“Avrum, how did your projects come along this year?” I ask. Somehow I’d forgotten until now.

He startles. “Uh… good. Fine.” He does the chin thing again. And then, after another long moment of silence, he says, “You know, I’m an old man. What do I know about arts and crafts?” He says it so quietly that only I hear it, though I sit at the opposite end of the table.

“Plenty. Forty years’ worth of making the most amazing projects,” I say firmly.

He looks up at me across the long, long table, past Suri and Chaim and the eineklach, and past Yossi. And he sighs a sigh that makes even the candles freeze.

Yossi backs away from his zeidy, a bit deflated. Avrum is usually the most fun zeidy on the planet, and eating here is the biggest Yom Tov treat.

“Yossi,” I call, trying to salvage whatever I can, “come show me what you made.” He happily runs to my seat and jumps onto my lap.

“Easy, Yoss.” I move the stack of dirty fish plates I was about to take to the kitchen out of the way. I gush and listen and gently remove him from my lap. Because I’m only second best. I try. I peck, I hug — but only for a moment.

I take the stack of plates, collect the dips, and walk to the kitchen.

Avrum. My brain itches as I search for clues. Avrum hadn’t shown me any pinecones this week, or dandelions, or anything else. He hadn’t spoken to me all week. Since… Monday. I scrape the plates as my brain works. Monday. Something happened on Monday. Monday I had a crazy busy day at the office trying to find accommodations for that family from Israel in an apartment close to the hospital. I had a meeting with Rabbi Greenstein about the Schwartzbergs’ need for an aide. Meeting.

I slap my palm on my forehead, sending a dirty fork flying. A meeting. Avrum had been invited to a meeting in yeshivah. He’d been afraid, saying something about rumors all year long about the board doing a staff cleanup. A cleanup!

As I pick up the fork and wipe clean the mayonnaise on the floor, I suddenly know why the pinecones are still nestled in the ground.

I do my own version of Tikkun Leil Shavuos. I didn’t have much of a chance to talk to Avrum before he left for shul, his pockets full of sweets for all the kids. I didn’t even have the time to chide him that it’s not Simchas Torah and no one will appreciate having kids come home on a sugar high. Not that he would’ve listened.

For once, I’m doing nothing as I lie in bed, feeling cold and then hot and then itchy. Avrum always says he’ll give kiddush in shul the first time he sees me doing nothing. He says I make him dizzy when I work so quickly. But now I can’t do a thing. I can’t even think, with the words “fired” and “cleanup” making circles in my brain at a quicker pace than I run the Bikur Cholim office.

I’ll call the menahel, I’ll speak to the hanhalah. I’ll get all the bigwigs I talk to every day to get Avrum’s job back. I’ll use every ounce of pull I can.

They can’t send him. They can’t. Shefichas damim, mamesh. He’s older than all of them (that’s the problem, I know). He practically built the yeshivah from the ground up. He gave up the chance to work in my father’s sweater factory all those years ago to teach Torah, to give to the community.

And anyway, who’s giving candy to all the boys learning tonight? Avrum! That’s who! The same one they want to send now! I know my mind tends to run quickly. For heaven’s sake, I haven’t even confirmed my suspicions. But then again, Avrum’s sigh has.

Rotten! Corrupt! The gentlest of guys, my Avrum. With his handwritten Shabbos newsletters and liquid white-out. With his handpicked pinecones and foam plates to save money for the yeshivah.

The thoughts circle and circle and circle until I feel them circling purple bags under my eyes. With no makeup on Yom Tov.

Finally, finally, the door opens. I hear Avrum shuffle in the hallway. He’s always shuffled — nothing to do with… this. I feign sleep and concentrate on the sounds in the room. Shuffle, shuffle, quiet turn on the doorknob. Good man that he is, he’d never wake me. I listen until all noise stops and there’s only quiet in the room. I almost laugh out loud remembering the good ol’ days when Avrum would sleep on the couch if he came home late from a wedding, so he wouldn’t wake me.

“Avrum,” I whisper.

“Oish, did I wake you?”

“No. I can’t sleep.”

He doesn’t answer.

“Avrum?”

“Yes.”

“The meeting.” I hesitate. Maybe I shouldn’t ask him just yet. “Never mind.”

He doesn’t beg me to continue. Doesn’t ask me what it is I wanted to ask. But being me, I can’t wait even one more minute, and the hours and hours of tossing has only exacerbated my restlessness.

“Avrum. Did they? Did they really let you go?”

