In 1960, I started first grade at the Charleston Hebrew Institute in South Carolina. The day school was a new thing in Charleston and people wondered if it would affect the children's ability to adapt to a secular world. I was the first in my family to try the Hebrew Institute.

I still recall an almost daily custom of our carpooling moms. After picking us up they’d rendezvous at the new fast-food Hardee's. If you were “more kosher” you would have only milkshakes and French fries. If you weren’t so strict, 10 cent hamburgers or, if you didn't care at all, the 15 cent cheeseburger. One father in our carpool told us “Take that off your head and put it away,’ referring to the yarmulke.

My parents, though, didn’t mind if we looked Jewish outside of school. Some parents feared their children would get too religious, but no one in this cultured Southern city in the 60s felt so comfortable or brave about their Judaism.

I felt secure and happy in the Hebrew day school. It was like spending the day with your extended family. By the time I reached 3rd grade, 9 of the original 15 boys and girls remained in my class, remarkable for our small Jewish community.

At night, like clockwork, I’d wake up wheezing at 2 a.m., take my asthma medicine, and fix myself a cup of tea. While sipping my tea, I fell into the habit of reviewing my homework and studying Rashi’s commentary on the Torah.

The nocturnal study of Rashi somehow seemed to soothe my irritated lungs. I enjoyed delving into Rashi and grasping the answers to his hidden questions. In the morning I’d take my morning asthma tablet and my dark-circled eyes would shine in class when I was called on to read Rashi's explanations.

I also recall overhearing a conversation in the school corridor. “But you’re supposed to ENJOY Judaism!” Rabbi Katz emphatically said to a fellow teacher. He said it with such pride and vigor. “Enjoy Judaism?” The words shocked me. It was such a novelty to me. To me then, Judaism was something that you had to do or had to deal with, like asthma.

This wasn’t such a big conflict until I was a teenager attending public school. My parents belonged to the Orthodox shul which my father's great grandfather founded, so I had to wake up early Saturday mornings and go to shul. I resented not being able to stay out late with my friends at the pizza shop Friday nights.

Around the same time, a new teacher was influencing my younger brother Charles who, in turn, prevailed on the rest of the family to observe Shabbat. But it was too late to catch up with me. I’d be out with friends Friday nights at football games,or parties at the beach. Rashi became a long-forgotten friend.

After my third year at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, I approached my faculty advisor. “I want to take a sabbatical,” I told Professor Henrietta Croom.

“Sabbatical?”

Those days, breaking up the four years of college was a novel idea and had to be sold.

“I see you want to find yourself,” Dr. Croom said.

“Find myself? I know who I am. I just want a year off to be free.”

I was itching to go west to the woods of British Columbia, the place of my high school dreams, but my mother convinced me to wait until after Rosh Hashanah. My college friend from Ethiopia, Bezuwouk, and I drove across the Southern states. Passing through Albuquerque, New Mexico one afternoon, I stopped at a pay phone, opened the yellow pages, and searched for the number of a synagogue.

“Hi, when is Yom Kippur?” I asked.

“This evening. Services begin at 7 pm.”

“My friend and I are passing through town.”

“You're welcome. Seats are $200 for Kol Nidre, $300 for the morning service and yizkor memorial service, or $400 for the entire Yom Kippur.”

“Thanks, that's okay,” I said, and reset the receiver on its hook.

“They want 400 bucks just to sit in their temple,” I said to Bezu. “C’mon, let's hit the road.” It was just the excuse I needed to free myself of the guilt and drop the heavy yoke. I had never skipped Yom Kippur before in my life.

After 5 years of riding the “freedom” roller coaster, I found myself in August at the yeshiva in Morristown, New Jersey, tasting the wisdom of Torah and the joys of Judaism. In September, I returned to college in South Carolina with an English cap hiding my yarmulke and tzitzit tucked into my pants.

I returned to Yeshiva after graduate school. Now I finally had my real Sabbatical - Shabbat and all. Now, I don’t just happen to be a Jew - I’m happy to be a Jew!

A clinical research scientist, Tzvi Jacobs is author of “From the Heavens to the Heart.”