Celeste and Eliana met in March 2017 at an event for queer Jewish New Yorkers at Henrietta Hudson, a lesbian bar in Manhattan. They chatted at the bar, but the real connecting started on the subway ride home. Most of their crowd headed toward Brooklyn, but Celeste and Eliana boarded the uptown A, toward Harlem and Washington Heights, where it turned out both lived.
Eliana was recovering from an ankle injury – she had danced too hard at a friend’s wedding. Celeste, who has never seen a dance floor she doesn’t like, was endeared.
Their first date was in Washington Heights, where they talked about their families and their relationships to Judaism.
The next day, Eliana flew home to St. Louis for Pesach.
Celeste still remembers Eliana sending her photos of the Machefsky family seder table on Erev Pesach. Endeared again, this time by the way Eliana and her family decorated for the Passover story – with toys representing each plague, a blue cellophane Red Sea, and Playmobil figurines of Miriam leading the people in song.
Then communication went dark. Eliana grew up modern Orthodox and maintained a commitment to halacha. Celeste only sort of knew what that meant, but learned it included Eliana being off her phone the first two days of Pesach. In the silence, they realized they both wanted to keep talking.
Eliana returned to New York and she and Celeste broke their chametz-fast together with pizza. Little did they know, this would be the start of a lifetime building Jewish rituals together.
There was a lot they didn’t know yet: That they would move to the Bay Area. That Eliana would become a lawyer. That they would adopt a dog, name her Beluga, and accumulate an embarrassing number of items printed with her face. But what they did know — whatever was next, they wanted to do it together.
Once Celeste and Eliana landed in the Bay, they took time finding their Jewish home. Two friends visited for Rosh Hashanah and together, the four explored local shuls: visiting one for Erev Rosh Hashanah and another for the first day; this one for the second day, and that one for Yom Kippur. All four felt most at home at Netivot Shalom, with its welcoming community, lay leadership and the beauty of its environment.
Covid put a wrench in their shul-going plans, but Eliana and Celeste found other ways to build Jewish community in a place still new to them. They constructed their first sukkah using palm fronds from a neighbor. They hosted a seder outside under a fig tree. The Bay Area added a little magic to it all.
On an early date, Eliana asked Celeste what qualities she most values in people. “Humor? Fun? Something like that,” Celeste said.
“Oh. For me, it’s integrity,” said Eliana.
It was a story Celeste would eventually share at their wedding, on July 2, 2023.
After six years, a cross-country move, and a pandemic, Celeste and Eliana were thrilled to finally celebrate with a wedding at Slide Ranch in Marin, and to host their aufruf with Minyan Dafna at Netivot Shalom. How incredible to see Eliana and her dad at the bimah together under the olive trees – Eliana leyning Torah and her dad reading the Haftarah. How special to bring their friends and families to the coast, to dance amidst the fog and walk through wild fennel.
Now Eliana and Celeste are celebrating nine years together, three married. They are so grateful for the Jewish home they have found in Netivot Shalom – a community filled with humor and integrity, and that special Bay Area magic.
