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Matt and I grab seats at the Blagden Alley La Colombe to chat about his formative experiences at summer camp, intentionality, the joy (and frustration) of hosting, what’s next on his Partiful, youth collectives, and the engagement he’s (kind of) responsible for.
Samuel: How’d you end up in the DMV?
Matt: I’m from Potomac, very near Potomac Village. I went to Churchill. I have basically moved closer and closer to the Capitol. I went to school at Georgetown, and now live two blocks from [Blagden Alley].
Samuel: What’s kept you in the area?
Matt: I love the international relations and all the political stuff that’s here and not anywhere else. I grew up in a house where my parents and brother were always talking about what they read in the newspaper, so I kind of got indoctrinated at an early age to care about everything that goes on in and around DC.
Samuel: Is there anywhere else you’d like to live someday?
Matt: I think it’d be fun to live in Taiwan. I have Mandarin skills and it’s fun to keep them up, but hard to keep up when you’re not in school.
Samuel: What’s your Jewish community like, especially having grown up in the area?
Matt: Growing up, my main Jewish community was from camp. I went to Camp Mosh, the one in Maryland. It’s a small socialist Zionist youth-lead camp. That was everything. My parents tried to –
Samuel: Sorry, socialist Zionist youth-lead camp?
Matt: So everything is run by people who are generally 22 or younger. At other camps, there’s counselors, but there’s other adults around really running things. At Mosh, there’s us and a few scant adults, but basically every decision is made by someone 22 or younger.
Samuel: How’s that experience affected you?
Matt: I think a big one is intentionality. You realize that nothing gets done unless you want it to get done, and you can sit passively by and maybe something will happen, but maybe it won’t. What I learned is that if you really want to make it happen, you do it yourself, and you make sure it happens.
Samuel: Very interesting! Back to your community today.
Matt: Now, I’ve basically merged all the Jewish communities in my life. There are people from camp, Jews I met at Georgetown, and meeting people in and around DC. I’m merging it all into this large group I try to maintain through Shabbat dinners and other events I host.
Samuel: Yeah, I heard you’re a very active host!
Matt: Probably six months into my time in DC, I started hosting small Shabbat dinners. They’re intimate, they’re good for getting to know people, but I also like putting a lot of people in the same room to socialize and have fun without having to pay for something or drink. It’s my apartment, so it’s not a third space, but I just make activities. I’ve done, now, probably 10 or 12 unique activities. We’ve done trivia. I made a living board game out of the Metro and had people chasing each other around.
And then I also try to organize still at least one Shabbat dinner a month with random groups of people over. What I’ve found is that people have really strong connections with a small group of people, but they’re usually looking for other friends, other people to meet…but you have to pry them away from [their small group]. I just try to put together the most random groups possible and see what happens.
Samuel: What signals to you that you’ve done a good job as a host?
Matt: It’s seeing people meeting new people and making connections they wouldn’t otherwise make. And some of that comes down to serendipity! Like, the last event I hosted, we were working in pairs, and two people who were randomly put together realized they were next-door neighbors.
Samuel: And you didn’t know beforehand?
Matt: I had no idea. But I look for things like that. You can’t always get it, but the Jewish geography and serendipity tends to happen. I also look to push people to do their own work, too. Part of organizing Jewish community is being like: Hey, this is a great thing, and if you want to try this, you can do it yourself.
Samuel: What does it feel like when something you plan doesn’t quite work?
Matt: I’ve definitely experienced that. That was a camp thing, too – sometimes you suggest something, and everyone knew each other so well that you could get really, really direct and sometimes incredibly tough feedback. I think it gets more natural with time. You just have to put yourself out there, to a certain extent. Start small and with people you know well. People you know better are going to be more willing to give you honest feedback.
Samuel: Is there a larger vision to all this event organizing you’re doing? Like, are you starting an organization down the line?
Matt: There’s not. I just want people to meet each other. And I know that some of my friends are going to leave DC, and I won’t be able to see them. So the best way to find people is to continually integrate new people into this group, so then I have Jewish community to surround myself with.
Samuel: A few quick ones to close. What are you feeling proud about right now?
Matt: I’m proud of the community I’ve put together. I met someone at Sixth & I who somehow knew one of my non-Jewish friends from Georgetown. We became friends, and then we went to a GatherDC happy hour together, and ended up talking to the one person I knew there – someone I knew from camp – and they hit it off. And now they’re engaged.
Samuel: What’s something you love about your neighborhood?
Matt: I love Logan Circle. Not right now, with the fencing up. It really, really annoys me. But just hanging out there is super fun. I like to go and read.
Samuel: What are you reading right now?
Matt: I’m reading the first of Robert Caro’s five books about Lyndon B. Johnson.
The aforementioned, fateful Happy Hour.
Samuel: You’re hosting Shabbat dinner and can invite any three people. Who are you bringing?
Matt: I want to invite someone who is Jewish and loves to cook, so I’d go with Claire Saffitz. I think it’d be fun to have John Mulaney at Shabbat dinner, even though he isn’t Jewish. His storytelling is unmatched. And then I’d invite my girlfriend. Or my Dad.
Samuel: Bring them both! Last one. Finish the sentence: When Jews of the DMV gather…
Matt: They bring joy and serendipity.
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