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corners from the old "heirloom tallit"
that belonged to her father and needle-
pointed the following verse on a new
atarah in petit point royal blue:

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Zeh shmi le-olam, ve-zeh zichri le-dor
va-dor: "This is My eternal name; this
will be My memory forever."
Saks embroidered the corners of the
tallit with her father's name, as well as
those of all the grandchildren.
At the service, Saks transferred the
atarah, which she had backed with
Velcro, from the heirloom tallit to
Ari's new tallit, its corners also embroi-
dered with family names.
For adult women, the tallit may
embody a tangible path to spirituality.
For boys, tallit, kippah and tefillin are
requirements. But for adolescent girls,
wearing a tallit is a choice — one that
often takes courage and commitment.
Many of Shira's friends wear a tallit
at their bat mitzvahs, but few continue
to wear it regularly, preferring to con-
form than to buck adolescent peer
pressure.
Loen Amer, 14, is the only girl who
wears tallit and tefillin in her grade.
When she wraps herself in the floral,
tie-die patterned tallit she made her-
self, she says, "It feels good. If I come
to the Shema and I don't have my tal-
lit on when I recite the verse about
tzitzit, it feels weird."
She and her three siblings each tied
the tzitzit (tallit fringes) in one of the

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from page 39

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four corners, with their parents' help,
and that family experience is sewn
into the fabric of her memory.
In her bat mitzvah message, Elana
Lancaster, one of Shim's friends,
described her struggle with her deci-
sion. "When the time came to start
deciding what role I would play in my
bat mitzvah ceremony, I was surprised
at how many decisions were based on
personal preference alone," she said.
Even after deciding to wear a tallit at
the ceremony, and enjoying the gift
her grandparents had bought for her,
"I was afraid to make the commit-
ment, afraid of what my decision
would say about me to the world. i
was afraid that deciding to wear it
would mean making a strong declara-
tion of faith and belief that I am not
ready for.
"I am 13: barely even a teenager. I
am only now beginning to figure out
who I am on the inside. Why are these
decisions about how to express my
beliefs on the outside being thrust on
me now?"
Elana has now decided to wear her
tallit all the time, confident that this is
what she wants. "Performing this ritu-
al now means more to me than it
would have had it been merely
required," she said. "I can only hope
that my choices in the future will offer
me as much insight into myself as this
one has."

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