At 13, I was a man. Today I just am.

Next week is the anniversary of my Bar Mitzvah. It will be (oh dear God!) 33 years since I went up on the pulpit wearing my brand new 3-piece suit and in my squeaky "trying-to-evolve" voice declared to all of the family members, friends, and pretty good number of strangers that from that day forward I was a man.

Little did I know…

On the Shabbat of my Bar Mitzvah, I led the Friday night service, read the entire weekly Torah portion as well as the Haftarah (reading from one of the books of Prophets) and led the final service on Saturday morning in the synagogue.

More importantly, I was the excuse for a big Kiddush after the Saturday morning services (various food, drinks, and other refreshments). Then on Saturday night I had a kick-ass party for my friends at my house with lots of the greatest hits of 1977 playing on the record player.

OK – let's be honest – in my mind at the time, it was a "kick-ass" party, but in reality the best that can probably be said for it was that of all the Bar Mitzvah parties held that year, mine was definitely one of them.

But it was my "rite of passage" – what every Jewish kid goes through at that age.

Unlike what is statistically the majority of kids though, I actually stayed involved on some level, although for very many years I worked very hard at giving the impression of being much more knowledgeable and observant than I really was. I continued going to weekly services with my folks, occasionally read the Torah portion, or the Haftarah, or led one of the Sabbath services.

We kept kosher in the home, and while out of the house we were not – according to Jewish law, being kosher, I never ate meat in restaurants and never ever had anything blatantly not-kosher (i.e. pork products).

When I went off to college, I decided to start showing even more what a "holy man in training" I was, and I began to wear my kippa (skullcap / yarmulke) full-time. Of course, when I say "full-time" I mean except for when I went into McDonalds (to get fish sandwich – never meat), or any other restaurant, since they weren't kosher. I also took off the kippa when I was out and about on Saturdays – I wouldn't want people to think that I was a hypocrite – advertising myself as "religious" by wearing my kippa yet going into non-kosher restaurants and violating the Sabbath (never mind that in doing so I really WAS being a hypocrite – but I didn't want anybody (besides me) to think or know that).

3 years later, when I moved to Atlanta, I kept up this personal "tradition" – wearing the kippa in public, but covering it when I went out on Shabbat or into the various restaurants (never ordering meat, of course – that wouldn't have been kosher). There were many Friday evenings when I drove to the local Orthodox synagogue, and I was very careful about parking a couple of blocks away and hiding the key so that I could walk to the synagogue (religiously observant Jews don't drive on the Sabbath) and go in as a nice young religious single. The beauty of that particular synagogue was that I never went into services without receiving at least 2 or invitations to Shabbat dinner.

After dinner, I would very "religiously" walk back to my car (confident that nobody from the synagogue was there to see me), take my key from its hiding spot and drive home to watch TV.

All in all, I thought I had a pretty good life at the time. People who knew me thought that I was a nice religious boy, but I wasn't weighed down by too many of the obligations and restrictions that went along with that label.

Then it came time to move to Israel. I had decided that my first stop in the Holy Land should be a kibbutz (a communal living settlement) which offered an ulpan (intensive Hebrew learning program). Every immigrant is entitled to receive a 5-month ulpan, fully subsidized to help ease into Israeli society. I had been all set to go to a kibbutz which was not a religious kibbutz, but when I discovered that this also meant that they were not kosher, I decided to switch to a religious kibbutz.

My life on this kibbutz opened my eyes to what I had been doing for past several years, but not really in a good way.

I went to services at the kibbutz synagogue – not so much by choice, but because that's what we had to do (When in a "religious" community, do as the Romans do, and all that....).

2 things really struck me there – one was how unspiritual it seemed. People were talking non-stop through the services, praying at a pace faster than the speed of light, and basically just going through the motions of being a religious community without having any of the real "oomph" to what they doing. In all fairness, this was not everybody there, and probably not even the majority of people, but it was a high enough percentage that it really stood out for me and struck me as a bit phony as best and hypocritical at worst. It made me thing that if this was where "religiously observant" Judaism was and was heading, that there really wasn't much future for it.

