The Attic

B"H

Dream World of a Different Era

Golden hair with gentle waves, she looked like a Russian princess to me.  Not that we learned any great love for the czar and his family.  All that I heard was that G-d should keep him far from us.  But this Russian princess had her own chest of clothing and her own dressing table and chair with a perfect little brush that matched it all.  I spent hours playing with the attic doll.  My sister, on the other hand, found an exquisite wooden horse.  That is who she wanted every time we visited Uncle's big old attic in the big old green house.      Cereal and milk was the food of choice for the horse.  Bailah said that horses eat oats and this cereal had oats.  I don't know about the milk.  My princess had tea and cookies.  And so did I.    

How long did we spend in that attic?  Who knows?  Untethered by time we spent our summer afternoons with Uncle.  When the fall began to find us, life stirred, it hustled and bustled, and carried us to a New Year with a New Book of Life where good, healthy, safe lives were supposed to be inscribed therein for us all.  

The Big Old Green House

B"H

A Shelter For Us All

It was green. It was old because there was still a carriage in the carriage house and two stalls for horses.  And it was a shelter for us because my uncle loved us all so much.  

We felt that the house had secrets.  Special hidden staircases that allowed you to appear out of no where.  A jail in the basement and tunnels that led you out of the house to cellar doors three houses down by the big old oak tree.  The sub-basement had thousands of dusty, dirty old bottles filled with something.  Who knows what was in them?  And again, more tunnels in another direction.  Those tunnels met up with brick walls.  Here and there we saw playing cards on the ground with our flashlights.  Who would be nuts enough to play cards down here?  Exploring inside was much better than hide and seek outside.  But, Uncle's neighborhood was changing.  All the big old houses were being torn down and replaced with apartment buildings.  Where once only one family lived or by our time, one old, old woman lived, now twenty families lived.  All tunnels lead to brick walls.  And the carriage was gone replaced by a car.  

Papa Was No Tzaddik...

B"H

But, Perhaps His Teacher Was.

"Listen," said my Bubbe, "Papa was no tzaddik, he was just a lonely man.  I was his wife.  I took care of him.  I fed him, I did his laundry, I gave him sons, I kept house, I made Shabbos and holidays.  I took care of his brothers one by one as they came out of Russian hell.  But, a woman gets tired as she gets older.  It's nice to sleep at night.  And that is why I say Papa was no tzaddik."  

Fragments of Confession

B"H

Another Year

Dear Beatrice, 

We just received notice of your approaching yahrzeit.  As in past years I will most likely be the one to buy the candle, set it up, and light it.  Your son, my husband, might be there because I will have called him to participate in this gesture but then again he might still be working when the time comes to light this candle... so, who knows?  Perhaps you do.  

I must admit diminishing anger.  You no longer occupy my every waking moment.  Your boxes of stuff never got dealt with to a natural conclusion.  I kept seeing things that had no connection to the version of you that you bestowed upon me.  I saw a wonderful, vivacious, and confident woman.  But that is not who I knew.  I stopped going through your worldly possessions the day I found your perfume.  

A Good Daughter...

B"H

...Makes Shabbos For Her Mama

But, there was no daughter, there were no children, and so Yosef lit the candles for his beloved Lina, he said the Kiddush, and he held the two loaves of challah close while he said the Motzi.  Lina always could speak to him on Friday night, ... to tell him good Shabbos... and she could always smile back at him when he kissed her a good Shabbos.  It was just the two of them.  And some rabbis tried to take even that away from them.  What had the world come to be?  

Three Weeks

B"H

How Can We Know?

Tisha B'Av, the 9th of Av, ends the three week period of mourning for the destruction of the two Holy Temples in Jerusalem.  Josephus gives us an eye witness account which is so excruciating we cannot fathom the despair of our people in that time.  Reading about the destruction is heart-wrenching.  We even cry.  But there is no connection between the reading of it and the living of it.  

To Say "No"...

B"H

...Can Be A Gift?...

"We want all of our favorite songs, even twinkle," said the couple.  

"No problem... especially with twinkle.  Mozart has a lovely theme and variations on this simple tune," said I.  The bride and groom had just signed the contract to engage my ensemble to perform the music for their wedding.  With a non-refundable down-payment to save the date, we all shook hands and made arrangements for the rehearsal and the rehearsal dinner.  This was going to be a beautiful season.  But, somewhere between the handshakes and a month later the ground shifted.

Both bride and groom were medical residents. Their work lives became overwhelmingly busy.  The bride's mother was not pleased and in her displeasure pronounced an ultimatum.  If the couple had not finished with certain wedding  details within the next two weeks then she and the bride's eldest brother were taking over everything.  Can you imagine what happened?  Two weeks later, nothing had happened and the promised "coup d'etat" was a "fait accompli"... meaning the bride's mother and brother were now in charge.  

I knew nothing of this until the phone call.