The Opinion Section created the column Argus Apps to humanize the college process. Common App essays only ever exist within the framework of college admissions, alongside a list of accomplishments, extracurriculars, and test scores. With Argus Apps, we’re revisiting old Common App essays written by Wesleyan students to think about where we’ve been and where we’re going. In this edition, we hear from Opinion Editor Zara Skolnik ’26.
I decided to center my college application essay around my relationship to Judaism as a woman taking on a role in this religion typically reserved for men. After re-reading and reflecting upon this essay, I was inspired to compare my understanding of my gender and feminism now to when I wrote this piece two years ago. To be completely honest, I don’t think there is a drastic difference in my attitude then versus now. However, I think I resonate more strongly with the feeling of wanting to “take up less space” because of my identity as a woman. Since I wrote this essay, Roe v. Wade has been overturned, and women’s rights are being increasingly infringed upon every day. So, I don’t blame my past self for feeling like I don’t belong in the position as a shofar blower, a person who blows out of a ram’s horn on certain holidays, for my synagogue. However, seeing female affinity groups on this campus partake in male-dominated activities and intellectual fields has made me realize that there is nothing wrong with taking a position a man has typically occupied. Today, I blow shofar for the Wesleyan Jewish Community, and I am just as proud to do it now as I was two years ago.
Breath Control
Tekiah (one single blast), Shevarim (three continuous blasts), Teruah (nine staccato blasts), Tekiah Gedolah (the final prolonged blast)—four sounds made by the shofar, an ancient Jewish instrument formed out of a ram’s horn. It takes both a lot of breath and a lot of breath control to produce a sound with the shofar, but it came fairly easily to me since I had been playing the oboe for four years. The shofar is blown on the Jewish High Holidays to signify a day of repentance—and blowing it is typically the duty and privilege of an older male member of the synagogue. But I have been the Ba’al Tekiah (shofar blower) for five years at my synagogue—the first female and first teenager to take on this tradition. Once I started learning more about Jewish customs, I realized that performing the role of Ba’al Tekiah as a woman is a complex, and, in certain denominations of Judaism, forbidden, deviation from tradition.
Paradoxically, as I learned more about the role of women in the Jewish community, I started to feel more constrained by my gender. Rather than assuming the role of crusading feminist warrior, I started trying to take up less “space” in the world around me. I was intimidated by my ultra-orthodox relatives’ disapproval of my shofar blowing. Instead of viewing others’ negative judgments as an opportunity for debate, I found myself trying to conform to their expectations—to be less than I really was. Breath control took on a new meaning for me: it was no longer just for playing the shofar or the oboe but became a form of everyday self-censorship. I had always been the extroverted girl who voiced radical opinions and was willing to face criticism but now I was realizing that being a girl came with disadvantages: I noticed the conspicuous absence of other girls in my advanced science classes; the attack on abortion rights at the national level; the constant onslaught in the news of stories about sexual assault on women; the disapproving comments from boys who didn’t like “loud” girls. I internalized all these things, even the ones I didn’t experience directly. I quietly became more anxious about how I, as a female, could expect to be treated in this world. It felt like a long intake of breath.
Fortunately, my feelings about being female, as well as about my role as shofar blower, have evolved since then. An important catalyst for that change was the feedback I got from my Rabbi’s wife (Sharon) who told me that my being the first young female shofar blower made her feel confident about the future of the synagogue as well as Judaism in general. This interaction awakened me to my own inner feminist—the one I had been suppressing. I realized that taking on a tradition that “doesn’t belong to you” is what creates social change, and for me, that has been the dominant incentive for blowing the shofar. As I grew into the role of Ba’al Tekiah, I felt proud that I was creating a space for women in Judaism rather than worrying about taking up that space. Now, I want to use my shofar blowing as a platform for other young females to feel entitled to make noise—to use their full lung capacity, as it were.
I still see a lot of women who are controlled to some degree by a patriarchal system that prescribes and proscribes their behavior. When I blow the shofar, though, I no longer let myself be controlled by preconceptions about who should be a shofar blower. I feel the full freedom of releasing my breath in the loud, raw, and joyous blasts of the shofar. I hope that I can awaken people not only literally through the shofar but metaphorically to the ways in which traditions can and should evolve to be more inclusive.
Zara Skolnik can be reached at zskolnik@wesleyan.edu.