The second thing that struck me from this whole thing was that what I had been doing for the several years leading up to this time was not really any different that what I was seeing on the kibbutz that really bothered me. I was putting one show on for the outside world to see and to define me – a definition that I wanted to wear with pride, but privately there was none of the reality backing it all up.

I realized that it was time to make some decisions. I couldn't go on mirroring what upset me with so many of the kibbutz members. The time had come to "shit or get off the pot" – either to truly follow a religious lifestyle or to stop letting people think that I was. Either way, I had to be much more consistent with what I projected outwards and what I was truly believing and following for myself.

For whatever reason inside of me, there was obviously something about the traditional side of Judaism that I had never been able or willing to let go. I would eat in non-kosher restaurants, but not the meat – that seemed to taking it "too far" for me. I would drive to the Orthodox synagogue in Atlanta, but I was going to services, and something inside of me really wanted to be invited to a family's home for the traditional Shabbat dinner. I wore my kippa - even though I projecting, or advertising something that I really wasn't, it was something with which I felt the need to be associated. Something about this whole "Judaism" thing was keeping me holding on, even if I didn't know what it was.

Understanding that reality, albeit without understanding the reasons helped push my decision. If I wanted to be associated with observant Judaism, then I should at least learn what it was all about. So I spent the next 2 years at a yeshiva (learning center of Jewish texts, thought and tradition) learning. This particular yeshiva is a very special place – aimed primarily for people searching for "answers" but refusing to give them the answers. Rather, all of the rabbis and teachers there help us develop the tools for finding the answers within ourselves.

This set me on a path, which today I find very ironic.

I have reached the point in my religious development and my observance level that not only do I refuse to label myself in any way, but I don't think that I really fit into any of the labels.

I am what I am (and that's not Popeye the Sailor Man). I consider myself religiously observant – which is not so much a "label" as it is a description (and yes, there is a huge difference between the two), but that doesn't necessarily mean that I fit into any of the categories of "types" of Jews. I have my spectrum of beliefs, some of which would fall into the "Orthodox" camp, others into the "Conservative" one and others yet into ""Reform". I'm not comfortable praying in a Conservative or Reform synagogue, but I don't rule out the possibility that they might be "right" and I'm wrong.

On the other hand, maybe there is no "right" and "wrong" in this – everybody has to find what works for them in their relationship with God (for those that feel that have/want/need a relationship with God – not everybody does, and it is definitely not a pre-requisite for leading a good, moral and fulfilling life).

In my religious practice, I lean much more towards the traditional, but in philosophy and theology, I fall all across the spectrum. That being said, I believe that my practice and beliefs are actually consistent with one another. I don't assume to have the ultimate "right" answers, nor do I presume to have a monopoly on any ultimate "truths". There is too much up in the air, too much unknown.

Which brings me back to where I started this blog. The anniversary of my Bar Mitzvah is next weekend, and as I did oh-so-long-ago, I will be reading the Torah portion in my synagogue next Shabbat. At the time, it was important for me to define myself as a "man" – although I don't know many 13 year-old boys that really understand what that means.

And at the time, my real biggest concern wasn't what it meant to be a man, it was how much would my party that night really kick some serious tush?

What I have since learned is that the passage from childhood into adulthood is the constant struggle to figure out who I really am, as opposed to "what" I think I want to be. I spent so many years trying to define myself, trying to find the label that best suited me, and trying to see that others would give me that label – as if somehow magically being labeled by others would help determine how I could see myself.

The irony is that today I'm happier than ever being un-labelable (yes, I know that's not a real word. Deal with it!). Labels don't work. Definitions don't work. Even descriptions aren't so clear cut as I once thought they were.

It's kind of funny, but after spending so many years trying to push others to define as something that I really wasn't, today I can't even define myself for what I am.

And somehow that seems to fit me pretty well.