They’re newlyweds, and I’m nervous they’ll view us like a pair of dinosaurs, cute dinosaurs — dinosaur dolls

I

sometimes wander into my kids’ empty bedrooms, staring at their neat beds and undisturbed papers, and wonder where the time went. They made aliyah, and now our friends and neighbors call us empty nesters. They say it to our faces.

“You’re empty nesters. How does it feel?”

I want to poke their eyes out like in the Three Stooges. “Why you — BOINK! How does that feel?”

It’s so unfair. We spent about a thousand weeks with our kids before they left. Memories? It feels like they went from three to 30 in a year and a half. I recall nothing of the in-between. The photos on the walls say something different, but you can’t trust pictures — everybody knows that.

This Shabbat, we are not alone; we’re hosting Nuchem and Sara, our children’s friends, for meals and sleeping over. They’re newlyweds, and I’m nervous they’ll view us like a pair of dinosaurs, cute dinosaurs — dinosaur dolls.

I want to be a good host, but it’s not easy. You have to read minds.