Once Penina Wasser made up her mind about something, she didn’t do much second-guessing. She moved forward

Months ago, right after Yom Kippur, Rabbi Wasser had delivered a parting bein hazmanim schmuess.

It had been pretty good, he thought, more or less what he had heard from his own rebbeim: the importance of helping out at home and behaving like a ben Torah. At the end, he’d smiled and said, “And don’t forget to have a good time too, rabboisai, you worked hard this zeman and deserve it. Have fun, relax, enjoy.” He’d considered saying the word “chill,” but decided it against it — it wasn’t a word a rosh yeshivah should use in public.

He’d planned a similar shmuess now, as the bochurim prepared to go home for Shabbos Chanukah, but as he stood at the head of the beis medrash sharing the ideas that had worked last time, he felt like he wasn’t connecting. The bochurim were distracted, as if there was a bad smell or strange noise in the beis medrash, and he ended the schmuess earlier than he’d meant to. The “have a good time, boys,” line also fell flat and he closed the open gemara in front of him feeling cheated, somehow.

He hadn’t planned on telling Penina about it, but as they sat there, watching the large van pull out of the front gates, it came out on its own.

“It’s like, you expect to feel a certain way at the end of a zeman — the boys learned well, they’re going home for Chanukah, it’s a big deal. But this time it’s not like that, it’s different.”

Penina wasn’t big on analysis. She was more into being direct. “Why? Cause of the music thing, you think?”

He nodded, marveling at his wife’s ability to articulate things that left him confused.

“Yeah,” he said glumly, “probably. Everything is about the single.”

Later, trying to sit and learn in the empty beis medrash, it dawned on him how right she was. Bochurim should look forward to going home, to seeing their families, but they should be leaving yeshivah with a sense of excitement to return. This time, Rabbi Wasser realized, they were nearly all focused on getting home so that they could get to work recording.

“It’s time,” Rabbi Wasser had overheard Leiber say, “to hit the studio.”

He cringed and tried to focus on the Rashba in front of him.