She smells the barbecue of the new non-Jewish neighbors who just moved in from the American Embassy. The smell of nonkosher meat grilling fills the air. Sosha’s natural inclination when she passes their house is to bring a cake to welcome them to the neighborhood. She would love to bring an apple pie. Greet them with a good old American smile. Let them know there are other Americans on the block.
Then she sees their young son hair in a crew cut. High and tight. Military style.
And it all came back the time the Chinese woman moved to their street in Baltimore. How the Chinese woman Li Juan had no one. How her husband was relocated and how she had no idea she’d just moved into a religious Jewish neighborhood. How Li Juan had wanted to be Sosha’s friend. And so Sosha made her a friend.
Li Juan came every day with her closely shorn five-year-old boy Mao. And Mao brought treats and toys with him. Of course Sosha had to explain the laws of kashrus and other things like when Li Juan offered to invite Sosha’s boys over to watch some television. Sosha handled it with grace and kindness. She knew the connection would get stronger as the children got older but she didn’t want to hurt anyone especially not a new mother in a foreign country with a young son.
So Li Juan continued to come. The children played in the huge backyard. On the swings in the pool and the small turtle-shaped sandbox. Sosha would bring out lemonade or some kind of punch. And they’d sit under the shade of the old cherry blossoms and admire the deep-blue purple of the irises. Enjoy the laughter of their children and clean grains of sand every so often from their children’s eyes.
Sosha understood the challenges and started to feel the nuances of keeping up the open-door policy but she also understood that if she were cold or uninviting Li Juan would feel rejected. And that her distance could easily be interpreted as cruel and possibly a chillul Hashem.
The summer days went on. The children continued to come daily to play in the yard. And the days began to get colder just that little bit where the leaves rustle. Where after coming out of the pool there’s a shiver down the child’s spine and mothers run with towels already open to cover their child. And the questions grew.
It was one of those days you could feel Rosh Hashanah coming. Actually see how the children were getting that much older taller a little wiser from the open days and unlined pages of unlimited sun and water.
This year Mao would be six.
Yehuda would be seven.
Mao brought GI Joes Superman and some black-cloaked villain.
Yehuda played Go Fish with kosher cards.
Sosha could see the signs that this may be their last swim together as clearly as she could feel the hot summer air being replaced with the chill of fall. Yet still she didn’t know exactly how that would happen.
Then Yehuda came out of the water and she could see his goose bumps from her chair under the tree. She got up and grabbed the towel with the abandon of a mother saving her child from danger. As she hurried over to the pool her sheitel got caught on one of the tree’s branches.
Li Juan was in shock. Who was this friend she thought she knew? She’d thought Sosha was just like her. She hadn’t known a Jewish woman wears a wig.
Something happened in that moment. The realization that though we may seem alike there’s something completely different going on. Sosha could see a kind of fear in Li Juan’s eyes as she gathered Mao and her things.
Sosha could have explained but didn’t. She let the tree and its branch do the work. Give the explanation she couldn’t.
And now the smoke of the American Embassy neighbor’s barbecue gets stronger the breeze picks up the smell of nonkosher meats grilling and sends it into her yard. Sosha thinks how it’s just the beginning of summer but how the breeze feels like fall.
She likes the breeze but closes the shades so no smoke comes in through the back door. —