August 21, 2010 | 11 Elul 5770 

We joke about our loss of memory as we grow older.  (“They say that memory is the second thing to go as you get older. So what's the first? Umm, I forgot!”)  But the truth is that long before age takes its toll on memory multiple stimuli to our brains take their toll each day.  We just can’t remember everything.  We can’t even remember everything we would like to remember. 

This week our Torah Reading shares an image concerning physical protection that offers us an insight as we seek to find ways to hold on to memories we don’t want to lose:

When you build a new house, you shall make a parapet for your roof, so that you do not bring bloodguilt on your house if anyone should fall from it. (Dt. 22:8)

The verse is concerned with the physical safety of anyone who might wander out on to the flat roof of a house.  It also emphasizes the legal responsibility of the owner.

While that is the proper manner in which to understand the plain sense meaning of the verse, I also understand it in metaphorical fashion.

When we wish to hold on to  worthy memories we have to protect them before the natural course of life, forgetfulness that only increases with age, causes them “to fall off the roof,” and disappear.  No, no bloodguilt ensues from such forgetfulness, but most us know the upset and even pain when we remember that some episode with a loved one was significant…but we can no longer recall its content.

Last Sunday I drew upon that metaphor as I opened our congregation’s annual Memorial Plaque Dedication ceremony.  About thirty people who had placed memorial plaques at the rear of our sanctuary during the past year were present.  I suggested that the plaque was, in some sense, like the parapet in our Torah Portion…a protective fence against forgetfulness.  In addition, as a tangible object that symbolized the presence of that loved one in this particular holy space, the plaque would serve as a natural place at which to think about one’s loved one and recall and tell stories to later generations.  In other words, the plaque would serve as one important way to protect memories.

What are the other ways that we can protect memories, especially of loved ones no longer among the living, before the constant barrage of information we take in each day or age itself begins to crowd them out or erase those memories? 

As many of you know, both of my in – laws of blessed memory, Carol and Ricka Hart, along with my mother of blessed memory, Betty Sandler, died this past year.  As I say Kaddish each day, I conjure up a particular image of each of them for just a moment.  The particular image I have of my mother sometimes brings a smile to my face.  And then that image disappears again until I consciously act to evoke it.  It’s a rather tenuous way to hold on to something and someone dear.

How can we hold on to memories we wish to keep?  How can we hold on to what was precious to us in the lives of loved ones no longer alive?  How can we tangibly protect memories?  Let us share our thoughts with each other and learn from each other’s wisdom.

Shabbat Shalom.