The early dawn sunrays filter through the open shades, bathing the blue carpet a magnificent teal.

“Why are we talking about this now? After a full night of learning, don’t spoil my simchas Yom Tov.”

“Okay.” I sit up. “But just to let you know. I won’t let it happen. I won’t!”

“We’ll talk, Faigy. But you know, it’s from Hashem, and I really don’t want you to beg them to keep me.”

With that he turns to face the wall.

And I turn to face reality.

At the grand young age of sixty-six, Avrum is out of a job.

In the morning, I quickly hide all the beautifully computerized Yom Tov newsletters the grandchildren left behind. The sixteen varieties of cheese goodies are displayed on my best cobalt dishes before I head to shul. I know using cobalt discloses my real age, now a sore topic.

This is not a Yiddishe way of looking at age! Ridiculous! A man handwrites Shabbos notes and he gets sent. Cleanup. Cleanup! C-L-E-A-N-U-P. Like my Avrum is a dust mite the janitor can just get rid of. I have to be careful not to actually stomp to shul. I resist the urge to clank my heels loudly in protest. See? I’m still in heels, young and sprightly.

I think of Avrum’s SAS shoes he’s wearing since we had our firstborn.

I open the shul doors only to be accosted by the entire shul, literally. They’re all headed toward me — the door, actually. Davening is over. I gracefully (or so I’d like to think) turn around and slowly make my way down the steps, the same ones I just climbed. I’ll wait for Avrum, and we’ll walk home together.

“Oh! Gut Yom Tov, Mrs. Felder!” Mrs. Gobioff greets me and pats me on the shoulder. “You saved our life last week with those meals you arranged.”

“Good! How’s your husband doing?”

“Baruch Hashem, baruch Hashem.” She bobs her neck as she nods. “He even made it to shul with a walker this morning.”

“Baruch Hashem! Anything else you need, don’t hesitate to call.”

“Gut Yom Tov, Faigy. How’re you? I didn’t see you in shul, must’ve missed you,” Ruchy from down the block greets me.

I smile and nod. I’m not enlightening her. Avrum sees me and makes his way toward us.

“Rabbi Felder,” Ruchy continues, this time addressing Avrum, “you can’t imagine how my son lives with Yom Tov! It’s all to your credit, I tell you. Last year… well, it didn’t work out too well, and this year, all he wanted was to go learn last night! The yiras Shamayim you put into these boys… amazing!”

I try to meet Avrum’s eyes, he doesn’t do the same. He just smiles his wide, warm smile that makes his beard split in two. “Ah, your Moishe’le is a neshamah, a tzaddik’l. I hope you let him learn last night.” He winks to show he’s only joking.

Ruchy stands taller and smiles proudly. “I’ve got more boys coming up, Rabbi Felder. Looking forward.”

As we walk, I’m three steps ahead, as usual. I’m happy to see Avrum busy pointing at tulips and maple trees while I’m busy making seating calculations for the seudah.

Business as usual at the Felders

June 21 used to be circled in red on the calendar. This year, the date remains uncircled, and the annual celebratory barbecue remains unplanned. The two Shabbosim between Shavuos and the end of the school year are the quietest we’ve had in months. No one asks to come and none of the kids calls to offer help for the nonexistent barbecue, or for anything else. Moshe and Suri come to pick up their fish on Friday and awkwardly greet their father. He sighs, and I sigh. I catch him with a Chovos Halevavos on Shaarei Bitachon on quite a few occasions, and for some reason I’m unhappy. Why doesn’t he stand up for himself instead of accepting everything?

The house is so quiet, it screams. I secretly hide out at the office to escape the subdued shuffling of the afternoon hours, but as I watch Avrum’s face every day when I get home all exhausted and dressed up, I regret it. The mornings are even worse. I see the hesitant way he leaves the house to cheder, almost as if he’s deciding between making the most of every day or being afraid of getting too attached to his job.

On the Last Day, I make sure to be home before the school day is out and stand by the window waiting and dreading Avrum’s arrival. Since Shavuos he’s been taking the car, claiming it’s too hot for a walk. Trust me, it’s easier to walk than to drive his battered red Volvo.

I hear the car before I see it. A mournful rumbling sound making its way up the block. Slowly, he steps out and removes a huge box from the trunk. He heaves it up the steps and I run to open the door for him.

“Hello,” I say, trying for a cheerful tone.

He does the same. “Hello.” He drops the box in the kitchen and sits down. I ignore blood pressures and cholesterol levels and scale numbers, all of which are high, on his end, and place a steaming plate of lasagna before him.

