His voice was soft, his eyes gentle. She hesitated.
“If you agree you will be granting me a great privilege, that of welcoming a Sabbath guest into my home. My name is Nachum Cohen.”
He smiled at her and she smiled back. Her own acquiescence surprised her but wordlessly, she walked beside him, down the narrow streets of the Jewish Quarter and into an old stone house. She followed him through a small book-lined library into the candlelit room where crystal and silver and china shimmered on a long table covered with a snow-white cloth. Faces, like those of the swirling dancers, bright with joy, wreathed in smiles of welcome, turned toward her.
“Shabbat shalom,” they said in unison.
“Shabbat shalom,” she replied shyly.
That, of course, had been the beginning.
She had spent that evening with the Cohen family and their guests, young people like herself, two American boys who were students at a nearby yeshiva, an Australian girl who was studying nursing at Hadassah Hospital where Rachel Cohen was an emergency-room physician. The five Cohen children were exuberant youngsters who dominated the dinner table conversation, talking as rapidly as they ate, jumping up now and again to help their mother bring serving platters piled high with roast chicken, potato puddings and sweet carrots in from the kitchen. The two elder boys, talkative twins, challenged their father on an interpretation of the Torah portion. Their sisters registered their opinions in high sweet voices. Even the youngest girl, Nurit, who could not have been older than seven participated in the discussion.
“My teacher says that Sarah was very wrong to send Hagar into the desert,” she asserted, nodding so vigorously that her dark braid swept from side to side. “It was cruel.”
“Let’s talk about that,” Nachum Cohen said and they did, for over an hour, guests and the host family alike, offering opinions, listening attentively as Nachum offered one explanation and then another.
Fascinated, Sandy listened. The biblical personalities were alive in this dining room, vibrant guests at this table where conversation soared and laughter erupted with startling suddenness. Then the meal was over and the singing began. She did not know the songs but she understood the joy and happiness of the melodies that filled the room. In unison, led by the two elder boys, they sang the grace after meals and she found herself humming along as Nurit placed a small hand on her own, a gentle gesture of welcome and inclusion.
“Will you come again?” Rachel asked when she left.
“Perhaps,” she said awkwardly and then turned swiftly back. “Yes,” she amended. “I would love to.”
She walked back to the university that night and thought of Friday-night dinners at her family’s Westchester home. Sometimes her mother remembered to light the Sabbath candles and sometimes she didn’t. They rarely had guests because her parents were always exhausted by the end of the week. Their dinner table conversations were quiet, almost careful. Laughter sometimes but never song, never prayer. Their father might talk about some political issue, their mother might ask about a school assignment but never would they discuss a Torah portion. They would not even know what portion was being read on a given week. They listened patiently when their children spoke but their interest was dispassionate. The family scattered after dinner but always Neil and Elaine retreated into the living room and sat across from each other in the lamplight, books in hand, chamber music softly playing.
It occurred to Sandy, on that long walk back to the dormitory, that in her parents’ home she sometimes felt like a guest, while in the Cohen home she had felt like a member of an extended and welcoming family. The thought seemed disloyal and to atone for it she wrote a long letter home that night, describing her courses, her new friends, the beauty of Jerusalem. She had been right, after all, she wrote to her parents, not to join Lisa who had opted to spend her own junior year abroad in Rome. After all, she and Lisa, companions from birth, deserved a vacation from each other. She decorated the letter with a pattern of interlaced stars and flowers so that they would know she had not forgotten her interest in design, would see that she was nurturing her talent.
She did not write home about her visit to the Cohens, nor did she discuss it with Tina who had given up spiritualism for socialism and was now spending weekends at a left-wing kibbutz. But she continued to spend Friday evenings at the Cohens’ and, within a few weeks she was spending all of Shabbat there. By the time she went to visit Lisa in Rome on winter break she was keeping kosher, an undertaking that amused her twin.
“But why?” Lisa had asked.
“It reminds me of who I am.” Sandy had fumbled for a reply and the one that she offered seemed inadequate.
