Miami Vice: B’midbar

I just returned from a whirlwind of a trip over Memorial Day Weekend to Miami.

I got the phone call at noon on Thursday, when I was almost three hours north of the city; the main teacher of this trip of fifteen teens, Latinx and Jewish, was sick with Covid, and they needed a replacement.

Could I make it to JFK airport by 6 O’clock that evening?

Yes! Yes! Yes! Though Crazy, Crazy, Crazy!

And I made it there before anyone!

It was my first time in Florida! (Yes, I know; unusual for a Jew, but I am an unusual Jew.)

And though I am sick with Covid, I feel compelled to write. (And of course I got Covid! No one wears masks on airplanes anymore—and especially not in Florida!)

Plus, I barely slept for four days.

But it was an AMAZING trip!

It was the culmination of a year-long program of these Jewish and Latino kids working together—yet they had barely interacted until now.

This was our job—to get them to talk to each other, separated by their own little safe groups, their very own tribes: the Orthodox Jewish boys from one school, the groups of Latino kids from their public schools, the one Jewish girl who didn’t have a tribe.

We did museums, community gardening, Salsa dance lessons, the beach…

But the most important thing was the time we spent sharing and listening to each other’s stories in smaller, mixed groups.

It was through personal stories that the kids finally connected across the vast cultural and socioeconomic chasm that separates us in our society.

Little by little, they opened up to each other.

Each one felt heard. Each one felt like they counted.

By the last day, they were dancing, playing, laughing and jumping in the hotel pool together. They had finally bonded.

This week we begin the fourth book of the Torah: Numbers/B’midbar/In the Desert.

And the first thing that happens in this last book is, everyone is counted: Each tribe, each individual—well, each male—I have to be truthful.

But that’s an important fact.

Because it begs the question: who among us is not counted? Who doesn’t count in society’s wider eye?

One of the things we did as a group was learn about the housing crisis in Florida, especially Miami.

There’s so much “speculation” going on, so much construction—but it’s all for the wealthy; the average local person is being priced out, much like in New York City.

This vice I saw in Miami of over-consumption of resources (fancy buildings, high-blasting air conditioning, bottled water) in a place that nature didn’t intend to have large human populations, is something that’s happening all over our country.

As a society that supports “market speculation,” building where we shouldn’t be for those who don’t need it, we are not counting those who need to be counted.

Seeing the immensity of the problem in such a concentrated way made me feel overwhelmed and helpless.

But at the same time, I was given an incredible gift.

Being with these young people, hearing them exchange their stories, seeing them connect despite vast differences, and listening to their solutions to the problems, their passion and drive to make change happen, gave me hope.

There was a small amount of healing in our tiny corner of the Earth this weekend.

I told them, if they are our future, then there is hope for the future of humanity.

And let us Amen.