As she typed in his name, she suddenly stopped and looked up at the nonagenarian before her

The old man walked into the office and quietly sat down.

Laibel Leibstein* had recently turned 90, and needed assistance navigating his Social Security benefits.

On his way to the office, as he walked down 48th Street, he’d taken a moment to savor the sweet niggun of boys learning Chumash, cascading from the open windows of their cheder.

Born in 1934 in Kyiv, Laibel was seven years old when the Nazis overran the city in September of 1941, rounding up and murdering over 30,000 Jews at Babi Yar.

To this day, when he hears a truck backfire he is taken back to the night of September 29, 1941 — he still hears the sound of the machine guns as his parents were murdered.

Only through the chesed of Hashem and his small size combined with the darkness of the night did he survive that nightmare.

The rest of the war was a blur of memories full of suffering.

When he arrived in America in 1946, he was 12, an orphan with a second-grade education.

Yet Laibel persevered and eventually married. He and his wife, Ethel, lived in the Catskills where he worked at Kutshers, Grossingers, the Flagler, and the Pines, as a maintenance man. Almost 20 years ago, after the Borscht Belt disappeared, they moved to Boro Park.

Another consequence of the war was that they remained childless. Then Laibel lost Ethel to Covid after over 60 years together.

Laibel wondered what his experience at this new agency would be. Past experiences at other agencies had not gone well.

As he waited, he silently recalled the good years he and Ethel spent hosting bochurim at their various homes in Ellenville, Monticello, and South Fallsburg. They could never afford to purchase their own home, so they moved every few years depending on which hotel Laibel was doing maintenance work for.

The “boys” would come to them on their days off from being waiters at the many hotels, heartily consuming the heimish home-cooked meals he and Ethel would prepare.

The bochurim would often ask Laibel how they could repay his hachnassas orchim. Laibel would reply, with a hearty laugh, “One day, when I am old, you will host me in your home for Shabbos. That’s how you will pay me back!”

Yet those days were long gone. He now lived alone, needed assistance navigating his Social Security benefits, and was hoping someone from this agency could help him.

As the young case manager signaled to him, he shyly entered the inner office. Baila Tennenstein* was very professional in her demeanor. She asked for his name and address and as she typed in his name, she suddenly stopped and looked up at the nonagenarian before her.

A look of disbelief was on her face.

“Mr. Laibel Leibstein… is that really your name?”

“It is. I was named after my alter zeidy, a rav in Kyiv.”

She did not react to the mention of his yichus. Instead, she asked, “Did you ever live in South Fallsburg?”

He was surprised. “Yes, I did, in the 1970s. Why do you ask?”

Baila Tennenstein did not answer. Instead, she excused herself and left the office, returning just as quickly, followed by a man in his sixties with a large beard.

Laibel wondered if he had done something wrong. Yet before he could say a word, the man embraced Laibel in a bear hug.

After giving Laibel a proper shalom aleichem, the man proudly announced, “Laibel, it’s been almost fifty years since those huge meals I enjoyed in South Fallsburg. This Shabbos, you will be my guest. This Shabbos is hakaras hatov time.”

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1021)