Changing my name is a choice that I can make. I can keep my name if I want, or change it, or come up with something entirely different. By deciding to take my soon-to-be-husband’s last name, I am naming a particular moment in my life, my transition from single to married. I am changing my name, not because that is what I am expected to do, but because I am signaling a unified partnership, as we are both helpers to each other. Adam isn’t naming me, like the birds and the beasts. I am claiming the power to name myself.

My daughter is 11 months old. Yet I don’t know if the thought that I am someone’s mother has fully settled in. Mother. It’s a term I did not consider carrying much weight until 11:46pm on June 12 of last year. Now, it’s a term that feels very rich and heavy. It is a term that is ripe with promise. It is a term that terrifies me.

I told my husband that if we're blessed to become pregnant again, I don't want to start discussing names until the day before the bris or simchat bat— perhaps we'll make that an added superstition that we throw into the barrel of Jewish pregnancy customs.

Reposted with permission from InterfaithFamily.

As I’m writing this, I’m sitting in my car outside my daughter’s day care. No worries, there’s no crying here, no major trauma. I’m trying to check things off my list while waiting for the start of “El dia de Primavera,” a celebration of the first day of spring.

I'm not your old-fashioned Jewish Mother, who shovels guilt on my kids in whose lives I'm over-invested.

It’s Presidents’ Day. And I find myself thinking about her, the woman who came closest to presiding over our nation, taking up temporary residence (for the third time) at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. I am fascinated by our nation’s changing perceptions—and altered reception—of Hillary Clinton.

“Being a diplomat is no career for a woman who wants to have a family,” said the consul.

“By the time you’re ready to get married he’ll be married,” said my mother.

“Don’t put off having children,” said the prominent professor.

The Guilt Trip begins by introducing Andy Brewster (Seth Rogen), a thirty— something inventor about to embark on a road trip to sell his innovative organic cleaning product. Andy makes a quick stop at his mom’s (Barbara Streisand) house, and spontaneously invites her to come along for the ride. Their journey cross-country turns into an exploration of the ties that bind (Jewish) mother and son.

In the recent Disney/Pixar film, Brave, a young princess defies an age-old custom and fights to make her mother understand that she is not ready for marriage. I know you’d rather not think of the Disney princesses at all, but we live and breathe, and shop at Target, so I contend---if forced to choose among that whole pastel-clad, sugary lot, you’d want your daughter to be more independent, courageous Merida, less Cinderella waiting for her prince to come, right?

On the front page of this morning’s Denver Post a picture of Veronique Pozner, mother of Sandy Hook Elementary School victim Noah Pozner, at Noah’s gravesite at B’nai Israel Cemetery in Monroe, Connecticut, assaults me as I sit down to drink my morning coffee. Veronique stands next to her rabbi, and my eyes are drawn to his kippah. And I’d thought, that perhaps, I was going to be able to start this day without crying.

Though still in the month of Elul, we are approaching Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. We are leaving 5772 behind and will soon enter 5773.

One recent summer weekend, my life—or my awareness of its imperatives—underwent a radical shift. My 28-year-old son was away at the beach with friends.

So, it’s an educators’ conference. You can imagine, we are caught in our business casual pastel prints and scarves, pencil skirts and ballet flats.

Despite being a Jewish educator, I have never felt a strong, personal connection to our sacred texts.

Did you ever wonder what it would be like to work with your mother and learn about her life and in doing so discover a completely different person?

Thank goodness, it’s almost Father’s Day! Which means the pressure is off, at least for a day, to please mom. Whew!

Judaism is rooted in our people’s ability to tell a good story.

I am a lucky girl. I have two women who I call mom. Well, one I call mommie and the other emma (Hebrew for mother), but that’s just semantics.

My mom is not famous, like her sister, Lea Nikel, who is included in JWA's online encyclopedia of Jewish women.

Mother's Day always makes me wonder: How do we convey the love, respect and gratitude we feel for the women in our lives – and for the fortitude and accomplishments of women everywhere?

Ever dream of making a film about someone you wanted the world to know more about?