He looks into the plate, wordlessly. And then, almost for the first time in forty-three years, Avrum cries. It’s the first time he seems bitter since The News. His shoulders arch forward and his beard makes contact with the lasagna. He doesn’t make a sound, but the tears wet his beard and whatever cheeks he has. I wipe my own tears away.

It’s a funeral. The painful, bleeding death of a man’s respect.

Slowly, slowly he removes the box from under the table, the steam of the lasagna slowly, sadly spiraling heavenward. He removes one bulletin after the next, and talks of each one.

He shows me his Sefirah chart and the middos he’d worked on. The mitzvah note bulletin, the Chumash bulletin. A disciplinarian, he’s not, I know, but a master mechanech he is. Was. Ouch.

“A smart board. They wanted me to use a smart board! Little boys learn from a heart. Not from a stupid, stupid smart board.”

I remain quiet. I don’t tell him that he can learn to use a smart board, that I learned to use a computer in place of my trusty notepads. I just nod along and get up to refill his plate.

Miraculously, June 22 dawns. Two things enter my foggy brain. Avrum’s bed is empty. I am flooded with relief. Secretly, I’ve been terrified of… something, maybe a heart attack, a depression. And he’s out of bed, as usual. The second thing I realize is that it smells. Of food — fried food.

I sit up. “Avrum, you home?”

“Good morning, Faigy,” Avrum calls from downstairs. His voice is cheerful. “Our annual June 22 breakfast is waiting for you.”

Oh! I forgot about those. The first vacation breakfast courtesy of Avrum! I chuckle. I’ve never been too excited about those. The dishes, the mess, and the calories… but today I feel only relief.

“Sure, coming.” I try to erase every last trace of surprise from my voice, and hope I’ve succeeded as I hurry to get dressed. “Smells delicious from down there. Can’t wait.” It comes out muffled with my sheitel pins between my teeth, but I think he hears me.

I walk into the kitchen to the most beautiful sight. Uneven pancakes piled high on my best milchige china, and there’s syrup and jam (for Avrum). The pancakes are pure white. He obviously didn’t use the whole wheat flour, because why should you eat the schmutz of the flour when you can eat it without? On each plate, there are peppers sliced like flowers, each with a scoop of tuna topped with a cherry tomato. I don’t even roll my eyes.

Avrum looks different. Or maybe not. He just looks regular, peaceful and happy and content. Everything I’m not, at the best of times.

“Faigy,” he says, once I’m seated, “this is for you. I can finally treat you for working so hard. Ha! You’ll thank the cheder for sending me.”

Avrum, sarcastic? But he’s not. He seems genuinely happy.

“What do you say to the pepper flowers?” he asks. “Remember they made it at our sheva brachos? I never knew how to do it, but today I figured it out. Maybe I can become a food decorator,” he jokes.

Sure. A food decorator. With pepper flowers and maybe an umbrella toothpick.

“Avrum, you’re good,” I say, and actually mean it.

He suddenly turns serious. “I’ve thought a lot over the past two weeks.” He pours half the syrup bottle onto the pancakes. “You know, we hardly got to talk lately, but I’ve been thinking…”

I glance at my watch. So much to do in the office, and I’m eating pancakes.

“I’ll miss the boys”—his voice catches—“and yesterday was hard for me. But, look — Hashem made it happen this way. The investment house is finally paid up, and now I can be at home.”

I look up, shocked, but Avrum’s deep into pancake number two.

“Um… Avrum? Are you, um… sure? Like, you don’t feel like… like, worthless? Old?” I whisper the dreadful word.

“And if I’m old… I can play with the eineklach. Learn. I’m actually excited. And I think I’ll start planning the New Hampshire trip today. Or maybe I’ll plant some flowers.”

He can’t be at peace with this! He can’t! How can he just rot and become old? Where’s his drive?

“I should thank them,” he says calmly. “Otherwise, I would never give it up. And then, I wouldn’t be able to live my dream”—he smiles indulgently—“and make you pancakes. Every day.”

* * *

The pancakes weigh heavy on my heart as I walk up the steps to our large office building. And Avrum has French toast planned for tomorrow. Soon I won’t be able to walk, I’m afraid. I feel every bit of my age as I arrive at the top, and can’s shake the frightening feeling of going to work and leaving my husband home. Jobless. Who knows how I’ll find the house when I get back? I turn the doorknob, and instantly, Dina and Esther, my two secretaries, are all over me. Ah. The pleasure of a busy day.