Lisa was gay during that visit, in love with Rome, in love with Bert, her lab partner, in love with the winding streets of the city, in love with the way the sun rose so slowly over the slope of the Palatine hills. She and Bert watched it rise and watched it set, she told her sister proudly. She was in love with her own body and during Sandy’s visit she walked about her apartment in her underwear and studied the rhomboids of golden Roman light that danced across her very smooth skin. She knew who she was and Bert, wonderful Bert, knew who she was, too. She had no need to search for answers at a Sabbath table in a distant city.
“So who are you?”
“I’m not sure. I’m trying to find out,” Sandy said and envied her sister who was so free of self-doubt.
Her answer had been painfully honest and back in Jerusalem she determined to pursue a certainty that would match Lisa’s. She enrolled in classes in bible and Jewish philosophy at a woman’s institute that Rachel Cohen recommended. She worked hard at her Hebrew and volunteered to teach an art class at Nurit’s school.
She returned to the States knowing that Judaism was at the core of her being, that she was happiest studying Jewish texts and sitting at the Cohens’ Friday night dinner and that she wanted to live in Jerusalem for the rest of her life.
“So who are you?” her twin asked teasingly, almost maliciously that first week home as they packed to return to Penn. She lit a cigarette and snuffed it out before Sandy could answer.
Lisa had lost her gaiety and Sandy understood the pain that had caused that loss and the resultant bitterness that hardened her sister’s voice and shadowed her eyes.
“Actually, I’m Sarah now,” she had replied then, concealing her hurt at her sister’s flippancy. The name by which she would be called from that day on defined her, told her who she was.
She kept the bargain she had made with her father, completed her education and then returned to Jerusalem. Weeks after her arrival, Michael Singer, newly arrived in Israel from a trek through Thailand, sat opposite her at the Cohens’ Shabbat table. Sarah immediately sensed that tall, grave-eyed Michael, who spoke softly and listened carefully, was different from the other young people whom Nachum often invited home—the potheads who would briefly replace dope with Torah study, the world-weary hippies who had not heard that the sixties were over, the dropouts in search of themselves. Michael was serious, his questions—and he had many—laced with depth. He wanted to study. He wanted to find an intellectual and spiritual discipline that would give his life a sense of purpose. He had not found it during his brief stint as a medical student nor had he found it during his wanderings in the far east. He enrolled in a yeshiva and was completely engrossed in his studies. Torah and Talmud fascinated him. A life lived within the parameters of Jewish law intrigued him, offering as it did purpose and commitment, discipline and faith. He confided all this to Sarah and it seemed to her that his words gave voice to the secrets of her heart. He articulated the answers she should have offered to her sister, her brothers, her parents who saw her return to Jerusalem, her embrace of orthodoxy, as betrayal and desertion.
Six months later, she wrote her parents that she and Michael, who now called himself Moshe, planned to marry. Neil and Elaine had protested mildly, Michael’s parents vociferously. In the end they had all come to the wedding as had Michael’s brother
and Sarah’s siblings, uneasy guests at a celebration they could not call their own.
Sarah knew that she and Moshe mystified their families. Her pregnancies had been a source of concern rather than joy.
“How will you manage?” her mother had asked worriedly.
“I have my little business and I love it. Moshe teaches. We don’t need very much,” Sarah had replied patiently.
She was proud of the work she did at home, designing the fabrics and creating the patterns for the long dressing gowns that were popular among orthodox women. She contracted out the manufacture of the garments to other women in the community who were grateful for a new source of income.
Her mother’s question had irritated Sarah, ignited a resentment she would not reveal.
“I’m doing exactly what you did,” she added.
She was, in fact, emulating her mother. Elaine had always spent long hours in her studio, creating her ceramics, maintaining contact with galleries and clients without neglecting her family.
Elaine did not remind her daughter that their situations were totally different. The Gordons had not depended on her work for sheer economic survival nor had it intruded on the needs of the household. Elaine’s studio was apart from the house and she skillfully juggled her time so that her professional life did not interfere with either Neil’s needs or the needs of her children. A succession of au pairs, pleasant smiling girls from the UK and Scandinavia, helped of course but Elaine herself, ever calm and organized, was responsible for their orderly home, for the well-balanced meals served at appropriate hours, for a kitchen sink, that unlike Sarah’s, never overflowed with dirty dishes and cutlery, for beds, also unlike Sarah’s, that were never covered with unsorted laundry.
