2-in-1 Yada Yada

by Neta Jackson

  At the end of the service, the shofar blew again as we opened our mahzors and read the “Tekiah” (one long blast on the shofar) . . . the “Shevarim” (three short blasts) . . . and the “Teruah” (a string of staccato blasts that left the horn blower gasping).

  After the service, people stood and chatted in little groups, while kids darted here and there. “L’Shanah Tova, Jodi,” Ruth said, giving me a hug. “Happy New Year!” Stu squeezed past Denny’s knees and claimed her hug from Ruth’s plump arms. “L’Shanah Tova, Stu.” Ruth beamed at us both. “Thank you so much for coming! You have no idea how much it means—”

  Ruth stopped midsentence and peered behind me at Denny, who was still sitting in his chair like a brooding sculpture. The Thinker, with clothes on. “Denny? School’s out—you can get up now.” She frowned. “You okay?

  Denny looked up and blinked. “What? Oh. Sorry. Just thinking.” He rose hastily and gave Ruth a hug. “Forgive my manners. Thanks for inviting us—well, for inviting Yada Yada.” He jerked a thumb at Stu and me. “Hope you don’t mind me tagging along.”

  I smirked at him. That’s okay, Denny. You don’t have to admit I dragged you here.

  “Well, come on,” Ruth ordered, heading toward a table in the back. “You can’t leave till you’ve had some apples dipped in honey—traditional, you know.”

  APPLES DIPPED IN HONEY might be traditional, but it didn’t make it as “lunch.” Denny and I were famished. We splurged on huge burgers at a new Steak ’n Shake on Howard Street, so it was almost two o’clock by the time we got home. I tried asking Denny what he’d been thinking so hard about after the sermon, but all he said was, “Oh, all that stuff about ‘repenting for the sins of the people.’ Don’t know what I think about it.”

  Didn’t know what I thought of it either. Seemed one thing for Old Testament prophets to pray “on behalf of the people,” but nobody else could repent of my sins, could they? Didn’t I have to repent my own self? Wasn’t that what “personal salvation” was all about?

  Willie Wonka dashed past us as we came in the back screen door, as if he’d been waiting a long time for somebody to let him out. The back door was standing open—had the kids gone out and left the house unlocked?

  Then I noticed the In Use button on the kitchen answering machine was blinking and the cradle was empty—somebody was talking on the phone somewhere. “Helloooo?” I called, dumping my tote bag on the dining-room table. “Amanda? Josh?” Then I saw a note in Josh’s scrawl on the table. “Getting a haircut. Back by supper.—J”

  A haircut? Denny usually cut Josh’s hair with his old electric clippers. But if Josh wanted to use his own money to get his hair cut, more power to him. So it must be Amanda on the— “Uh, hi Mom. Hey, Dad.” Amanda appeared in the doorway between the hall and dining room with the cordless in her hand. “You guys went to church on Saturday?”

  “Uh-huh.” Denny waggled his eyebrows. “Yada Yada let me tag along.”

  “Oh, stop,” I said. “It was interesting, Amanda. You would have enjoyed it.” I tipped my head toward the phone in her hand.

  “Who’s on the line?”

  “Oh . . . nobody. Just talking to a friend. They hung up.” She scuttled into the kitchen, replaced the phone in the wall cradle, and then turned to me. “Can you take me shopping for a comforter today, Mom? It’s been two weeks since my birthday and you promised.”

  Oh, yes. The birthday coupon. I sighed. “I guess. Just give me fifteen minutes before I have to get in the car again.” Well, there went the rest of my Saturday. I’d been thinking about a good nap.

  As I checked out the refrigerator, which looked pretty much like Mother Hubbard’s cupboard, I felt slightly annoyed. Why didn’t Amanda just say who she’d been talking to?

  18

  Amanda and I actually found something she liked for a decent price at Target—or “Tar-zhay” as the kids called it, bestowing a phony French accent on the name of the discount store. Of course, I would have preferred the comforter with big yellow sunflowers, but Amanda didn’t give it a second glance and went for the yellow-and-black geometric shapes. I couldn’t look at it too long or I started feeling dizzy.

  While wandering the aisles of household items, I remembered Florida said Carla and the boys needed sheets. I stuck two sets of Spiderman twin sheets and one set with rainbows into our shopping cart.

