This saga may have started on a fall day in 1928 when my dad, Sidney Ballon, first stepped on the Brown University campus as a freshman. Regardless, this has been a story long in the making. Dad and his younger brother, Herbie, the “Ballon boys” of Providence, were much heralded in their day. They took all the math and Latin awards at Classical High School, or so legend has it. They were both Phi Beta Kappa at Brown—Dad in the Class of 1932.
 
The next generation benefited from their legacy. I don’t know about my brother, Jeff, five years my senior, but as for me, without legacy my high school grades alone surely would not have merited admittance to Brown. Yes, I had board scores showing a lot of promise, but face it, I neither knew how to study nor why one would bother. At the time, I was not ready for East Podunk Community College, let alone Brown. But I got in with the fervent hope that the small size of the school would provide a nurturing environment in which my potential would be realized.
 
It didn’t.
 
In addition to my having developed no discernible study skills, being practically devoid of intellectual curiosity, and possessing a prefrontal cortex very much “under development,” I also suspect that underlying that shaky intellectual foundation was even less stable psychological soil. I’ve come to believe that personal demons were at work, anxious to prove to me and to the world that I was unworthy. Simultaneously, they may have been striking back at my father for putting me in this untenable position. With all that at work, it’s a wonder it took me five semesters to flunk out! Chalk that up, I suppose, to perseverance.
 
I had been skating on thin ice most of the way. During the fall semester of my junior year, I cleverly, if unconsciously, assured my academic demise and subsequent departure by scheduling a full slate of morning classes while virtually sleeping until noon every day. That allowed me to avoid the discomfort of sitting in a class for which I was unprepared. It also gave me a wide open afternoon and evening to pursue my real interests: intramural sports, marching band, writing scandalous halftime shows, playing bridge and hearts, and general horsing around with my buddies. (Okay, I did show up in the art studio by and large, but even there, my instructor questioned my commitment.)
 
It’s only conjecture, fifty-one years later, but I have to assume I experienced as much relief as remorse when the hammer finally came down. And the guilt—yeah, there was a healthy dose of that. It was aided and abetted by Jeff, who had managed to squeak through with the Class of ‘64, and who may have taken a small measure of glee by bluntly declaring to me that I was “killing Dad.“
 
The fact is, by my dismissal, I got all that I had long, but unconsciously wished for—a ticket out. It was Jeff‘s fate (or choice) to follow in our father‘s footsteps—Brown, Hebrew Union College, ordination as a reform rabbi, service as a chaplain in the United States military, a pulpit in the south, a pulpit in the north. I, by contrast, could now cash in my golden ticket to do anything and everything else that life offered. What a relief! What a ride! The following autumn I miraculously found myself in a tiny art school in Portland, Oregon—yes, three thousand miles from Providence! It was the late sixties. Tune in, turn on, and drop out was the mantra. While I didn’t push that to its extremes, I, nonetheless, enjoyed a great burst of creativity and a refreshing breath of freedom. And yes, Jeffrey’s admonishment went with me wherever I went—mostly unconsciously, sometimes bursting through in judgment, shame, and anger toward myself and others.
 
I have to accept my role in nurturing the shame throughout the years. Dad’s gone. Jeff’s gone. Of what use was it for me to perpetuate shame thrust on me for simply doing what I had to do? As the poet, Mary Oliver put it:

There should be no villains in this story—just understanding, acceptance, and forgiveness. We all did all we could do, all we knew how to do, under circumstances not entirely of our making. At last, I’ve concluded that half a century is sufficient purgatory.
 
To put it in another context, what do today’s youngsters do when they aren’t quite ready for college? They exercise the option of taking a “gap year”—not a socially acceptable approach, or one even given consideration back in the sixties. Aha! How clever of me! Ahead of my time! I unwittingly created my own “gap year”—albeit two-and-a half years, albeit at great expense, albeit nonsensically on a college campus instead of a worthy alternative. And what did I accomplish in the “intersession“ of my own making? I met a lot of unmet needs that were critical to my development and to preparing me for a life of learning—just as a gap year should.
 
Perhaps the greatest need that was met at Brown, in sharp contrast to my life at West Hempstead High School, was a sense of social ease. In high school I was known to one and all as “the rabbi’s son” and suffered from more than the typical adolescent alienation. Whereas, at Brown, no one knew or cared who my father was. I was one of the guys! I had buddies. We played cards and sports, watched the original Mission Impossible and Batman, had meals together in the refectory, hung out in the dorm. I fit in!
 
One rewarding similarity with high school was how I took a leadership position in the band. At Brown, due to the nature of the largely student run organization I had an even greater role than in West Hempstead. It wasn’t long before I became part of the comedy writing team responsible for the aforementioned scandalous halftime shows. Later, when I became president of the band, I used my art skills to create a cartoon self-portrait as a “mascot” logo that, much to my surprise was, in later years, dubbed Elrod Snidley, and is still in use today—my legacy to Brown! (3)
 
Meanwhile, my frontal cortex was slowly developing, such that academic pursuits subsequent to Brown were highly successful—an artistic achievement award from the University of Judaism, dean’s list and a bachelor’s degree in education from Hofstra, a Master of Architecture from Yale, to wit. Yes, Brown provided a virtual and formidable “gap year.“ I am proud of my achievements there and all that they led to throughout my academic and professional life.
 
