We are incredibly grateful to bring this anthology into the world, to bring fourteen different stories about Jewish life into the mainstream, and to bring together fifteen contributors (including ourselves) from varying backgrounds. But we couldn’t have done it alone. Thank you to Karen Greenberg and the entire Knopf team for believing in this anthology and pulling it all together behind the scenes. Thank you to our agents, Jim McCarthy and Louise Fury, for making this dream happen.
We are also grateful to have such an incredible list of contributors. Our authors worked on tight deadlines, answered what felt like a million emails, and, most importantly, shared their experiences and stories with us. We had a vision of what this anthology would be, but the end result surpassed even our greatest hope. These stories make us laugh and cry, and we hope our readers will experience the same wonderful emotions.
Laura would like to acknowledge her parents, who brought her up in a supportive and vibrant Jewish community. She is immensely grateful for every b’nai mitzvah party drop-off and pickup, for every Jewish youth group traveling fee, and especially for every bowl of matzo ball soup. She would also like to thank Congregation Etz Chaim and her rabbis, from both past and present: Rabbi Shalom Lewis, Rabbi Paul Kerbel, and Rabbi Dan Dorsch.
Katherine would like to acknowledge her family and all their support, not just for this book but always. She’d especially like to thank her mom for all the schlepping she did back and forth from synagogue—the super-supportive, kind mom in Some Days You’re the Sidekick; Some Days You’re the Hero is for you. She’d also like to thank Rabbi Yair Robinson, Marisa Robinson, Rabbi Elisa Koppel, and Congregation Beth Emeth for their support, wisdom, and teaching. She’d like to thank Congregation Rodeph Shalom for being a welcoming new home.
And, most importantly, we are grateful to our readers. Thank you for picking up this book. Whether or not you are Jewish, we hope you connected to these stories; we hope you found something that brought you joy, or made you think, or made you believe.
Thank you for reading.