  “Uh . . . Mom?” Amanda curled her lip at the juvenile sheets. “No way!”

  “Not for you. Florida’s kids.”

  “Oh. Cool.”

  No complaint about needing new sheets herself. I wanted to hug her. Amanda’s soft spot for kids did indeed make her “lovable,” but a hug right in the middle of Tar-zhay would not be cool.

  After we got home I called Florida to see when I could deliver the sheets. “Don’t go makin’ no trip,” she said. “I’ll get them tomorrow.”

  “What do you mean? Yada Yada doesn’t meet this week.” Or did it? Wasn’t the robbery just last Sunday?

  “Nah. I mean I’m bringin’ the kids to Uptown tomorrow. Gotta start goin’ to church somewhere reg’lar as a family.”

  “Carl too?”

  “Huh. Now wouldn’t that be a miracle.”

  A door slammed, and I turned to see Josh coming in the back door. Florida’s voice chattered on in my ear, but I didn’t hear a word she said as I stared at my son’s head.

  “Hi, Mom,” he said, avoiding my eyes while strutting past me, through the dining room, and disappearing down the hall toward his bedroom.

  Josh’s head had been shaved completely bald—except for a small ponytail high on the back of his head. A bright orange ponytail.

  LORD, HAVE MERCY. Why didn’t somebody tell me raising teenagers was like trying to herd cats, I muttered to myself as I struggled up the stairs to Uptown Community’s second-floor meeting room the next morning, lugging the heavy bag of sheets in one hand and a chicken-and-rice casserole for Second Sunday Potluck in the other. I quickly ducked into the kitchen off to the left, both to deposit my casserole and to avoid people’s dropped mouths when they first caught sight of my son’s bald head.

  “Why, Josh?” I’d wailed. “You had such nice hair!”

  He’d shrugged. “What’s the big deal? Look at Michael Jordan.”

  Humph. Michael Jordan, aging superstar, was one thing. Joshua James Baxter—my son—was another. Amanda, of course, said, “Cool!” I don’t think Denny liked it, but he did pull me aside and suggested we basically ignore it. Oh, right. Ignore your son’s head looking like a light bulb with an orange pull-chain on top.

  I put on a smile and greeted Brenda Gage, who was sorting food by main dish, salad, or dessert. “I love the curtains you made for the baby’s room, Jodi,” she said warmly. “Main dish?”

  “Uh-huh.” Remembering the fiasco the last time I’d brought this dish—I forgot to cook it, much to the amusement of Stu, who was visiting Uptown for the first time—I stuck it in the big oven in the church kitchen and turned it on to 300 degrees. There. Take that.

  As I came out of the kitchen, sure enough, Florida and her crew were coming up the stairs. She had eight-year-old Carla by the hand, followed rather glumly by Cedric and Chris, eleven and thirteen. “Got a ride from Stu,” Florida huffed. “She’s parkin’ the car.”

  I handed the bag of sheets to Florida and lightly punched both boys on the shoulder. “Hey, guys. Good to see you.” I got a mumble and a half-smile in return.

  Then I knelt down on my good knee at Carla’s eye level. “Hi, Carla. Remember me? You came to my house a couple of months ago . . . the first time you visited your mom.”

  Carla, her hair neatly combed into several fat ponytails tied top and bottom with colorful glass beads, looked questioningly up at her mother. Florida prompted, “The lady with the crutches— remember?”

  Carla stared back at me. “Oh. You the same lady had the big ol’ black eye?” She looked me up and down, like a kid expecting a magician to reveal how he’d done that l
atest trick.

  I was saved by Avis’s voice up front giving the call to worship, and we hustled to find seats. “Great Sunday to bring the kids,” I whispered to Florida as we crowded into a row behind Denny and Amanda. “We’re having a potluck after service.” I craned my neck, looking for my son’s bald head. Ah, good. He was manning the soundboard at the back of the room. At least I didn’t have to look at it—or people’s stares—all through service.

  “Girl, I didn’t bring no food for no potluck,” Florida whispered back.

  The praise team had launched into an enthusiastic version of “Shine, Jesus, shine! Fill this land with the Father’s glory! . . .”

  “Don’t worry about it. There’s always plenty.”

