"Mommy, Daddy, come quick. I've just seen an angel."
Laura Simmons looked up vaguely from the coals she was
coaxing and smiled at her precocious seven-year-old
daughter.
"There are no such things as angels, dear."
"Certainly not in Yosemite," added her father, Mark, who was
trying in vain to secure a tent.
"No, really, you must come see!"
Laura and Mark exchanged a look of amusement and
exasperation. Mark shrugged and let himself be led by his
daughter into the woods. They had only walked a few meters
when the girl stopped abruptly.
"Well?" Mark asked with a smile.
"He was right here, all white. He was radiant!"
Mark noticed a woman bent over a grill. She didn't look
appropriately dressed for camping, as she was wearing a long
skirt. A brightly colored bandana was wrapped around her
head. She looked up.
Mark smiled sheepishly. "My daughter says she saw an
angel."
"Really? Where?" asked the woman. Mark was bemused at her
matter-of-fact tone and the fact that she began looking
around as if expecting to see an angel as surely as one might
a squirrel.
"He was right here. He was white, all white, and he had these
white wings and a black bird or something perched on his
head. He was swaying and..."
"That's enough, now. There are no angels. They don't exist.
You must have seen an animal."
"Um, excuse me," the woman interrupted, "but I think I can
solve this mystery. David," she called over her shoulder into
the cabin behind her. "Can you come here, please?"
"That's him! That's the angel!" cried the girl, pointing at a
thin 13-year-old boy who had just emerged from the trees. He
was an albino with white-blond curly hair, very white skin
and almost red eyes.
"This is my son, David," said the woman. "He just became bar
mitzva."
"Where are your wings?" asked the little girl in a voice of
deep consternation, "and your black bird?" As uncomfortable
as this exchange was making the girl's father, he grew even
more unnerved when the woman calmly said, "Sweetie, get your
tallis and tefillin a second." A moment later,
the boy returned with a tallis draped over his arm,
lovingly holding a pair of tefillin.
"You see," explained the woman, "we're religious Jews. My son
was praying before. Wrapped in his prayer shawl and with his
coloring, I can understand why your daughter thought she was
seeing an angel. Although I've always said that he is one...
What's your name?" she added, smiling to the little girl.
"Malka."
"Oh, well! Malka is a Jewish name."
"But we're not in any way practicing," her father hastened to
say. "We never go to synagogue or anything like that. We
don't do any of that kosher stuff. My wife," he added, seeing
her quizzical look, "insisted we give her the name. She liked
the sound. It was my wife's grandmother's and it was my
mother- in-law's last wish." Mark Simmons looked like his
only wish was to get away from these strange people and back
to his breakfast.
"Do you know what your name means?" asked the woman, her eyes
sparkling. Malka shook her head. "It means `queen'. But you
know what? You're really a princess because you're the
daughter of Hashem. He's the King of kings."
Mark Simmons did not like the way this conversation was
going. Malka was enraptured. "Well, thanks for clearing up
the angel business. See, I told you Malka, there are no such
things as angels."
"Oh, but there are," said David, cradling his new
tefillin lovingly. "We create them all the time."
"You... you can make an angel?" asked Malka, awestruck.
"Malka, Mommy's waiting."
"Would you like to come back with us and have beadfast? We're
having bacon and eggs," she asked innocently.
David and his mother exchanged a look.
"Religious Jews don't eat bacon and eggs, Malka," her father
supplied.
"Why not?"
"It says we're not allowed to in the Torah."
"What's that?"
"It's the book G-d gave us to tell us how we're supposed to
live."
"Well, it also says in the Torah that you're supposed to
listen to your father, Malka, so come along and let these
people eat their breakfast. We'll eat ours."
"But we don't read the Torah. Why don't we read the Torah?
You just said we're Jewish, too. Are there angels in the
Torah?" But Mark was already halfway out of the clearing.
"Um, would it be alright if my son blesses Malka?" the woman
called after them. "He's a kohen. He needs practice,
you see," she added, casting around for a logical reason for
the request.
"Oh, yes, please!" Malka said, breaking away from her father
and running over.
David placed his hand above Malka's head and pronounced the
appropriate blessing. Malka was impressed. Mark was
impatient.
"Wow! I was blessed by an angel!" Malka said as she was being
led away by her father, clearly having been oblivious to the
finer points of the preceding conversation.
"Bye," she called back as she was spirited away.
Eleven years later, Malka had talked her parents into letting
her take a trip with some friends to Italy, Spain, Greece,
Israel and Turkey. Malka wanted to study Art History and she
wanted to see some of the historical art and architecture.
She and her friends arrived in Jerusalem at 11:00 p.m.
straight from the airport and took a room in a youth hostel.
Malka awoke early, wanting to start her first day in the new
country. She looked out her window at the Old City and
couldn't believe her eyes. The street was full of angels,
just like the one who had blessed her in Yosemite when she
was seven years old. She threw on some clothes and ran out
gawking at all the men on their way to and from shul,
many wrapped in a tallis, some with a `black bird'
perched on their head. The only time she'd seen anyone
looking like that had been when she was seven. The men were
pointedly avoiding looking at her.
Instinctively, she looked around for `her' angel. It was
impossible. All the men looked the same to her. And besides,
her angel had been in Yosemite. He couldn't possibly be...
Then she saw him. A tall man with blonde-white curly hair,
white skin and red eyes.
"David!" she cried, running up to him. He stopped and looked
at her, stunned, trying to imagine how a scantily dressed
teenage girl knew who he was and why she was so happy to see
him.
"I'm Malka," she cried happily. Something stopped her from
throwing her arms around him in a grateful hug. Maybe it was
the look of abject terror on his face.
"You blessed me in the forest when I was seven. Yosemite.
Remember? You were there with your mother and I thought you
were an angel."
David's face brightened when he realized she wasn't some
lunatic who jumped out of the shadows at religious men. And
his mind grasped for the memory which slowly floated into his
consciousness.
"Hi," she smiled awkwardly. "Um, what brings you to
Jerusalem?"
Malka told him and then he invited her and her friends over
to his house for dinner that night. He explained that it was
Shabbat and that it would be a special experience. That night
she came with her friends. The next day she came alone. She
continued to visit David and his family until she took his
wife's suggestion to spend some time learning at a girl's
seminary.
Malka never did get to Turkey.
