The Book of Trees by Leanne Lieberman Read Free Book Online

like he’d been waiting all his life for me to show up.
    “Welcome, welcome. I’m Joseph Blume. Please come in.” He took my coat. “Have you ever been for Shabbos before?”
    I shook my head. I’d been to my bubbie’s, but never to an Orthodox home. I wanted to back out the door.
    He clasped his hands together. “Such an honor to share your first Shabbos with you.” He sounded genuinely excited. “Chava,” he called down the hallway to the kitchen, “this is Mia’s first Shabbos!”
    Mrs. Blume, a little mousey thing wearing an awful gray hat, came down the hall. She looked like a small mushroom. She gave me a huge smile and grabbed my hands. “We’re so happy you could come.” I kept nodding and smiling.
    I followed the Blumes into a dining room crowded with people standing around a table laid with a white cloth and blue-edged china. Mr. Blume invited everyone to sit down, and a teenage girl with dark curly hair, the Blumes’ daughter I guessed, came in from the kitchen.
    Mrs. Blume blessed the candles. I remembered some of the words from Bubbie Bess’s house and mumbled along. A sense of nostalgia for Bess and her apartment enveloped me.
    Then Mr. Blume sang a Hebrew love song about a woman of valor. I watched in awe as this fat middle-aged man sang this loving song to his frumpy wife in front of a table of guests. I tried to picture Don singing Sheila a love song in front of our family. Even though he was a musician and had a beautiful voice, I couldn’t imagine it. I felt a lump in my throat like I was going to cry. I swallowed it away.
    After the song, Mr. Blume’s daughter, Aviva, stood before him and he put his hands on her head and whispered a blessing in her ear. I’d never seen that before and I started to tear up. I wanted to get up and excuse myself to go to the bathroom, but the table was so crowded, at least six people would have had to move to let me out. So I sniffed a little and murmured “Allergies” and let my hair fall in front of my face, just in case anyone was looking at me. They weren’t. They were all watching this dad show how much he loved his daughter. I tried to imagine Don giving me any kind of blessing, or even a song—it so wasn’t going to happen. I gritted my teeth.
    What if I made my future different? What if that was me at one end of the table with a husband who sang me love songs every Friday night even though we’d been married twenty years? What if I had a husband who loved our children to pieces and blessed them every week with a secret whisper in their ears? What if?
    Mr. Blume blessed the wine and then everyone filed into the kitchen to wash their hands in a complicated ritual I didn’t understand, pouring water over each hand with a special pitcher. All the guests filed back to the table and sat silently until Mr. Blume blessed the challah , a braided bread, and passed it around. I’d never sat in silence with a room of people before, not even for a minute.
    After the meal, the Blumes passed around little song-books. I watched as Mr. Blume closed his eyes, tipped back his head and sang “ Ribbono shel Olam .” “Master of the Universe.” His family joined him, their voices floating on the wide-open notes. The other guests joined in as best they could, stumbling through the transliteration.
    I started to sing the song too, and an amazing feeling rose inside me. As I sang, I could feel our voices bringing peace into the world. I wanted to hug each person at the table because I felt happy and oddly united with these strangers. I wanted to feel this way— connected to others—all the time.
    I went home elated, humming one of the songs on the subway. At the Blumes’, all the pieces seemed to fit together. They worked all week and then they rested and celebrated the Sabbath together, sharing what they had with others. They sang songs at the end of the meal, with their eyes closed, and a feeling of godliness filled the room. It was better than playing