you going to do with that?” I asked. “Use it to eat my ice cream,” he answered. Whereupon I took the spoon/ tieclip from his poisedto-dip in the icecream hands, and said: “Well clearly, as a gentleman, you were going to offer it to me, your date, first, as of course you would not expect less than perfect shemirat kashrut from me.” Needless to say, he was stunned. And continued to be so as, after eating a spoonful, I washed the mini spoon in water and returned it to him so he could eat his. (Don’t know how he fared on future dates, but he was clearly not for me.) Back to today. As I looked around my table, I thought of how many more choices there were today for those beginning to date. And so many wonderful ways and places at which one can daven. One of the most famous is the grave of Rabi Yontan Ben Uziel, in Amuka, near Tzfat in Israel. If you are looking to get married, look no further. Go to Amuka and, according to tradition, your prayers will be answered within the year! Rabi Yonatan had been a talmid of Rabi Hillel HaZaken. He never married and apparently regretted it. Tradition teaches that before he died he promised that if men and women looking for their bashert prayed at his grave, their prayers would be answered. The most auspicious day to go there is the 26th of Sivan, the anniversary of his death. Every year hundreds of people descend on the gravesite to pray, hoping they will be blessed to find their bashert. Some say you should walk around his grave seven times, others believe that just praying there is sufficient. One of the strange sites you will see near the kever is a tree with various items of clothing, scarves, etc., tied to it. This is because many people, women in particular, believe that this will also help them find their partner. Even though there is a notice up saying that this practice is forbidden, it doesn’t deter people from continuing to decorate the tree! Some people write messages asking for help and use the clothes as a way of tying the message to the tree, in a similar way to people leaving messages in the Kotel. You can also see trees covered in messages tied in items of clothing near the graves of other sages as well. As I light candles erev Shabbat, I thank Hashem for so much. I pray for the safety of all my children and grandchildren and greatgrandchildren and Am Yisrael and for His help in keeping them on the right path in this complicated world. Over the years I have learned to say, “Thank you Hashem that I am not in charge, You are! In Hebrew, my wish to the younger generation is a double entendre: Nesiya Tova (its varied spellings means “Have a Good Journey” or “Have a Good Marriage”) and a G’Mar Tov (May all endings be good) and Shana Tova uMevurechet: May we all be written in the book of good life and have a healthy and blessed year.