We often don’t notice truths that are too obvious until they’re pointed out to us. For millennia, for generations, Jews have shared an experience while preparing for Pesach every year. It’s so common, so expected and, thus, taken for granted that we usually miss it.

There is never enough time. There is always just the right amount of time.

Pesach is the most effort-intensive of the Jewish calendar. To whatever extent one observes, perhaps it’s just the arrival of spring and new beginnings or perhaps it’s the rigorous halachic requirements to make one’s house, or at least kitchen, properly kosher for Pesach, followed by the mad rush to shop and cook, either hosting or contributing to a festival meal often including several households or just getting out of the house and to your hosts without delaying everyone with your tardiness…. The further requirement to say to (teach) your son  (children) also takes time, in ever-shorter supply, to prepare.

Perhaps it’s genetic and runs in families or maybe it really is more Jewishly universal, but even when I haven’t hosted or prepared a Seder in years, enjoying the hospitality and friendship of others, by noon on Erev Pesach, the day before the festival actually begins at sundown, I feel all the internal signs of anxiety and distress. My feet tap, I yearn for yet another coffee, my eyes turn this way and that. It’s not unusual that the night before I’ll have one of those recurring dreams where, magically, I’m a teenager, back in school, realizing that I hadn’t prepared for the exam about to be administered. But…… I take a breath and get started, anyhow.

These are, indeed, primal lessons of Pesach. There’s always one more spot of potential chametz (leaven) you forgot to clean. One more favorite dish there just won’t be time to cook or bake this year. One more insight to prepare to share with friends and family, perhaps with students or congregants. One more nagging sense that it’s already too late to flag down a taxi to the site of your Seder and that you’ll arrive hot, sweaty, exhausted and late.

But even if that happens, somehow the Seder always starts, even if somewhat late (fortunately, for those precise about halacha, there’s a time to stop weekday “work” and to light candles, but no prescribed time to begin the actual Seder).  Seated around the table, even if the younger kids are beneath it or madly running around it, voices will join singing the familiar starting song, Kadesh Urchatz, Karpas Yachatz…….

For those familiar with American slang, I’ll assume you know what the last three letters of the acronym SNAFU stand for. But keep in mind the first two, “Situation Normal”.

My Rebbe, teacher and mentor growing up in Denver, Rabbi BCS Twerski, often remarked that there will plenty of time for “peace of mind” after 120 (the biblical lifespan). Life is not meant to be a vacation, but nor is it a lifetime of drudgery. The lesson of Pesach is that, somehow, with all the slavery and drudgery and pressure and anxiety of “everyday life”, we’ll have exactly the right amount of time.

May we all experience, and be aware that we’re experiencing, the redemption from unrelenting pressure and restriction and anxiety (an expanded definition of the Hebrew word for Egypt, Mitzrayim) to a Redemption, Geula, ever-expanding life and love and connection and Being. Chag Pesach Sameach.

And now, back to the kitchen to finish the charoset…….