Twenty-three years ago, when I moved to Los Angeles, someone kept telling me to go to the big synagogue on Main Street in Venice, but I drove up and down Main Street and just couldn’t find it. Finally, on Sukkot, I decided to walk. I started on Main and Rose and headed North. I walked past the big blue post office that I recognized, but this time, when I looked up at the building. I saw to my great surprise Mishkon Tephilo written across the top.
I was thrilled to find that services were held in the sukkah. I walked up the alley and went in. About a dozen people were sitting, and each one looked up at me at some point and smiled. I was offered an Aliyah and an etrog and lulav over which to say the blessing. As services concluded, everyone came over to say hello and ask me whether I was visiting and where I was from, and I was invited to lunch in someone’s Sukkah. They spoke to me as if I were their friend yet gave me the space to jump in as much as I wanted. I found my place to worship and my people.
As I began to see the same people every Shabbat and got to know them, I realized that for the first time I was part of an extraordinary community – one that would embrace but not devour me, allow me to reveal myself at my own speed, and always make me feel welcome. Over the years, this exceptional community has celebrated simchas with me and held me in my grief. It has provided minyanim when I needed to say kaddish, provided for my gluten-free needs, and been my place of learning. My son recently asked what it would take for me to return to the East Coast. I told him there wasn’t a plane big enough to take my community with me, so I had no immediate plans to leave.