Between two emergencies, I try to imagine life without my job. And I just can’t. I think about Avrum’s peaceful smile as he cleared the table, and I feel bad for him. For settling and not fighting back. How? Why?

Dina makes me a coffee at around noon, and for the first time in a very long while, I’m too full to drink it, because every time I think about food, I taste those flower pepper slices.

Instead of accepting the coffee, I tell her to sit down. I need to talk to someone.

“Dina.”

“Yes?”

“My husband lost his job.”

“Really? He taught my brother last year, and he loved him! What happened?”

“They claim he’s too old.”

“Seriously? Your husband? He’s so young at heart. How’s he taking it?” Her vindication soothes my soul more than coffee ever can.

“Oh, you know him. He seems okay, but he can’t possibly be. And I’m going out of my mind thinking about it.”

“He needs a job,” she says softly.

“Duh.”

“No, really. Anything to keep him young.”

I sigh and nod.

All day long, I think about it. He needs a job! But he’ll never look for one, which leaves it up to me. What can he do? Teach, tutor, learn… I nix each one. If he’s too old to teach, he’s too old to tutor, I guess.

And then old Mr. Stengel calls. Esther takes the call, but transfers it to me while mouthing something like impossible.

“Mrs. Felder,” he says, “I ken’t enymore, he’s nutting worth, my stupid aide.”

“Why is that?” I try my most patient voice, while lines two and three blink incessantly. “I thought we sent you a nice Jewish boy?”

“Nice? Jewish? My foot! My old, cranky foot, maybe! Feh! He didn’t know nutting! Not about de tefillin, not about how to prepare me a decent meal! Nisht in moil tzu nemen! Garniks ken er! I’m used to gitte paprikash, and he gives me sushi!”

I breathe deeply and think how to answer him. As many times as I’ve tried dealing with him, it hasn’t worked. Avrum! Avrum would be perfect.

Bingo.

I field two more calls about incompetent aides, and patiently speak to a potential candidate with a poor English. As the day wears on, the Idea seems to be the solution in so many ways. I’m the one who decided to add aide placement to our organization’s services, but to be honest, it’s really not my thing.

Avrum will shine at this one! No need for smart boards or typed parshah sheets, that’s for sure. And I’ll give him a private secretary if he needs it.

It’s time to use my protektzia.

“Rabbi Breir, Mrs. Felder speaking,” I say to the CEO.

“How can I help you?”

I outline the problem, and… the solution. My brilliant, brilliant solution. I can’t wait to share it with Dina.

I hang up with a meeting scheduled for later that day to iron out the details… I’ll save him, his respect, his ego. Head of an entire department! I deserve The Greatest Wife Award.

* * *

At six o’clock, I pull up to my home still thinking about the meeting with Rabbi Breir. He had seemed genuinely happy to have Avrum join. I fantasize about the office we’ll construct — in a different wing than mine, of course. Never good to work with a spouse in one room.

The late afternoon sunshine casts shadows on the street as I decide where to park. I see Avrum’s Volvo peeking out of the driveway, which leaves me with the street. I won’t tell Avrum anything until the phone call comes. Ahh… The suspense is great.

I carefully get out of the car. The smell of topsoil and mulch greet my nose as I walk up the driveway. I stop. For a moment, everything looks familiar. Avrum surrounded by his talmidim. He used to bring them to our house on many occasions, usually to bake for a siyum, while I used to breathe heavily, thinking about twenty-something children touching cookie dough. But these aren’t his talmidim. These kids I recognize from the street.

Avrum is engrossed in his work with the small digging shovel in hand and the entire neighborhood around him. He seems to be in the middle of delivering a science lesson and the kids listen raptly. His face is peaceful. His shoes are caked in mud and his beard suddenly seems so black.

I stand quietly and watch. As hard as it is for me to admit it, I’m awed.

“Mechy, you’ll do a great job with these flowers, come here and give me a hand.”

Mechy stands up proudly, and all the boys watch him enviously. He’s overweight and a social outcast, but with a bit of Avrum-therapy, he’ll walk away lighter. I think of Mr. Stengel. Avrum-therapy might be just the thing.

“Hi, Faigy,” he says, finally spotting me.

“Kinderlach, my wife is home.” He gives each child a cleanup task, which they quickly carry out. “Thank you all for helping, tzaddikim. Tomorrow you can come back and we’ll learn a little more.”

