On The Nightstand Thursdays: Jewish Origami

I can almost guarantee this is totally not the sort of thing darling Jewcy had in mind when "On The Nightstand Thursday" was hatched, I'm sure. But, this week, shuffling through book after book, trying to find just the right, heavy, thought-provoking title to share with all of you, I found these early on and kept coming back to them. Was it the paper hammentaschen? Maaayyyyybe. The little horrible stereotype of a shrugging guy made from folded paper on the cover? Maaaaaayyyyyyyyybe. An any event, I couldn't let this one go, so humor me. I promise you a more impassioned essay of greater intellectual clout next week. But for now: Jewish Origami.

The first book I found was Jewish Holiday Origami by Joel Stern. Tracking down a copy and giving it a whirl, I have to admit challenging as it may be, making tiny origami Torah scrolls might be my new thing. It might. It was fairly easy to follow and didn't make me feel like a complete paper-folding failure, so I liked it. What to do with all of my efforts, I wondered? Well, there's no shortage of tiny Jewish kids on my radar, and they were at first curious, then amazed, then delighted to shred, stomp, hide and otherwise enjoy their paper treasures. My cat was pretty gung-ho about a few things, but lost interest once he realized they weren't too stalkable.

So, I moved on to Jewish Origami by Florence Temko. I kind of sucked at making the tiny origami dreidels, but there was some improvement with each. So, I tried out Jewish Origami II, and had a bit less success, but all in all, I have to admit my Jewish origami experience was kind of fun. So, run right out and try it for yourself and totally, completely impress your friends silly with your folding-savvy.  Plus, you know, if I'm not the only one doing Jewish origami, I'll feel a little less-weird about it all. Heh.