Helloooo, Our Shiputzim fans!
I must confess that this post’s title is somewhat misleading, because – to be perfectly honest - you won’t find any prisms here. In fact, strictly speaking, you won’t find any prunes either – unless you count the forthcoming reference to pruning. And, for that matter, I’m not really going to be blogging about pruning per se. Instead, I’m going to write about the lack thereof.*
You see, due to shmitah-related considerations, it’s been almost two years since we pruned (aha! there’s the pruning reference) our aravot tree. (Yes, I know that shmitah was only one year. But we always prune our tree immediately after Succot in order to give it a year to grow back.)
Anyway, as a result, the tree is now extremely overgrown. In other words, B”H we have a bumper crop and would be more than happy to provide any of our readers with aravot.
If you are interested, please contact us at: OurShiputzim at gmail dot com.
*(So why, then, did I use this title, you ask? Good question. Well, the thing was that although we’ve had Shakespearean references as well as allusions to assorted movies, songs, and TV shows, we’ve never had – as far as I can recall – a Dickensian title. The time, I felt, had come to remedy that, and hence the title…)
And on that note, the entire Our Shiputzim staff wishes all of our dear readers a:
גמר חתימה טובה
ושנה טובה ומתוקה
May you have an easy and meaningful fast and a good, sweet, happy, healthy, prosperous, and peaceful new year!
I'd like to do a watercolor of aravot leaves. But I live in New Jersey, so the leaves won't survive the trip. We actually have a little aravot tree in our backyard, that my son planted last year. I'm afraid if I pruned it, it would no longer exist.
ReplyDeleteA funny note: I was telling my art teacher (who isn't Jewish) that I wanted to paint aravot, but I couldn't remember how to say it in English (it's a willow, right?).
Yes, aravot are willows.
ReplyDeleteDo you think you'll have enough branches on your little tree for your 4 Minim this year? We really enjoy going out and picking our own aravot each year on Erev Succot, but IIRC, the first year or two after we planted the aravot, we had something which resembled a bush more than a tree...
Gmar chatimah tovah!