He gathers the tools and he chuckles. “I got myself a day camp here, and I got a lot of planting done. Maybe I should consider giving planting classes.” He smiles and points out the tomato plants and the geraniums he planted, in purples and reds. It’s breathtaking, and so Avrum-like. “I’ll need all the veggies I can get to make you delicious food, because you work so hard. I hope you’re not too jealous of my vacation.”

I look around at my transformed lawn and resist the urge to cry.

I swallow. Great Wife Award. I’m not so sure anymore. I’m actually deathly afraid of The Phone Call. I notice an old lawnmower leaning against the steps. I’m afraid to ask where he got it from.

“So what else did you do today? I tried calling you,” I say, not quite so nonchalantly, taking in the dried mud settling between his wrinkles.

“Baruch Hashem, geloibt iz der Heiliger Bashefer. I cleaned my dentures, and kept on forgetting where I am.”

He’s joking, but he’s hurt at my questioning. Oh, no. I can’t have Rabbi Breir calling tonight. Me and my stupid ideas.

I take some of the gardening tools from Avrum as we head toward the shed.

“Faigy, you don’t believe me, do you?” He stops walking, shuffling, and turns to look at me. “I truly am happy. I believe Hashem took the job and not… the cheder. Or the board. Im yirtzeh Hashem, I hope to arrange a chavrusa and seriously buckle down.” He speaks like a young bochur. He starts walking again. “Actually, I feel almost bad to see you working so hard. Not getting to enjoy your golden years.”

It’s my turn to stop walking. He’s happier than me?

Well, it’s only day number one. Let’s see what he’ll say next week. But I lag behind and touch the lawnmower as I think about Rabbi Breir’s phone call.

Avrum makes dirty footprints as he follows me into the house. He turns on the faucet to wash his hands. I cringe as my Windexed faucets turn brown.

And then the phone rings. I jump. Avrum is oblivious. He quickly wipes his semi-dirty hands in a clean towel to take the call. By the way Avrum clears his throat, I know it’s him.

I should grab the phone out of his hand! Tell him it’s a mistake. Tell him it’s the wife who has the problem, that she can’t understand a man content to be with himself.

I hurry out of the room but stay close enough. I want to escape upstairs, escape from myself. But my feet keep me close to the kitchen, eavesdropping like a little girl.

“Hello, Rabbi Breir, what can I do for you?” I can’t see him, but I’m sure he’s busy with his beard.

“I know. She’s not only the best office manager, she’s also the best wife.”

I wait.

“Aha, so you’re offering me a job.” Avrum sounds surprised. Or is it hurt?

What have I done?

“So my wife is behind this, I guess.”

Avrum, some diplomacy please, I beg silently. But Avrum and diplomacy is like serving sushi on cobalt.

Then he’s quiet for a long moment. I’m afraid he hung up.

“I hear. So you’re saying that this job will help my wife”—he pauses—“I can’t take how hard she works, and honestly, I know it’s your organization, but she’s running herself ragged. Not a moment to just sit.” He chuckles softly.

My heart warms.

“If not now, then when?” Avrum is saying. “She has to ease up a bit, but I’ll tell you the truth. I am really not looking for a job.”

I breathe sharply. So it’s over.

“Aha, so you’re saying that if I take the job, she’ll be able to cut hours?”

Cut hours? Me?! Whose idea was that?! What would I do?

“Oh! That would be my dream! To help her.” His voice is buoyant.

I’ve never appreciated Avrum enough.

“I’ll get back to you, Rabbi Breir. A yasher koyach!”

I hear the click as he hangs up the phone. I don’t have a second to waste. Quickly, quietly, I run upstairs and lock the bedroom door.

The carpet swallows my heavy footsteps as I deftly change into a snood and house top. I hear Avrum’s heavy footsteps coming closer, stop, and then recede again. Must’ve thought better of it. Smart man.

If not now, then when? She’ll be able to cut hours? That would be my dream.

My head is heavy on my pillow, and the soft feathers sag. Not a moment to just sit. I don’t need to just sit!

I roll over and extract the eye-shield Avrum once brought home for me from his airplane ride. It’s blessedly dark, and colorless. There’s nothing there. Only myself.

Could I do this every day? Just… be?

The darkness overwhelms me with its intensity. With its questions.

I fling the eye-shield off, and sit up.

“Avrum?” I call.

He comes.

“Avrum, please take it!” I say desperately, before the word old or useless form in my mind. “Please. It’ll mean the world to me.”

Because it is never too late to learn about seeds and pinecones and patience and inner peace. And, of course, acceptance.

It’s time to plan a barbecue.

(Originally featured in Calligraphy Succos 5778)