By Bill Simons

Recently, I was asked to share personal reflections about my synagogue, Temple Beth El of Oneonta (NY), upon observance of its 90th anniversary. Although details differ amongst individuals and shuls, I believe that most of us have experienced a merging of community, synagogue and family in our formal Jewish affiliations.
My son Joe was born on September 24, 1984. His mother Donna, my first wife, is a mainline Protestant, but she agreed that Joe could be raised Jewish provided I took him to temple. If I did not, she said she would take him to church because a child needed the security of religious identity. I resolved to be a more observant Jew. 
I contacted an Albany mohel, and Joe was circumcised at Temple Beth El in the old kitchen. We invited friends and family to the ceremony. The circumcision was the first step toward conversion. 
Soon after Joe’s birth, Millie Levine gave him a homemade blanket and did the same a generation later for Joe’s oldest child, Lily.
Even after our divorce, Donna kept her pledge that Joe could be raised Jewish. Through the years, she would come to Temple Beth El when Joe was part of a service or other event put on by his religious school class. 
I was the founding president of the Oneonta Fathers’ Rights/Caring Parents group, an organization born in controversy and misrepresentation. Temple Beth El provided me a refuge during my years as a single father, not an easy status. Some of the synagogue mothers provided Jewish socialization opportunities for Joe and me. And the older ladies offered empathetic counsel. 
At home, Joe and I recited the blessing as we lit Shabbos candles. We also prayed before meals and at night. We visited extended family in Boston frequently. During one such visit, Joe’s Great-great-uncle Ted described the journey of the Simonovich family from Russian shtetls to our promised land of America with a drama never to be forgotten. 
During Joe’s boyhood, the Temple Beth El religious school was bursting with the energy of other Jewish children, something not found in the public school. Joe looked forward to Sundays. After religious school, Joe and I would go to the Southside Mall with Mark Boshnack and his children. The kids played video games while Mark invariably defeated me at air hockey. Then, the fathers and children would share lunch. 
On Yom Kippur, Joe and I would do our best to fast. After morning services, we would paddle and walk at Gilbert Lake, finding nature part of our immersion into the sacred Day of Atonement. Then, we would return to Temple Beth El for the Neilah service, always leaving with a sense of awe. 
Rabbi Donald Roberts was central to the Judaism experienced by Joe and me. For a time, I was part of the rabbi’s study group of Jewish literature. Discussions went deep. Catechism is not our tradition, and Rabbi Roberts encouraged us to grapple with the tough questions: How can a good and omnipotent God allow a child to suffer, and why did our people endure the Holocaust? 
Joe and I would go to the Emmons Farms residence of the rabbi and his wife Barbara, the cantorial soloist. There, Rabbi Roberts would prepare Joe for his formal conversion to Judaism. Finally, we were ready for the memorable drive to Beth David, the Orthodox synagogue on 39 Riverside Drive in Binghamton. The mikvah turned out to be a jacuzzi. Rabbi Roberts, Joe and I celebrated this great milestone with a big lunch at the Neptune Diner on Oneonta’s Southside. 
Subsequently, Rabbi Roberts devoted many hours to preparing Joe for his bar mitzvah. Three generations of the Simons family journeyed to Israel for Joe’s bar mitzvah at the Western Wall in Jerusalem. 
During the physical renovation of Temple Beth El, Joe and I participated in moving items to storage elsewhere. Joe enjoyed being paired with George Betts, who had a special way with young people.
And Joe and I were moved at the ceremony marking completion of the Temple Beth El renovations. There was a sense of excitement about that day, particularly when Ben Krohn, one of the founders, then nearly 100, arrived, albeit remaining in a car. Joe and I felt like we were participating in a piece of history.
For a single father and son, Passover could have been a time of lonely isolation, but it wasn’t. Faye Munson included us and other Diaspora sojourners in her family Passovers. In mind’s eye, I can still see the warm, crowded table. 
After his bar mitzvah, Joe would accompany me to the Men’s Club. The regulars made Joe feel part of the bagel minyan. There, Joe learned how Jewish men kibbitz. 
Former synagogue President Hollie Jaffe, from organizing nursing home Shabbat to home deliveries of Hanukkah candles, modeled congregational kindness for us. 
Ron Feldstein and I were co-advisors to the SUNY Oneonta Jewish student group. At the college, we organized a series of noshes that brought SUNY Oneonta students and the Temple Beth El community together with food, discussion and sometimes movies. For Joe, those experiences set the stage for his decision to do his undergraduate work at SUNY Oneonta.
All true communities have a heart and soul, and for Temple Beth El that would be Faye Munson. When Joe learned that he was to be a father, I initially displayed more anxiety than support. That evening, we went to a Shabbat gathering that Faye was leading at Temple Beth El. After others had left, Joe and I met with Faye in the temple library. We left with the feeling that things would be good and they were.
Rabbi Roberts counseled Joe and Lynette, and she made the decision to convert to Judaism. Since then, I frequently think of the following verse from the Book of Ruth: “[F]or whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.”
Lynette became a nurse, Joe an attorney, entrepreneur and pilot. Their five children, three of whom have gone to Jewish day school, range from a year old to 19. In Swampscott, MA, Joe was elected president of Shirat Hayam, the largest New England synagogue north of Boston. 
I still attend Temple Beth El, accompanied on holidays and lifecycle observances by Nancy, wife and life partner for 22-plus years. 
Joe carries with him lessons learned at Temple Beth El – and so do I.