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S

unny Lanewas a busy place in the mornings. Vans honked impatiently and cars pulled away in a hurry while on the sidewalk a steady stream of children marched briskly by on their way to school.

Leah Morris was usually the first to leave as she had a long walk to sem. Chavi whose school was a little closer was normally next to go hurrying along to the corner to meet her friend. Then it was the turn of Moishy Morris and Raffi Rabinowitz both of whom used the same van. The last of the bigger kids to leave were usually Fishel and Faivish Friedman who would come racing frantically out of their house as their van driver gave one final exasperated honk and threatened to leave them behind. There was always a scuffle as each tried to climb onto the van first.

After that there would be a lull and then came the younger children: Miriam Morris walking with Mommy around the corner to Morah Shulamis chatting nineteen to the dozen; and Shimmy Rabinowitz trotting along with his father to a different morah after waving goodbye to his baby brother Yoni. Shimmy had just started going to Morah for the first time a few days ago and still felt very big and grand.

Then suddenly the road would turn quiet. This was Mr. Krankowitz’s cue to heave a sigh of relief and come out to check on his prized rose bushes grumbling under his breath about how all the noise wasn’t doing them any good.

This was also when Yoni Rabinowitz would start following his mother around as she got to work in the kitchen babbling away in baby language.