  She smirked at me. “Well, that ain’t no potluck, then. More like a pot blessing, I’d say.”

  Most everyone was standing in response to the stirring music. I closed my eyes, trying to get focused on worship. Pastor Clark often said we should come to the service “in an attitude of worship,” but just getting everybody up, showered, fed, and out the door in time to make the 9:30 service rarely left me in an attitude of worship—especially not on potluck Sundays, when I had to throw together something edible to take with us.

  At the end of the first song, Rick Reilly—the twins’ father— gave up his guitar for a set of bongos as the praise team launched into “Hail, Jesus, You’re my King! Your life frees me to sing! . . .” I noticed Chris and Cedric perk up and begin to clap along with the strong percussive beat.

  I clapped too—it was almost impossible not to!—and sang, “Hail, Jesus, You’re my Lord! . . .” That was one thing I liked about Uptown Community: we sang about Jesus a lot. No one who visited even one Sunday would go away thinking we preached a watered-down gospel about a generic God. Yet it occurred to me that at Beth Yehudah, “Jesus” was always translated as “Yeshua”— the Hebrew form of Jesus. And something else: in the mahzor, the names “God” and “Lord” were always printed as “G-d” and “L-rd.” At first I thought it was a typo, but it happened again and again. I’d meant to ask Ruth about that but forgot.

  We didn’t have many traditions or liturgy at Uptown—a fact that appealed to people who were kind of burned out on church. Appealed to me, frankly. I’d grown up in a small, nondenominational Bible church, and liturgical worship felt kind of perfunctory whenever we went to church with Denny’s family. But the Rosh Hashanah service had felt so . . . rich, somehow. It was easy to imagine Jewish people in hundreds of nations using a similar liturgy on this traditional feast day—though Beth Yehudah obviously expanded the meaning of the service to celebrate Yeshua as the Messiah.

  After the last worship song, two of the men brought out a small table covered with a white cloth that had figures representing children around the world embroidered along its edge. Communion today? It was usually the first Sunday. Must’ve been moved because of the Labor Day holiday last week when a lot of people were missing. Pastor Clark removed the cloth, revealing a round loaf of bread, a ceramic pitcher, and two ceramic goblets. I smiled to myself. I liked the way Uptown celebrated communion —literally “breaking the bread” and “passing the cup.” Guess we had our own rituals, after all.

  Pastor Clark, wearing a brown Mister Rogers cardigan and a truly awful green tie, read the familiar scriptures about Jesus saying, “This is My body” and “This is My blood.” Then he added, “As we partake of these elements today, let us meditate on what the apostle Paul said about Christ’s death: ‘God demonstrates his own love for us in this:While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.’ ” Then he broke the loaf of bread in two and handed the pieces to the first two people who came forward. After they’d broken off a bit of bread, they each passed their hunks of bread to the next person, followed by the cup of wine.

  I got up from my chair when the line wasn’t very long. I could hear the murmured voices as I moved forward: “The body of Christ, broken for you . . . The blood of Christ, shed for you . . .” And then the hunk of homemade bread was put into my hands.

  As I started to break off a small piece, Pastor Clark’s admonition replayed itself in my ears: “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” Oh . . .my. Suddenly I remembered the prayers yesterday at the Rosh Hashanah service, “repenting for the sins of the people.” That had struck both Denny and me as a bit strange—to identify with the sins of others as if they were our own and ask God’s forgiveness. Fact was, it felt challenging enough to identify my own sins and ask God to forgive me. I still struggled to feel forgiven for the accident that killed Jamal Wilkins.

  But Jesus . . . whew! What Jesus did took that a lot further— identifying with the sins of others to the point of taking their punishment. That was the whole point of salvation, of course: Jesus died for our sins, not His own. But did the concept of “repenting for others” or “taking somebody else’s punishment” have any application in our own day-to-day—

  I felt a poke in my back. “Jodi!” Florida stage-whispered in my ear. “Ya gonna pass that bread on or what?”

  Good grief. How long had I been standing there? Pushing my thoughts to the back of my mind, I put the bit of bread in my mouth, turned, and handed the larger piece to Florida. “The body of Christ, broken for you, Florida,” I said—and wondered, Would I be willing to take the responsibility for your sins, Flo?

  I couldn’t imagine it.