Still, Sarah did manage both her business and her growing family. Her days were exhausting but that exhaustion was threaded with gladness. She wakened each morning, looked out at the Jerusalem hills, listened to Moshe’s rhythmic breathing, the sweet, sleep-bound voice of a child, and thought herself blessed to be living this life in this city at this time. It saddened her that her father, her gentle, generous father, had never come to terms with the life she had chosen. His visits to Jerusalem had been too brief, his judgment too clinical. He had offered her acceptance but not the approval she had craved.
But her mother’s stay in Jerusalem would span enough time so that, at last, she might experience the rhythms of Sarah’s life, and come to know and understand Moshe, to respect his quiet kindness, his intellectual acumen, his devotion to her and the children.
Sarah passed her hands over the gentle rise of her abdomen. This new pregnancy could no longer be concealed. Lisa, sharp-eyed and sharp-tongued, had warned her that their mother, always worried about the sheer physical demands on Sarah, would not welcome the arrival of yet another baby.
“Do you really want this baby?” Lisa had asked then.
“Of course I do.”
Her reply was swift and certain. She thought it wonderful that a new life would so swiftly follow her father’s death.
Lisa’s question annoyed but did not anger. She and her twin, ever emotionally enmeshed, had always been best friends. The disparate paths that they had taken had not altered that. She acknowledged that she herself had difficulty accepting Lisa’s single life, her professional ambitions, her relationship with David that seemed to preclude any thought of marriage. She did, with a wrenching sadness, understand why Lisa wanted to adopt a child but, by tacit agreement, the sisters did not discuss it. They had pledged themselves to a complicity of silence that distant evening, when the chilly winds of an early Roman winter had shaken the last of the autumn leaves from the trees. Lisa had wept that night and shivered and Sarah had brought her tea, covered her with light blankets and whispered words of comfort that she knew to be lies even as she uttered them.
She shrugged away the memory and wondered, as she glanced again at the clock, if she should tell her mother that she and Moshe had already decided to name the new baby after Neil. Would such a revelation bring comfort or sorrow? It saddened her that she could not predict her mother’s reaction, but then they had lived apart for so many years. This visit, this very long visit, would surely bring them closer together.
The child within her stirred and she felt a surge of joy. She walked to the window and saw Moshe’s van pull up, saw her mother shade her eyes with a gloved hand and stare up at the window. Excitedly she waved and Elaine, seeing her, blew her a kiss that seemed to flutter through the soft Jerusalem air.
Dinner that first evening was exciting, the children clamoring for their grandmother’s attention, Ephraim and Leora proudly practicing their English and, even more proudly offering to teach Elaine Hebrew. Golden-haired Leah gave Elaine the finger painting she had carried home from day care and chubby Yuval, the baby, scrambled onto her lap and fingered her heavy silver earrings.
“Savta,” he said happily.
“That means ‘grandma,’” Leora explained importantly. “Say ‘Grandma,’ Yuval.”
“Savta,” the child repeated and they all laughed.
Moshe was solicitous, refilling Elaine’s wineglass, insisting that she try the pomegranate jam.
“Sarah makes it herself,” he said proudly. “From the fruit of our own tree.” He pointed to the tall tree that grew in the courtyard, its heavy red fruit shimmering in the half darkness, its fragrance wafting sweetly through the room.
Elaine tasted it and smiled her appreciation as she had smiled her appreciation from the moment of her arrival. She had accompanied Sarah on a tour of the house, admired the brightly colored cushions of Bedouin weave scattered across the shabby beige sofa, the lamp bases of intricately patterned Armenian ceramic, the table carved of golden olive wood. She had protested mildly when Sarah told her that she and Moshe would sleep in the living room during her visit so that she might have the privacy of their bedroom.
