oven in an hour or the kugel will burn.”
The phone rang. She hurried away. The smell of sweet lokshen kugel wafted into my room, right through the walls, and into my prayers. I sighed and gestured to the heavens. This was terrible timing.
There was a sudden roar from the kitchen as the mixer turned on. The beaters whirred loudly, turning gooey egg whites into frothy snow. My mother was baking the Shabbos cake, the vanilla sponge kind that was my most favorite thing.
I jumped up and finished with God.
“Dear, dear God,” I said hurriedly. “If I fast for forty days and nights, please do a miracle and make my brother normal.”
I said this three times just in case, so it would be as clear as possible, and also because I was in a rush. I wanted leftover cake batter before my sister got her hands on it.
Shabbos was getting closer.
“Try on the Shabbos robe I bought you,” my mother called. I grabbed the robe on my mother’s bed. It fit. Good. I took it off and tossed it on the floor.
“And don’t leave the robe on the floor!”
I picked up the robe.
I set the dining room table. Then I stuck my face inside the flat container of gefilte fish and ate. My mother demanded that I take my face out of her gefilte fish; she had worked on it all night long.
Only an hour and a half to Shabbos.
It was nearly dusk, but my father wasn’t home. It was the traffic again. And no matter how many times my mother had told him not to be late for Sabbath! No matter how many times…Why couldn’t the man leave earlier?
My little sister, Miri, refused to take a bath. And my sister Rivky called me a rotten brat because I refused to move the gefilte fish from the pot to the plastic container. But in with the fish was an actual fish’s head, beady dead eyes and hollow skull, and I said I was not going to touch it. I’d throw up if I had to—I would. Yitzy said that I was a real baby, because once upon a time in Jerusalem (Aunt Tziporah always said), our grandmother brought home a live fish every Thursday night and put it in the bathtub to swim. On Shabbos eve, she’d take it out and hold it down on the kitchen counter. Then, with the words “l’kovod Shabbos kodesh” —in honor of the holy Shabbos—she’d clop the thing over the head with the wooden clopper, praying for its quick death.
Sometimes the fish would slip out of my grandmother’s hands and Tziporah and her brothers would run around the kitchen in circles, screeching, as the fish, in honor of the holy Shabbos, jumped and flapped on the hard stone floor and my grandmother chased after it, clopper in hand.
And I couldn’t move one fish head from pot to plastic container.
I told Yitzy that I lived in New York. And I wasn’t touching the head of any dead fish, not for a hundred dollars.
Shabbos was in a half hour. My mother ordered me to call my father—now!
I picked up the receiver to call his car phone. I dialed—just as the front door swung open. It was my father. “It’s thirty minutes to Shabbos!” I hollered into the phone anyway. “Why couldn’t you leave earlier? ”
Twenty minutes to Shabbos.
My mother rushed out of the bathroom. My father rushed in. I rushed around, just because. Miri spilled strawberry yogurt all over her new Shabbos robe.
A neighbor came by. She needed the eggs I had borrowed last week. We did not have any eggs. She said I was irresponsible.
Ten minutes.
Mrs. Meitelis called. I picked up the phone. She said there was a Shabbos kallah after lunch tomorrow celebrating her daughter’s engagement. My mother should come. “Make sure you give her the message, Menuchah, okay?” Not like last time, when I had forgotten to give the message until Sunday evening. I was totally, incorrigibly scatterbrained. “Okay,” I said. “Mazel tov and gut Shabbos. ”
Five minutes.
The shower was turned off. The garbage had been taken out. The lights in the dining room switched on. My father, his
The phone rang. She hurried away. The smell of sweet lokshen kugel wafted into my room, right through the walls, and into my prayers. I sighed and gestured to the heavens. This was terrible timing.
There was a sudden roar from the kitchen as the mixer turned on. The beaters whirred loudly, turning gooey egg whites into frothy snow. My mother was baking the Shabbos cake, the vanilla sponge kind that was my most favorite thing.
I jumped up and finished with God.
“Dear, dear God,” I said hurriedly. “If I fast for forty days and nights, please do a miracle and make my brother normal.”
I said this three times just in case, so it would be as clear as possible, and also because I was in a rush. I wanted leftover cake batter before my sister got her hands on it.
Shabbos was getting closer.
“Try on the Shabbos robe I bought you,” my mother called. I grabbed the robe on my mother’s bed. It fit. Good. I took it off and tossed it on the floor.
“And don’t leave the robe on the floor!”
I picked up the robe.
I set the dining room table. Then I stuck my face inside the flat container of gefilte fish and ate. My mother demanded that I take my face out of her gefilte fish; she had worked on it all night long.
Only an hour and a half to Shabbos.
It was nearly dusk, but my father wasn’t home. It was the traffic again. And no matter how many times my mother had told him not to be late for Sabbath! No matter how many times…Why couldn’t the man leave earlier?
My little sister, Miri, refused to take a bath. And my sister Rivky called me a rotten brat because I refused to move the gefilte fish from the pot to the plastic container. But in with the fish was an actual fish’s head, beady dead eyes and hollow skull, and I said I was not going to touch it. I’d throw up if I had to—I would. Yitzy said that I was a real baby, because once upon a time in Jerusalem (Aunt Tziporah always said), our grandmother brought home a live fish every Thursday night and put it in the bathtub to swim. On Shabbos eve, she’d take it out and hold it down on the kitchen counter. Then, with the words “l’kovod Shabbos kodesh” —in honor of the holy Shabbos—she’d clop the thing over the head with the wooden clopper, praying for its quick death.
Sometimes the fish would slip out of my grandmother’s hands and Tziporah and her brothers would run around the kitchen in circles, screeching, as the fish, in honor of the holy Shabbos, jumped and flapped on the hard stone floor and my grandmother chased after it, clopper in hand.
And I couldn’t move one fish head from pot to plastic container.
I told Yitzy that I lived in New York. And I wasn’t touching the head of any dead fish, not for a hundred dollars.
Shabbos was in a half hour. My mother ordered me to call my father—now!
I picked up the receiver to call his car phone. I dialed—just as the front door swung open. It was my father. “It’s thirty minutes to Shabbos!” I hollered into the phone anyway. “Why couldn’t you leave earlier? ”
Twenty minutes to Shabbos.
My mother rushed out of the bathroom. My father rushed in. I rushed around, just because. Miri spilled strawberry yogurt all over her new Shabbos robe.
A neighbor came by. She needed the eggs I had borrowed last week. We did not have any eggs. She said I was irresponsible.
Ten minutes.
Mrs. Meitelis called. I picked up the phone. She said there was a Shabbos kallah after lunch tomorrow celebrating her daughter’s engagement. My mother should come. “Make sure you give her the message, Menuchah, okay?” Not like last time, when I had forgotten to give the message until Sunday evening. I was totally, incorrigibly scatterbrained. “Okay,” I said. “Mazel tov and gut Shabbos. ”
Five minutes.
The shower was turned off. The garbage had been taken out. The lights in the dining room switched on. My father, his
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