  19

  What with Rosh Hashanah, Florida coming to Uptown on Sunday, and my son looking like a Hare Krishna, I almost forgot I’d invited Hoshi to dinner on Tuesday, except she called the night before to ask what time she should come. Minor panic threatened to consume my entire Monday evening. Should I cook Chinese? Bad idea. I didn’t have a clue, beyond the sweet-and-sour pork roast my mom used to make, or stir-fry where we throw in whatever fresh veggies we happened to have on hand along with some beef or chicken.

  Maybe Japanese people didn’t eat Chinese anyway.

  I polled my family. To a man—and girl—they told me not to make it a big deal. “Just cook one of your favorites, Mom,” Josh said, banging the back screen door behind him as he took Willie Wonka out for his nightly constitutional.

  It’s annoying when your family is right so much of the time.

  So I decided on pasta with a Gorgonzola cheese sauce, salad, and garlic bread. Simple, yummy—those two magic words—and I had all the ingredients, even a hunk of Gorgonzola in the freezer. I was good to go.

  The second week of school was going pretty well so far, except some of the kids in my class were way below grade level. Kaya, my supposedly “wise child,” didn’t have a clue how to write a two- to three-sentence summary of a Scholastic article I’d assigned over the weekend, even though she’d raised her hand when I asked who had read it. I sent Christy to work with her awhile, but later she told me Kaya couldn’t even read the title of the article, which was “Teamwork.” That was discouraging. We’d talked about the article in class just that morning, even referring to the title several times. Christy persevered, covering up part of the word, showing how it was really made up of two words. Still no recognition from Kaya. Finally, when Christy broke it down even further, to just letters and sounds, Kaya laboriously sounded out the word.

  My student teacher came to me in frustration. “Ms. Baxter, what is this child doing in third grade?” My thought exactly.

  However, with a few exceptions, most of the children were getting into the rhythm of the school day, needing some reminders about the rules, but otherwise muddling along in good spirits.

  Except Hakim. He wasn’t rowdy or a troublemaker. But he didn’t like to be called on and stubbornly refused to answer. I didn’t want to force him and make a big scene; on the other hand, it would be all too easy to skip over him and pick on one of the madly waving hands, letting him slide into a black hole.

  I was thinking about Kaya and Hakim while stirring the Gorgonzola sauce Tuesday evening. Okay, Jesus, You said let the children come . . . but what if they don
’t want to? I didn’t want to leave Kaya or Hakim behind, but I had to keep moving forward with the other children.

  Grabbing a Post-it note from the counter beneath the wall telephone, I wrote, “HAKIM . . . KAYA . . . JESUS, HELP!” and stuck it to the hood above the stove just as the doorbell rang.

  “Denny!” No answer. “Josh? Amanda?”Where was everybody? Somewhere in the back of the house I heard music coming from behind a closed bedroom door.Turning the flame to low, I ran for the front door—it’d be quicker to answer it myself.

  Hoshi, dressed neatly in beige slacks and cotton sweater set, held out a bouquet of daisies as I opened the door. “Am I too much early?”

  “No, no, right on time.” I took the flowers and gave her a hug. “You didn’t have to do this!”

  She smiled—a bit sadly, I thought. “My mother would say, don’t arrive at host’s house with empty hand!”

  “Well, come on—oh, help! My sauce!” I ran for the kitchen, hoping Hoshi would follow.

  The Gorgonzola sauce had only begun to brown slightly on the bottom. Major save. I quickly poured it into another saucepan, dumped a box of linguini into the big pot of water boiling on the stove, and hunted for a vase for the flowers. As I cut off their stems and ran water into the vase, I craned my neck to look into the dining room but couldn’t see Hoshi.

  “Hoshi?” No answer. I retraced my steps and found her standing in the archway of the living room, seemingly lost in thought. “Hoshi, are you all right?”

  She turned quickly, as if I had startled her. “Oh. Yes, I am all right. Just . . . seeing this room makes me think about that terrible woman. How could she do that?—hurt my mother? We do not treat guests to our country that way.”

  I wanted to slap myself upside the head. It had never occurred to me how coming to our house—the scene of so much trauma the last time she was here—might make Hoshi feel.

  “She hurt me too,” Hoshi murmured. “More than if she had cut me with that awful knife. She cut me off from my family.”