The Halvah Man comes every Purim. Until one year, he’s missing

As Told to Etty Fried

The Halvah Man comes every year, before the Purim seudah — when ribbons and nuts and exposed Styrofoam are still strewn about.

He once told my father he comes before the meal, before the meshulachim arrive, so that my father can listen, really listen, to his story. Not just stroke his beard and rip off a voucher, as though he’s a tipsy yeshivah bochur in a Dr. Seuss costume.

My father listens — and gives — generously, and they talk news, politics. He brings halvah-filled hamantaschen with him every year, no bow or ribbon, just the plastic box, price on. He lays it on the table, magnanimously, and says, “Ess abissel.”

My mother doesn’t like halvah, but she takes one, just to see his smile, to watch his back straighten a little on this day when, door after door, he’s a taker, taker, taker. Then he disappears into the noise outside, and the box stays in the center of the table for the meal, mostly untouched.

The Halvah Man, as my brother called him some years back, has been coming for 15, maybe even 20 years, and counting. A tradition of sorts.