From the Editor Jane Liddell-King Firstly, a huge thank you to all of you who have contributed to this magazine and to those stalwarts who have ironed out the many mistakes I missed and upon whose technical know-how I crushingly lean. On 29th May, 6 Sivan, Shavuot, my cousin, Michael Kagan died of Covid 19. For years, despite severe and recurrent respiratory infections, he had fought and won a battle against cancer. But his life depended on regular chemotherapy. On his last visit to hospital, his test for Covid 19 came back negative. And then a second test came back positive. His sister records that he was extremely cross. Even as he struggled for breath, he talked on his mobile to his wife and children about the needs of the birds in the garden, about coming home. He chose life until the very last minute. I mention this because the global pandemic has affected us as individuals and it is as individuals that we have responded to each other. None of us has dwindled into namelessness. Reuven has brought us together on Fridays, sharing his thoughts on masks, time, his excitement over the number of mitzvot in a single pasuk. He has heartened us with psalms and news of friends who have survived Covid. Sarah Schechter has unfailingly sent the Cambridge Jewish Support newsletter and the Goldrein family have kept us in online tea and good company. We have Zoomed, telephoned, emailed: grateful for the digital age. Each gesture, however small, has helped us to face this anthropause, to adapt to a new normal, a Cambridge of disappeared shops, masked faces, and a river whose quietness feels like a blessing, a place to gaze and think, and perhaps, anticipate Taschlich and a new year. Now 3 Thompson’s Lane is open again and we can daven together. Another thank you to those who have given so much time and thought to enabling us to do so in safety.
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