With the onset of cold weather came the biblical feast days. We had never observed these before, so they were especially exciting to us. We studied the bible a lot, as well as our Master Key magazines, to try and figure out what we were supposed to do.

First came the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur). On Yom Kippur, you are not supposed to eat or drink for 24 hours (from sunset to sunset) or to wear leather, or to work at all. You spend the entire day mourning for your sins over the past year and pleading with God/Yahweh to give both you and the world another chance, another year to do a better job of it. We didn't know about the leather, or not to drink water. We did fast for a whole day and prayed and studied all day long. If I remember correctly, we didn't sleep, either. We stayed up all night long praying until the sky began to lighten and the sun arose.

Afterwards, we had a short time to prepare for the next holy day/week, the Feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot). Now, modern day Jews do not stay outdoors for 8 days, not entering their homes, but this is what we thought we had to do. So, we put a lot of effort into setting up our tent in the back yard. The weather was already quite cold at night, and so Dennis set up a fire pit lined with stones, most of them brick to head size. The idea was that at night, we would bring the stone into the tent with us. All our food would have to be prepared outdoors too, so we prepared for all that as well. Dennis and my mom didn't want to rough it, and they hauled their mattress off their bed and into the tent. The goal was to not sleep, eat, or live in the hosue at all, although we would still have to use the bathroom facilities. Any forays into the house were to be as brief as possible.

This proved to be rather difficult. For one, the mattress took up nearly all the space there was in the tent. Lisa was allowed to sleep with Mom and Dennis. The rest of us shivered against the cold ground. The stones lost their heat within a few hours and then tormented us with their frigidity in our sleeping bags. `We had a lot of blankets, but cramped betwen the mattress and the sidewall of the tent, it didn't seem to matter. We hardly slept at all, we were so cold. Still, this was supposed to be a joyous holiday, so we tried not to complain. The second night, we tried to be more prepared. Forgoing pajamas, we wore long johns and clothing over the long johns, and as many socks as we could layer over one another. We piled blankets under ourselves and added more to the top layer as well. Lisa and Mom complained as vocally as anyone about the cold, and this was especially irritating, since the rest of us didn't have the bulk of a matress beneath of, nor the warmth of one another next to us. I was crammed in between the foot of the bed and the sidewall of the tent, and Mike and Gia laid alongside the mattress towards the door of the tent. The second night was just as cold and damp. In the morning, Mom declared that Israel was a warmer clime, and surely Yahweh wouldn't want us to suffer like this, and she and the girls went indoors for good. Dennis grumbled and ranted and raved about being steadfast in adversity, and he and I and Mike all stayed in the tent for the third night. Again it was cold, and there was an open rift between Dennis, who proclaimed that Mom and the girls were sinning and breaking the commandments about a high holy feast day, and Mom, who pled with us to come indoors (Mike and I tried to persuade her that we were tough and we loved camping, really we did). Dennis said that Yahweh would judge people who didn't keep his feasts. Finally Mom ordered us into the house, but Dennis stayed outdoors the entire eight days. We never camped out for the Feast of Tabernacles again.