Observing The Observant

draft
Observing the Observant
by
geo geller
geo (at) ObservingTheObservant.com

I am a shabbes goy, a secular brooklyn bred nyc jew, very independent moving/still/audio documentary imagemaker who grew up a part time jew – my earliest memories from living on the outskirts of the ghetto called boro park brooklyn before many of the men in black hats, long black coats and long black hair who didn’t look like us was as my mother, and father said “they made us look bad” “they were from the 17th century in their dress and habits too – from the old world” they said that every time we saw the observant jews – my mother coming from warsaw poland, spoke with an accent she thought all of her life and was trying to assimilate into the new american world order – like many conservative jews i was bar mitzvahed – my mother, who was my friend and youngest and funniest person i knew, of course i understood this as we both got older and younger together – she left her body behind jan 2011 at the age of 101 – she was my favorite photo and documentary muse you can see my tribute to my mother my muse at http://ViZualPoetry.com/mom too – she also had her own private relationship with god and her own religion, her god was a forgiving god who she spoke to often especially when calling my name – asking for god to forgive me in her prayers i am sure 🙂 – she observed the jewish holidays and lit candles on shabbes and fasted on yom kipper and celebrated certain holidays – she believed in the goodness of people and infected me with that for some stranger the fiction reason i have an unrecoverable social conscious documentary addiction – anyway all of her prayers and asking for forgiveness for her favorite and only son obviously didn’t work — interestingly, the conservative jews looked down with a certain disdain on the observant jews as giving them a bad name — I started Observing the observant to my surprise by accident – but that is another story for another time – through observing the observant documentary i hope to be and to give an open minded and hearted observation the good, the bad, the beautiful, the ugly and I will stick to that and try and let you, the observer of the observant decide for yourself – which if in full disclosure is not easy – the more i know the less i wish i knew – what does that mean – it means i know too much and after four years i have a love/hate relationship that i hope as it unfolds will let people speak for themselves

be well

geo geller
gidalia baruch