 It is about 7 a.m. and the sun is on the verge of rising. Most people are sound asleep this Saturday morning but no, not the Cooper’s. I quickly run into the shower. The warm water has no trouble washing away the morning coolness. I hop out, reach for my towel and see my father has only his tie left to put on. I rush to get dressed. My suit is already laid out for me from the night before. I hear my mother in the distance shouting, “Ready!” signaling it is time to go. I finish putting on my tie and out the door we leave, as a family, as one.
My little brother, all dressed up looks like a “mench”, which is the word my family uses to describe a healthy young man. My father, in great physical shape for a man of his age, walks with purpose. And my mother, simply the proudest woman I have ever seen. Together we are the Cooper family; together we are Jews. The occasion is Yom Kippur which is the holiest and most sacred Jewish holiday of the year. It is the last time before the New Year that the Jewish people can make amends with God. There is no celebration on this holiday. It is a very solemn day as a matter of fact. We arrive at temple and get out of the car. Being the youngest son, my brother holds my father’s tallit bag. This bag holds a yarmulke and a tallit; two items that must be worn by men inside the synagogue. I hold my own bag. My mother carries her purse.
As my family enters the service, we do not joyfully greet others for it is a time of atonement. At most there is a simple hello. The atmosphere inside the temple is stern, but it is an event that is necessary in keeping our faith. It is our duty as Jewish people to practice and follow our religion. My father remembers his mother, who passed away before I was born. I never got to see my grandmother and my father tells me she would have spoiled my brother and I like no other. I reflect on what could have been. I sit with my mother, my father, and my brother and we pray in silence, while the Rabbi leads and the Canter chants.
For a Jewish male it is not easy to find many other people who share my faith. This is an especially daunting task while attending Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri. Kirksville’s literal translation is Churchtown. I am the only Jew on the football team and one of approximately 20 Jewish students on a campus of around 6,000. I realize that there are Jews scattered throughout the nation with the greatest populations being in Florida, California, and New York, but in Missouri only about one percent of its five and a half million residents are Jewish.
I am a native Floridian. I attended a public high school in Miami, Florida and earned a football scholarship to play for Truman. The area I grew up in has a pretty large Jewish population. Most of my best friends from high school are Jewish. I went to a separate Hebrew school to learn the language of my ancestors and to become Bar-Mitzvah’ed. According to Judaism a Bar-Mitzvah is the transformation into adulthood. Every Jewish youth has one at the age of thirteen. My parents in fact moved to a wealthier neighborhood so that I could go to a highly academic high school and also be surrounded by people that shared my faith. It is one of the only neighborhoods in South Florida where the majority of people are not African American or Hispanic. There are also numerous synagogues in the city that I
can attend.
What was my parents’ main concern with sending me away to a Midwest town in Missouri? They wanted to know how their little Jewish boy was going to keep faith in such a non-Jewish setting. I am not going to lie. The answer is very hard to find. I had to start somewhere so the last two things and most important two things that I packed for college were my yarmulke and my prayer book. Little did I know at the time, those two items would soon make up my spiritual constitution.
I remember the first Sunday that I was up in Kirksville for football camp. There was a church service in the morning. I did not attend. The fact that there was church didn’t bother me. However, the ignorance expressed by the teammates around me was another story. I overheard some guys talking about a handful of players that didn’t wake up that morning to go to church. My name came up. The exact words were, “Those fools are going to hell.”
Shocked. Taken back to say the least. It was just the beginning.
During my first week of college one of my professors started to make a comparison with something that was done in class and an event that occurs in Sunday Mass. I don’t know what happens in Sunday Mass because I have never been. My professor, supposedly an educated teacher, took for granted that everyone went to church. It hurt me inside because I was apparently on a different page. I kept to myself. I had to make a concentrated effort to remain true to my religious beliefs and values.
I would have to get used to this “everyone is a Christian” hegemony or I would crumble under my own beliefs. I had no other choice. Add this awkwardness with the transition of college and me living on my own and this quickly turned into some of the hardest times of my life. Then for a side dish take the stereotypes some of my own teammates would use such as, “rich like a Jew” or look at that “Jewish nose” and it got to the point where I would question my faith at night. Lying in bed I would just ask myself if it was worth it to have such strong beliefs and pride in my religion. I didn’t know the answer.
Just when it couldn’t get any worse, it didn’t. I got some calls from my grandparents and they told me how important it was to stay true to my beliefs and my Jewish faith. I discussed issues with my father and the grass on the other side started to turn a vibrant green. I learned how to become strong. I learned how to believe again. I put on that yarmulke and I opened that prayer book and read and recited prayers of hope. My soul was alive once again! My family helped me understand. My family helped me keep faith.
I’ll never forget my first college football game. The team chaplain led the team in the “Lord’s Prayer”. I removed myself immediately from the kneeling crowd of players. Right then and there the tone was set. A new sense of respect was born because my teammates knew how much courage it took for me to walk away; for me to stand alone. As a freshmen this was the hardest thing to do because I was new and I was young. As a sophomore the freshmen saw me stand alone. As a junior, the freshmen and sophomores saw me stand alone. And as a senior, my team saw their Captain stand alone.
As for my football career, I was a two time all conference selection, three time academic honor roll selection, and elected as team captain by my teammates in my senior year. I got the starting job at strong safety as a true freshmen after my 5th game and didn’t look back. 39 consecutive starts later it’s safe to say that I definitely am blessed.
A little over four years have passed since the last time I went to temple with my family. I am done with football now and graduating soon with the aspirations of becoming a chiropractor. I feel at one with myself now. I have learned not to let others control my destiny. I am the only one with that power. Even though I am far away from my family I will take what I have learned from them and empower myself with devotion to my heritage. I know that is what they expect from the Jewish son they have raised. It is said that one must set goals in life in order to be successful. My goals have been set during the time I have been away at college and I can safely say goal number one has been achieved. I can say it with pride. I have kept faith!
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