I didn’t come to this realization in a single flash of insight and clarity. It was a process. It took some time, some deep probing, some work. Strange as it may seem, I owe a lot to my dreams—not the aspirational kind, but the one’s that come in the middle of the night. I’ve long paid attention to them, and especially so in the last few years. I have a friend with whom I regularly meet to support each other in sifting for the subconscious messages to be found in our dreams. I have a spiritual director who has expertise in doing dream work in a spiritual context. And I have worked with a Jungian therapist for whom my dreams provide fertile ground for psychological exploration. I can’t say exactly when and where among these resources I finally put all the pieces together. That’s part of the magic of living an “examined life.”
 
In his book, From Age-ing to Sage-ing, Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi says that part of a constructive approach to aging is to make amends with the past by recontextualizing one’s life. Having finally reframed the joys and sorrows of my Brown experience, there was only one thing left for me to do. For the reader to appreciate this next point, I must describe a piece of Brown University lore.
 
Brown’s Van Wickle Gates provide a ceremonial entrance to the campus. The monumental main gates are flanked by two smaller side gates that remain open throughout the year. The central gates, however, remain locked except for the first day of each semester when they open inward for incoming students and on Commencement Day each May, when they swing outward for the graduation procession.

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I couldn’t agree more.

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Soon after the chaplain departed, Becca, Josh, and the baby arrived. To our surprise and delight they described how the pediatrician assigned to the procedure happened to be Jewish. While many babies are arbitrarily circumcised just before leaving the hospital, Becca mentioned to the doctor that today was actually the baby’s eighth day, and that they were hoping to say a few prayers. The doctor was delighted! She had a little boy of her own and could relate. Moreover, despite having performed thousands of circumcisions, she had never done one on the eighth day as commanded, let alone with the traditional blessings. She asked Becca to email her the service that I had sent to Becca the night before, in order that the doctor print copies of it for their use.
 
The service begins with the milah prayer that is customarily said by the mohel. Under the current circumstances I had little hope that the doctor involved would be up to doing that, so my notation in the handout was for that prayer to be offered by the “Surgeon or Parent.” This surgeon, however, did not hesitate to speak the words,
Baruch atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech haolam, asher kid’shanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu al ha-milah.
Becca and Josh were sitting just outside the surgical room. Their vision of the baby was obstructed by the doctor, but they were within earshot. They responded with the translation,
Blessed are You, Adonai, guiding spirit of the universe, who has sanctified us through Your mitzvot and ordained circumcision.
 
After performing some technical preparations, the doctor informed Josh and Becca that the circumcision was beginning. That was their cue to say, 
Baruch atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech haolam, asher kid’shanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu l'hakhniso bivrito shel avraham avinu v'sarah imeinu.
Blessed are You, Adonai, guiding spirit of the universe, who has made us holy with Your commandments and commanded us to bring our son into the covenant of Abraham our father and Sarah our mother.
There it was—all (or certainly most) that I had truly hoped for—the ritual of circumcision with the requisite blessings!
 
We waited some time for the chaplain to return with the wine, but the exigencies of the baby’s needs as well as some follow up appointments of Becca’s, forced us to move ahead with the remainder of the service without the Kiddush. (I suspect that the Kiddush here is designed to make wine available for the baby’s comfort as much as anything else! Our baby was peacefully asleep at this point so we were quite willing to continue without the wine.) We moved on to officially give the boy a name. With parents and grandparents all in attendance, I read,
Eloheynu v'elohey avoteynu v'imoteynu, kayem et ha-yeled ha-zeh l'aviv u-l'imo, v'yikarey shmo b'yisrael Shmuel Etan ben Yehoshua v’Rivkah. Baruch atah Adonay, koreit ha-brit.
Our God and God of our fathers and mothers, sustain this child for his father and mother. May his name in Israel be called Shmuel Etan son of Yehoshua and Rivkah, and Samuel Eugene Shapiro in English. Blessed are you, God, who establishes the covenant.
I couldn’t say if there was a dry eye in the room as I was too filled with joyful emotion to observe. We all recited the Shehekheyanu, expressing gratitude to be alive in that moment. Josh and Becca lay hands on their son and recited the priestly benedictions. And lastly, and again with much emotion, Becca recited the Gomel prayer—words of gratitude for surviving childbirth, serious surgery, or, as in this case, both.
 
If we had had perfect foreknowledge of all the factors influencing this morning—the timing of the procedure, the traffic, the doctor’s religion, the hospital rules, etc. we could not have planned a more deeply experienced, heartfelt, and joyous sequence of events. I knew when I arranged the service folder and sent it to Becca that it would seem like too much to orchestrate given all the other physical and emotional challenges of the day. In an attempt to relieve her of the feeling that I was pressuring them to do more than was desirable or even possible, I had texted her last night, in complete honesty, “Prepared for the full range of possibilities. No worries.” That range was from absolutely no ritual observance, to the possibility of doing what was written on the handout—if not in the hospital then perhaps later at home.
 
Deepak was right. The intention was set. The outcome was left open to circumstance. Our patience and fluidity led to the consecration of this precious boy that exceeded all expectations. Baruch hashem.
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