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Home
and Family
Laugh some, cry some, `shep some Yiddishe nachas' from our
Baal Tshuva neophyte yeshiva bochur as he fields some
difficult situations
DEAR DIARY - Part III
by R' Pinchos Kantrowitz
DEAREST DIARY,
I just learned from Irwin that today is called `Erev
Shabbos', the day preceding the Sabbath. I was getting ready
for any old Friday, so it came as a bit of a surprise to me.
Irwin kept popping into our room saying, "Shabbos! Shabbos!
Shabbos! One who prepares on Erev Shabbos, eats on Shabbos!
C'mon folks, let's get movin'!"
He has made extensive arrangements for all of us to eat at
different families for the entire Shabbos. "Fasten your
seatbelts, folks," he warned us. "This is going to be a Real
Ex-tra-va-gan-za of a Shabbos," quoting some rabbi at his
yeshiva. Well, I can hardly wait, after everything we've been
through so far, and he hasn't yet warned us to `fasten our
seatbelts.' I can hardly wait.
I sort of have an image what it will be like, which I would
like to compare `before the fact', and we'll see how it
stacks up to the actual event `after the fact'. Really, I
can't even begin to imagine what the whole Shabbos will be
like with this `extravaganza' at all of these different
families, but Irwin mentioned that we will be visiting an
older European rabbi and rebbetzin, that's his wife,
by the way, for one meal, and it is about this meal that I
would like to conjecture. I could just picture us in some
tiny, quaint but rapidly dilapidating apartment in old
Jerusalem, filled with Jewish artifacts like candelabra,
Kiddush cup, Menora, snuff box from a bygone era in old
Europe. The rebbetzin will be tottering around, making
sure all her grandparents' china is just right. She'll be
muttering, "Ess, mein kindt, ess! You must be very
hunkery with all this traveling, no?" as she plies us with
gefilte fish and chicken soup. What else? The rabbi will be
beaming. "Irving iz lerrnin' in yeshiva. Dos iz gut! Dos
iz gut! He should lerrn a little sumpin' there, become a
shtikel talmid chuchum, maybe. Better than university,
no? At least he can really learn a little sumpin', no?" See -
I still remember ah shtickel from my Bubbie's house.
Mark my words, dearest, you'll see that I won't be far
off.
Anyway, things were more peaceful between Melvin and Irwin
today. But both remain wary of one another. Oh, here comes
Irwin, again, cheering us along with his "Shabbos! Shabbos!
Shabbos!' I had really better start getting ready if I want
to `eat on Shabbos'! Maybe they won't let me into the house
if I don't look presentable. I don't know. Oh, one more
thing. Irwin tells me that I won't be able to write to you on
Shabbos (or write anything, for that matter). So, a guttin
Shabbos to you. I'll write to you on motzei
Shabbos (the night following Shabbos) if I can, bli
nedder - without oath, as Irwin often says.
All my love,
Gertrude
Since our Shabbos entry is very long, and so as not to
keep you in suspense a full week, we will begin Part
IV)
DEAREST DIARY,
I'm still crying, dearest. I just can't seem to stop. Irwin
implored me numerous times to please stop crying. Melvin, in
his typical tactful and gentle style, told me to shut up
before he shuts me up. I simply cried more. By the end of
Shabbos, I was so moved by the entire experience that I just
couldn't seem to stop. Irwin's `extravaganza Shabbos' was
really quite the thing.
Where to begin? Where to begin? I guess at the beginning,
that's always a nice place to begin, isn't it? With Irwin's
encouragement, or, rather, nudging, we managed to prepare for
`Shabbos, Shabbos, Shabbos'. This is no small achievement for
people like us, real shleppers, if I must admit so myself.
But we were prepared on Erev Shabbos so Irwin said we merited
to `eat on Shabbos'. Sweet and generous of him, wasn't it?
So here we were, showered, spiffed up in our Shabbos best,
lights adjusted so as not to be altered for the entire
Shabos, and to top it all off, all `mooktza' put away. O.K.
O.K. I laughed when I heard the word, also, and that's enough
already. `Mooktza' basically means `hands off', `off limits',
literally `pushed away' or not to be used for the duration of
the Shabbos. Some examples that I remember are money - I
couldn't touch it for the entire day. At first I thought I
would plotz. As it turned out, it was actually quite a relief
to be free from its consuming influence for a whole day.
Rocks, pens - Oy, vey! So many times I felt like picking up
my pen and writing to you, but I held tough and kept `hands
off'. Television - didn't bother me a bit. It drove Melvin
crazy not to watch the news, but it was a relief for me not
to hear all those depressing things. The list included
hammers etc. etc. etc. which we could live with - rather,
without, for a day.
Anyway, we were prepared, amazing as it sounds, and a good
thing, because I was hungry!
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