It may be only August 12, but summer is over for me -- I'm sitting in my "office" in Merced (aka Starbucks) back in the swing of my student pulpit, with an email box full of information about booklists, class schedules, and the usual beginning-of-term negotiations.

I feel a little frantic, but good. There's already too much to do, and officially, school doesn't even begin for a week.

This week begins Devarim [Deuteronomy]. The Torah seems to stop and repeat itself, sort of, only with more detail about the laws. September is like that. The beginning of the 4th year of rabbinical school is like that, too. We gather together, we take a deep breath, and we do it again.