Annette’s Cart
Annette gets on the bus at Mahane Yehuda Market and plonks herself on the seat next to me.
“There’s room here for a shopping cart, too.”
I don’t know if she’s asking me a question, or simply making a statement, but I see no cart.
Annette’s long white hair is pulled back under her black gold-edged snood, her elbows hidden under the sleeves of her off-white shirt. The long gold earrings in her pierced ears dangle at the sides of her neck.
As more passengers get on the bus at this busy stop, a dark fuschia shopping cart, its cover fuschia and purple flowers on cream background, appears in front of her thick legs and jams me to the corner.
“You have one of the prettiest carts,” I say.
“Thank you. Yes, it’s my husband’s yahrzeit in two days time. I need to prepare for it. But however much I buy, it’s never enough,” she says in her guttural, Oriental Hebrew. “I’ll have to go back to the Market tomorrow and buy more.”
“Whatever you buy, I’m sure it will be enough,” I assure her, knowing how my own Shabbat food stretches, however many unexpected guests turn up.
“It’s his ninth yahrzeit on Thursday. I wanted to continue to make the Memorial in our home, but the rabbi said to make it in the synagogue. He said people are getting older and it’s too hard for them to climb the steps to my home. So I need to get all the food to the synagogue. Who’ll help me?”
I am impressed that she continues to honor her husband’s memory with a se’udah for the whole congregation. Again, I try to reassure her. “It’ll work out. Get some strapping young fellows to carry it.”
I don’t tell her how I’ve prayed, on occasion, for someone to come and help me with my own loaded shopping cart, with no one in sight late in the evening, and then out of nowhere somebody appears in answer to my prayer.
“Ach, who will I find in my neighborhood? You know, I say “shalom” to people but they don’t answer me….”
I feel bad for her: just because she’s toothless and her face as crinkled as the cobblestones of the Old City alley where I live is no reason for her neighbors to turn deaf to her greeting. She may be old, but she is still very much alive. Her thin black eyebrows still arch mischievously. She still loves gold jewelry: did her husband give it to her as a wedding gift? Two wide gold bracelets adorn her right arm, next to mine; three thin gold bands, her left.
Although it occurs to me to ask in which neighborhood she lives (thinking how much more civilized my own is), I decide against asking her. Better I don’t know the name of the neighborhood where one’s “shalom” is not returned.
“With God’s help, someone will come to help you,” I say.
“I cook for Aaron, I cook for Avraham…I cook for everyone….”
I have no idea who Aaron or Avraham are, but I hope that they will suddenly appear at her doorstep to carry all the food she’ll prepare to the synagogue. After all, she’s doing this as a se’udat mitzvah, in her husband’s memory. Don’t we always get help when we truly need it, when we are working to perform mitzvot? Haven’t we seen that God leads us in the direction we want to go?
“With God’s help,” she repeats, kisses her fingers and raises them above her eyes, heavenwards. “He knows I keep Shabbat, I keep a kosher kitchen, my dairy sink over here,” and she gesticulates with both hands to her right, “and my meat sink over here,” and again she gesticulates with both hands to her left. “…I keep His laws….”
“…And you keep the mitzvot of receiving everyone with a pleasant countenance, and honoring His creatures,” I add. The mitzvot between man and man reflect our relationship with our Creator.
Even in her distress, and even though I don’t see her slack lips stretch into a smile, I see the smile in the steady twinkle of her black eyes. Her losses and disappointments have not embittered her.
“May God grant you health and long life,” I say as I rise from my corner to get off the bus. She moves the cart out to the aisle, allowing me to pass.
“What’s your name?” I ask before I move forward to the door.
We exchange names. We have only traveled together for two bus stops. I am amazed that our short encounter leaves such an impression on me.
There is so much natural flavor in a ride on a Jerusalem bus.
Annette gets on the bus at Mahane Yehuda Market and plonks herself on the seat next to me.
“There’s room here for a shopping cart, too.”
I don’t know if she’s asking me a question, or simply making a statement, but I see no cart.
Annette’s long white hair is pulled back under her black gold-edged snood, her elbows hidden under the sleeves of her off-white shirt. The long gold earrings in her pierced ears dangle at the sides of her neck.
As more passengers get on the bus at this busy stop, a dark fuschia shopping cart, its cover fuschia and purple flowers on cream background, appears in front of her thick legs and jams me to the corner.
“You have one of the prettiest carts,” I say.
“Thank you. Yes, it’s my husband’s yahrzeit in two days time. I need to prepare for it. But however much I buy, it’s never enough,” she says in her guttural, Oriental Hebrew. “I’ll have to go back to the Market tomorrow and buy more.”
“Whatever you buy, I’m sure it will be enough,” I assure her, knowing how my own Shabbat food stretches, however many unexpected guests turn up.
“It’s his ninth yahrzeit on Thursday. I wanted to continue to make the Memorial in our home, but the rabbi said to make it in the synagogue. He said people are getting older and it’s too hard for them to climb the steps to my home. So I need to get all the food to the synagogue. Who’ll help me?”
I am impressed that she continues to honor her husband’s memory with a se’udah for the whole congregation. Again, I try to reassure her. “It’ll work out. Get some strapping young fellows to carry it.”
I don’t tell her how I’ve prayed, on occasion, for someone to come and help me with my own loaded shopping cart, with no one in sight late in the evening, and then out of nowhere somebody appears in answer to my prayer.
“Ach, who will I find in my neighborhood? You know, I say “shalom” to people but they don’t answer me….”
I feel bad for her: just because she’s toothless and her face as crinkled as the cobblestones of the Old City alley where I live is no reason for her neighbors to turn deaf to her greeting. She may be old, but she is still very much alive. Her thin black eyebrows still arch mischievously. She still loves gold jewelry: did her husband give it to her as a wedding gift? Two wide gold bracelets adorn her right arm, next to mine; three thin gold bands, her left.
Although it occurs to me to ask in which neighborhood she lives (thinking how much more civilized my own is), I decide against asking her. Better I don’t know the name of the neighborhood where one’s “shalom” is not returned.
“With God’s help, someone will come to help you,” I say.
“I cook for Aaron, I cook for Avraham…I cook for everyone….”
I have no idea who Aaron or Avraham are, but I hope that they will suddenly appear at her doorstep to carry all the food she’ll prepare to the synagogue. After all, she’s doing this as a se’udat mitzvah, in her husband’s memory. Don’t we always get help when we truly need it, when we are working to perform mitzvot? Haven’t we seen that God leads us in the direction we want to go?
“With God’s help,” she repeats, kisses her fingers and raises them above her eyes, heavenwards. “He knows I keep Shabbat, I keep a kosher kitchen, my dairy sink over here,” and she gesticulates with both hands to her right, “and my meat sink over here,” and again she gesticulates with both hands to her left. “…I keep His laws….”
“…And you keep the mitzvot of receiving everyone with a pleasant countenance, and honoring His creatures,” I add. The mitzvot between man and man reflect our relationship with our Creator.
Even in her distress, and even though I don’t see her slack lips stretch into a smile, I see the smile in the steady twinkle of her black eyes. Her losses and disappointments have not embittered her.
“May God grant you health and long life,” I say as I rise from my corner to get off the bus. She moves the cart out to the aisle, allowing me to pass.
“What’s your name?” I ask before I move forward to the door.
We exchange names. We have only traveled together for two bus stops. I am amazed that our short encounter leaves such an impression on me.
There is so much natural flavor in a ride on a Jerusalem bus.
This story first appeared in Yated Ne'eman, 5 September, 2003