But these Germans… they make you shiver. No one knows what they will do, or what they are capable of. We can only test, and wonder, and be careful, and try not to think too much.
Blessings of a new year…? The not-knowing inside me shivers.
Old paper crackles as Zeida turns a page in his machzor.
I look down at my hands, holding an old machzor. This has no ta’am, no flavor. No; it does; everything has a ta’am. The ta’am of this davening is dry pages of an old machzor. Not rich notes of a chazzan’s voice in the big shul. My insides twist, shivering suddenly in the cozy light.
Zeida hums, a warm, reassuring sound. A few notes, haunting, but not frightening, just enough to say that things are all right, as they will always be, even when things are not all right.
“Come, Froyim,” Zeida says. He is straightening up, holding out his arm, and I slide closer to him in my chair. Zeida is warmth, and strength, and steel – the same Zeida, last year, this year.
The sefer now in Zeida’s hands meets my eyes.
The Zohar Hakadosh.
Zeida starts speaking, a soft sing-song chant, learning with me the words of the Zohar.
There is something about those words; the strange sound of the Aramaic, the mysticism in the words. I know they speak of secrets. I feel the twist inside me uncurling, twisting in the opposite direction, feeling the flow of the light in place of its shadows. Secrets, secrets.
I sit and I learn with Zeida. The words tell of our Father in heaven, and His precious children on this earth. The feeling of awe sweeps in, muted, but there. It sweeps along me and leaves a tangle of fear. Aibishter…!
Tatte in Himmel, You are looking down at us. And what are You thinking about us?
Tichleh shana uklaloseha. The curses started last week. Will they truly end on this day?
It is all so serious. I feel so small, so lost, and so confused, the familiar kitchen more frightening on this night than a large room filled with people. And yet, the words of the Zohar are here, as they will always be. Zeida chants, gently, his grey beard moving softly. He finishes, a moment of silence caressing the room. He softly closes the old sefer and kisses it. I take it from his hands, and bend my face to kiss the cover before returning it to the shelf.
Aibishter, Aibishter, tavoh shana uvirchoseha… only You can make it good…
We sit here, in a moment of this heavy seriousness, hearing the silence before we daven maariv together.
Aibishter, please… Aibishter, please…
I know, now, with an intensity I have never felt before – in the shul, with a tzibur, with a chazzan, the intensity of truth that presses on my being – Aibishter, we are in Your hands, oh Tatte… We need You, Aibishter, please, to hold us, every day, and keep us sheltered within You, our names inscribed and placed before You, safe in Your book of life.