Yesterday was Eliav’s 7th birthday. And Yom Kippur is five days away. And those two things, combined, cause me to be nostalgic every year. And never more so than this year. So here goes.
7 years ago on Yom Kippur, I had a 6 day old baby at home. And anyone who has just given birth knows just how out of sorts they are. They haven’t slept in at least a week, if not weeks, and they’ve just been through the birthing process. The baby wants attention all the time and wants to nurse around the clock. Never mind the fact that our baby was jaundiced, so we had stayed an extra day in the hospital and had returned every day since for a jaundice check, including on erev Yom Kippur. It had been quite a week.
But wait – in addition to the new bundle of joy, there were three other little boys at home, all under the age of six. And they wanted to jump, play, yell and be active.
Checking out the new brother, Eliav |
And it was Yom Kippur. So Josh had gone off to the crazy-early minyan (prayers) at something like 4:30 in the morning, and I knew he would be back sort of soon. But it was 7:30 am, and I had at least a few hours left to be on my own. And I was losing…my….mind.
And as the fear and paralysis of the overwhelmed, exhausted, completely out-of-sorts mother started to bubble to the surface, there was a knock at the door. Who the heck could it be at 7:30 in the morning on Yom Kippur?
But as I formed the question in my mind, I immediately knew the answer. As I put down the screaming baby and got through the maze of rambunctious boys to answer the door, I knew before I opened it that it was Stella.
And there she stood. “Hi. Thought you might need some help this morning,” she said as she brushed right past me and scooped up Eliav.
I turned around in awe. Really? I hadn’t told her that I was worried about Yom Kippur and that I didn’t know how I was going to be by myself for the day. I hadn’t expressed anything. And yet, she skipped shul to come to my house at the crack of dawn to keep me company and to make sure that I held it together on that day.
Yom Kippur 5767. One to remember, always.