“Moshe insists,” Sarah had told her. “He’s scoring mitzvah points—honoring a mother. It’s the most harmless of his good deeds,” she had added wryly.
She did not speak to her mother of the wandering, wasted American kids Moshe occasionally brought home, of the amounts of money he distributed to the beggars whose pathetic appeals he could not resist, of the time he had given his good winter coat to an aged scholar.
“It’s not easy being married to a saint,” she would jokingly scold him but they both knew that she would not want him to be otherwise.
Elaine had agreed reluctantly to the sleeping arrangements. She had smiled at the bunk beds in the children’s rooms, piled high with the stuffed animals that arrived routinely from the States, birthday and Chanukah gifts from the aunts and uncles, the cousins and grandparents, who found it easier to mail packages than to board planes.
“You’ve done wonders with the space,” she said as Sarah showed her the wooden cabinets Moshe himself had built in the bedrooms.
Sarah cringed at the criticism inherent in the compliment. The space, Sarah’s space, was too small. In her mother’s eyes it would always be too small.
“But what about the new baby? Where will you put the crib, the changing table?” she asked as she fingered the gay blue bedspread with its sprinting bright green frogs and smiling yellow butterflies. It was her first reference to Sarah’s pregnancy.
“We’ll manage,” Sarah said curtly, her heart heavy with disappointment.
She remembered how Rachel Cohen had greeted her news with an affectionate mazal tov, a swift embrace. Foolishly, she had expected as much from her own mother.
“Of course you’ll manage.” Elaine’s tone was calm, reassuring. “I love this fabric. Your design?”
Sarah nodded. That had always been the maternal pattern, she remembered. Implied criticism and then a palliative compliment. Positive reinforcement, her father had called it, his professional vocabulary spilling over into the life of his family. The memory of her father singed her with sadness and she was relieved when the children burst into the house, when
the dinner evolved into a time of easy talk and laughter. The tension was broken. She would have to stop overreacting to her mother’s every comment, she told herself. She would have to keep the mysterious hormones of pregnancy under control.
“The jam is delicious.” Elaine lathered it across a slice of apple. “I’ve never even tried to make jam.”
“I’ll teach you,” Sarah said.
“I’ll help,” Leora volunteered happily.
“We’ll all do it together,” Elaine agreed. Together. It occurred to her that it was the first time she had uttered that word since Neil’s death. Suddenly, despite the fatigue of jet lag, she was suffused with a contentment, too long unfamiliar. She had been right to make this journey. She reached across the table and took her daughter’s hand in her own as Moshe began to softly sing the grace after meals.
six
Elaine sat on Sarah’s kitchen balcony the next morning, Yuval peacefully asleep on her lap, and, like a dispassionate theater patron, she observed the daily life of Ramat Chessed. Bewigged women in faded long-sleeved cotton house dresses hurried down the street carrying plastic baskets laden with vegetables and fruits, packages of laundry wrapped in brown paper, gallons of milk in clear plastic bags. They called to each other in Yiddish and in Hebrew, exchanged morning greetings. Boker tov. Gut morgen. They did not stop to chat. The milk might spoil, the beds were still unmade, impatient husbands waited for a breakfast grapefruit. Elaine recognized them. They were women not unlike her mother and mother-in-law, women whose lives were governed by work, who did not know how to walk slowly, who would not pause to look up at the sun-streaked sky. She marveled, still, that she had escaped their lives and was bewildered, still, that her daughter, talented and educated Sarah, destined for a golden future, had chosen to recreate her grandmothers’ arduous existence. She sighed and bent her cheek so that it brushed her grandson’s feathery hair.
She watched the young mothers, colorful scarves covering their hair, gauzy pastel skirts dancing about their ankles, who wheeled strollers and held the hands of toddlers. They too walked swiftly and chatted animatedly with each other. Like Sarah, they had to shop for large families, prepare noontime meals for schoolchildren and scholar husbands. As Sarah had done earlier that morning, they would bring their children to Ruth’s pink stucco house, the neighborhood day-care center, and then hurry to their own jobs.
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