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I should have known there was no way you would refuse. The Tzaddik needs to smile! And you — you would have given your life for the Rav. So you squared your shoulders drew a deep breath and you… danced. Slowly at first trying out your creaking spine before you segued into bolder moves. Higher. Lower. Fast and faster. You made your back your slave and you mastered your pain. As you twirled to meet the Rav with your twinkling eyes and your trademark playful grin — the Tzaddik broke into a loving smile. You walked out of his house that day a new man. Not a whisper of your back pain ever returned.

On Friday nights you sang too. You had a longstanding duet with Moshik. Moshik — the funny guy who was fifty going on five. A simpleton who had never grown up he had an open invitation at your Shabbos table. Lumbering into our home with his characteristic bent back dressed in white from his yarmulke down to his sneakers he would break out in a toothless grin as you asked him for his favorite Shabbos song. “And Moshe struck the rock… and what poured out?” “Of course. It just had to be soda.”

He would emit a cracking belly laugh and you’d laugh along. Together you then sang the joke again — as loud as you could possibly make it. In passing years I’ve seen Moshik hanging around the neighborhood many a time — begging outside the central bus station puffing on cigarettes with yellow-skinned shaking hands. He always grins and nods hello but he’s never as ebullient as when you made him sing.