A Bar Mitzvah Like No Other
Rachel, Zevi, Akiva and Elisheva Beneson at Zevi’s drive-by party.
PHOTO BY BINYAMIN WEITZ
JEWSINTHED
A very socially distant bar mitzvah celebration. SHELLI LIEBMAN DORFMAN CONTRIBUTING WRITER
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his summer, after a literal lifetime of anticipation and a year of near-continual planning, my husband, Michael, and I shared in the excitement and pride as our grandson Zevi became a bar mitzvah. Only downside was, due to COVID-19 travel and health concerns, the small group that surrounded him that day did not include us. Like many, our family has been though the gamut of frustration, anxiety and personal sadness during the pandemic. The bar mitzvah was supposed to be the bright star in an erratic, arduous and baffling time. Though Zevi and his family — including our daughter and son-in-law Stephanie and Avi Beneson and Zevi’s siblings Rachel, 11, Akiva, 9, and Elisheva, 5 — live more than 600 miles away in New Jersey, we were there the day each of the children was born. We never imagined being home in West Bloomfield when Zevi was called to the Torah in, of all places, a grassy area between a swing set and a vegetable garden in our kids’ neighbor’s backyard in the Garden State. In March, with the onset of lockdowns and prohibitions, nearly every single supposedly set-in-stone entry that had been checked off the extensive bar mitzvah list was in need of a major overhaul. The only thing that would remain just as planned was the date. Zevi would become a bar mitzvah on his Hebrew birthday and would read the Torah portion he had been learning since last summer.
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As our kids worked with persistently changing guidelines, our plans also fluctuated. Assessing it would be unsafe to fly since masks were not yet mandatory on planes, we would instead travel by car, making an overnight stop along the Zevi with his dad, Avi, the way. Thursday before his Shabbat bar mitzvah service. At that point, we canceled the postbar-mitzvah-week trip to the Jersey Shore with our children and grandchilThe four-generation gathering — includdren, initially envisioned as a continuation of ing Zevi’s other grandparents, Dr. David and the celebration. Marci Beneson of Southfield, and dozens of Even as Zevi’s synagogue service and kidothers from the Detroit area — assembled dush for 300-400 guests became a plan for for the traditional bar mitzvah party agenda: an outdoor minyan, and the catered meals pandemic-style. turned into decorative, individually wrapped In a grid-pattern of faces, participants packages, we still thought we’d be there. shared the screen to view a short music video, Mall and specialty store shopping became listen to Zevi’s inspirational d’var Torah and online suit, dress and shoe purchases, each celebrate with speeches and toasts. accompanied by a specially ordered coordiThat week, I checked the gas and oil in my nating mask. car in anticipation of our trip, which was to be the first time we would see our kids since SO MANY CELEBRATIONS Thanksgiving! And we were also tested for By June, the guest list and search for the perCOVID antibodies, thinking a possible expofect invitation turned to email addresses and sure might have given us a way to feel more a Zoom link for online festivities to take place comfortable about traveling, and were disapthe Sunday before the Shabbat service. pointed with negative results. That afternoon, we logged on with more Two days after “Zevi’s Zoom” was his than 100 friends and family from three coun- Hebrew birthday, the official date on which he tries and seven American states, including became a bar mitzvah. That morning, he was those who disappointingly canceled travel called to the Torah for his first-ever aliyah, in plans, but with the perk of the presence of a congregation of classmates in his teacher’s some who all along knew they would have backyard. been unable to be there. The afternoon was highlighted by a drive-
