Would it be so bad to miss this? Shulamis Greenman had plenty of friends; this was probably one of those events where she’d invited me out of politeness

Rebbetzin Weinberg: I try my best, but the community’s expectations aren’t realistic.

Shulamis: Your presence would have added so much to our simchah. Couldn’t you have made it?

Shulamis:

People take family for granted.

That’s the first thing I learned when I began planning our first major simchah in the family — my son’s bar mitzvah.

Heshy’s our only son, among five girls, and I was going all out — the next simchah in the family would probably be my daughter Chani’s chasunah, and she was only 16. I reserved the nicest hall in town, booked a well-known orchestra, and splurged on a new sheitel for myself. Yes, it was expensive, but baruch Hashem, Nachum’s business was doing well, and what was money for anyway if not to use for occasions like this?

When we got to the invitation lists, though, my excitement tapered off.

“My parents are going to come, of course, and your mother,” I told my husband, frowning over the lists. “But so far, none of our siblings has confirmed that they’ll make it.”

It was understandable — even if it hurt a little. Heshy’s birthday was between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, a hectic time. We lived pretty far from our families. Some of Nachum’s siblings lived in Israel, and my sister Etty was due right then, so all of those were out of the question.

“Dini and Menachem aren’t coming?” Nachum asked. His oldest sister and her husband rarely missed a family simchah.

“I’m not sure,” I told him. “They want to come, but I think she’s a little overwhelmed, she’s making a chasunah in Elul, remember? Could be Menachem will come alone.”

“I’m sure everyone is doing their best,” Nachum said.

“I know that. I’m not upset with them, it’s just — you know, the whole situation. It’s a shame not to have people there.”

“It’s not as if the hall will be empty, you know.” Nachum grinned. “I mean, you must have invited the entire community, plus everyone from work, plus your old seminary friends, and, oh, you didn’t forget your first grade morah, did you?”

“Ha, ha.” Despite myself, I smiled. “Yeah, it’s true, we did invite a lot of people. And it will be nice. I’m just—you know, family is family.”

Still, my spirits lifted a little after that conversation. While we’d been living far from family for all these years, we’d developed very close connections with many people in the community. I was close to my neighbors and had friends who were surrogate sisters. And surely there’d be a nice turnout on the other side of the mechitzah; Nachum had his business associates and he was very active in the shul, assisting with arranging shiurim and making generous yearly donations.

As replies trickled in, I was gratified to see that many of our friends and relatives planned to try to come, although it was still less than I’d imagined. Some of it had to do with the date — many of the community members would be going away already for Succos. Others just couldn’t make it for various reasons.

It is what it is, I told myself, and resolutely turned my attention to the million other details that needed to be taken care of before the big event.