not enough deep breaths in the world

i received a call this morning to officiate at a non-member funeral.  i said yes once confirming that my schedule is clear.  the deceased was a member of a conservative synagogue and the rabbi there was not available.  about 60 minutes later i received a call from the funeral home,

"rabbi, we're so sorry.  you are not allowed to officiate at the funeral because you are not a man and that is not allowed in this particular synagogue's cemetery."

after confirming the family was aware of this with the funeral home i freed up my schedule once again.

fortunately, the male senior rabbi at ts was as disgusted as i am.  he put a call into the rabbi at the conservative synagogue to find out the story. 

i don't think i could make this story up if i tried.

stress much?

to say that the last month has been stressful would be the understatement of the year.  a year that is less than 30 days old.   i feel as though there is no way to get around this and perhaps i will only look back on my first year of the rabbinate with rose colored glasses because never again will i know what it is like to relax without being on vacation.  i know that this isn't something that only happens to rabbis, at the same time i am finding that a lot of my friends who work in other fields can't entirely relate.  i hoped that after the hhds things would calm down and my stress would lessen.  perhaps what there is for me to improve is the way i respond to stress.  how do you deal with stress?