I’m not exactly sure, and they can sense that. They sniff out uncertainty like bloodhounds

I’m sitting on a folding chair in a small gray room, concrete walls, dirt floor.

Actually, I’m sitting at my kitchen table near a sunny window, but it doesn’t matter, it feels like an interrogation room.

The children are asking questions. Again. The curious, curious children. And G-d help me, they expect answers.

I started out a half hour ago, strong, confident. They asked me what Rashi meant here, no problem! What was created in the 18 minutes before Shabbos, easy peasy! Why Daddy always says he’ll be home from Maariv in ten minutes and then doesn’t get back for another hour — I can answer that!

They move on. “Why do we say v’al hakalkalah at the end of Al Hamichyah when no one else does?”

I’ve got this. I tell them the story about the chassid and the Rebbe. That should satisfy them.

But they aren’t done. Not by a long shot.

“If you poured yourself a cup of water on Shabbos and then didn’t finish it and put it in a bowl so you could water a plant with it on Sunday and then you did water the plant on Sunday, were you mechallel Shabbos? Even though it’s already Sunday?”

I’m starting to sweat. The lone, exposed lightbulb sways above my head. Or maybe it doesn’t. I can’t tell. But I must answer their questions!

“If you borrowed a head of garlic from the Grossmans and some of the cloves were rotten and then you return another head of garlic, did you just make the Grossmans do ribbis?”

“I don’t think so. I mean, Mrs. Grossman lent me a whole garlic head, so I paid her back a whole garlic head. She couldn’t know it was rotten.”

But I’m not exactly sure, and they can sense that. They sniff out uncertainty like bloodhounds.