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Home
and Family
Pa
by Sudy Rosengarten
Pa's day began at four thirty in the Bais Medrash of the Bnei
Brak Old Age Home, and other than mealtimes and an afternoon
nap, that was where he could be found till late at night in
prayer and study. If anyone wanted to see him, they'd first
have to call us to check when it would be possible to squeeze
a visit into Pa's busy schedule. After having struggled all
his life to earn a living, as soon as he was able to retire,
he had settled in Eretz Yisroel, and for the next twenty
years blossomed in his new, though belated, role of
yeshiva bochur. At the age of ninety-five there was a
sudden decline. He couldn't see; he couldn't hear. Walking
became a dreaded exercise of excruciating pain. The simplest
chore suddenly became an insurmountable mountain to climb. He
needed help in everything. Because of his loss of
concentration, he was unable to study the holy books that
had, in the past, been his sole source of pleasure; because
of his loss of control he dared not linger in the Bais
Medrash, the place he considered his true home.
Life was suddenly a humiliating burden to the once proud,
independent, sensitive old man. He was always coming down
with pneumonia which often required his being hospitalized
for several weeks. Confined to bed so long, the muscles of
his legs would atrophy and we'd be forced to teach him how to
walk again.
It was after one of those hospital stays. Before discharging
him, the doctor had told us: "The patient has got to get
back on his feet. Otherwise his whole respiratory system will
collapse. I realize that it's going to be torture for all of
you, but you have no choice. Just as soon as you take pity on
him, he'll die." Every morning I would help Pa get out of his
bed and up on his feet. He would tightly grasp his walker and
take a few steps. Worried lest he fall, I would stand behind
him, holding on to his caftan. Day in, day out, we did this
until he was able to walk to the door of his room. Then, he
started walking on the porch, from which seven doors opened
into seven other old people's rooms.
For Pa, every day was a struggle, each step demanded
supernatural strength. He'd hang on to the walker, lift one
leg, then the other, stop a moment, then lift the walker
ahead. Another step and another; all over again. Sweat would
break out on his forehead, his breathing would be a labored
moan. One heavy step, two, three and four. Then he'd stop,
turn to me and beg: "Bring me a chair." I could usually tell
by his voice if I dared coax him further. If I did, I'd first
give him a few moments to catch his breath, then tug at his
caftan to go on. Sometimes he'd be angry, sometimes he'd be
meek, sometimes completely apathetic, as though resigned to
accept his share of suffering. We'd already gotten as far as
the third door on the porch, but for a whole week Pa hadn't
been able to get any further than that.
"Bring me a chair." he pleaded, "I can't anymore." "Pa," I
said softly, "another little bit, just until the next door.
I'll bring the chair over there now. Then you'll walk to it
and sit down." "Sudy!" he cried in sudden tears. "What do you
want from me? Why do you torture me so? Can't you see that
I'm just a sick, old man and can't take another step?" I
looked at the bent shrunken Jew. He'd once been a giant, a
tower of strength; not only to his own family, but to all the
Jews around him.
I remembered the stories my husband would tell me about his
father as a young man, trekking through half of Europe to
escape inscription in the notorious Russian Army; of his
boarding a ship without the slightest idea of where it would
take him, ultimately ending up in Toronto. Unlike most of the
people who arrived under similar circumstances in the then
totally goyishe city and who had tried to blend into
the new life as inconspicuously as possible, Pa never took a
razor to his beard, never removed his long black caftan and
wide-brimmed black hat. His wife continued to cover all her
hair, his daughters continued to wear the same long sleeved,
high necked dresses and thick home-made stockings which they
would have worn had they still lived in die alte heim.
Long, curled payos dangled at the side of his sons'
shorn heads, making them the butt of classmate taunts and
titters as they sat bare-headed in the public school they
were forced to attend in the absence of a yeshiva in those
days.
Pa organized a shul, a mikve, a chevra shas;
wherever he went he taught the beautiful Chassidic
niggunim he had brought with him from Europe.
Throughout all the years, his house remained like "in the old
country," becoming, later on, a home and haven for a steady
stream of Holocaust survivors, awaiting entry into the
States. Over the years, Pa had become a legend; proving that
regardless where fate flung a person, it was possible for him
to remain a devout Jew; that despite his living in a country
where the stones were treife, your children could
still grow up to become strong links in the chain of Jewish
tradition.
And now, this giant of a Jew was old and bent and broken. A
large black skullcap, shiny with age, covered his hoary head.
A long silver-white beard hid his cavernous chest. A thin
black caftan, old and stained, hugged his frail body. His
nostrils dilated with the great effort that I demanded of
him. His eyes were filled with tears of self-pity at my
refusing to understand how impossible it was for him to make
the effort to go on living. The look in his eyes was both a
silent plea and a ferocious scream for me to stop tormenting
him, to just leave him alone, to not force him to take
another step. Couldn't I see that he was already beyond his
final strength?
"Pa," I said softly, not wanting him to be angry at me, but
determined not to let him go. "Pa," I pleaded again, giving
him another pause in which to pull himself together. With a
force born of anger, he turned round to face me. "For what?"
he cried."For what?" His face had turned purple. The whites
of his eyes were yellow with rage. "Why are you insisting on
torturing me, forcing me to walk, when I don't even have a
place to go to!"
"Why am I forcing you to walk?" I yelled back in a show of
equal anger, "so that when Moshiach comes, you'll be able to
run to greet him! Don't you want to be able to run to greet
Moshiach when he comes?" By then I was crying out loud, not
even concerned that someone might be listening, repeating
hysterically: "How will you even be able to run to greet
Moshiach when you can't even walk the length of this
porch?"
Never taking his eyes off me, he fumbled in his pocket for a
handkerchief, loudly blew his nose, grabbed hold of his
walker and made it to the fourth door.
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