Packing Away the Sukkah

Sniff sniff.

I hate packing away my sukkah. I love my sukkah.

It isn't fancy. It isn't one of those gorgeous sukkot you see in magazines, with matching decorations and coordinated colors. Mine is more like a family museum.

The Katz Family Museum of Childhood.

It has been collecting exhibits for more than 40 years. The security system is a safety pin.

Every year I open boxes of old drawings, photographs and decorations I haven't seen for twelve months. And every year, I remember.

The first piece of art I ever hung is now an antique. A torn green plate with an apple and a little jar of honey. It is almost 45 years old. I know it's torn. I know the colors have faded. If I saw it in a store, I wouldn't buy it. But I can't imagine my sukkah without it.

Because the little boy who made it is almost 47 years old. Today he spends his days in the Knesset, fighting for veterans whose wounds are not always visible.

But when I look at that plate, I don't see a man who is almost 47. I see a little boy handing me his artwork. “Ema, this is for our Sukkah.”

And I put it up. And I kept it. For 45 years.

There are dozens and dozens like it. “Ema, this is for your Sukkah.” “Savta, this is for your Sukkah.”

Preschool cards. Drawings. Paintings. Things made from construction paper, crayons, glue and whatever else a preschool teacher could find. Some are beautiful.

Some are... well... you have to know the artist personally to understand what you're looking at. I love them all.

Every one is laminated or contact papered. Every one hangs from a safety pin. Preserved for the ages, or at least until the next strong wind.

Laminated Love

And then there are two cards that are different. They are beautiful Hallmark cards from my dearest mother, z”l. Her words are blessings for our family. 

She is no longer here to say those words to me. But every year, I hang those cards in my sukkah. And when I look at them, my mother is still with me. Her handwriting. Her love. Her blessings.

One more generation hanging among all the drawings and paintings of the generations that came after her.

I have a golden Jerusalem made by my golden girl, who now works in Jerusalem.

I have the Old City, drawn in crayon by a little cutie who is now a captain, protecting our country.

I have a lulav and etrog that is 32 years old. The little boy who made it is 43. He is a rabbi. I think he is still pretty proud of that artwork.

And there are the preschool pictures of children who are now in high school. I remember their teensy hands giving me their creations. Now I look at the teenagers and wonder how on earth the years got away from me.

There are photographs, too.

For the ushpizin, I once dressed up seven of my grandsons as our holy guests and photographed them.“Little Avraham” is graduating yeshiva high school this year. Three of those little boys have already had their bar mitzvahs.

And there they hang, frozen in time.

Except, of course, they aren't frozen at all. They grew. They became themselves.

That is what my sukkah has become. Not just a place to eat. Not just a place to invite guests. It's a family history book. Except the pages hang from safety pins.

Every year I add a piece or two. Every year I say, “Oh, look at this!” And every year I put it all back up.

The Museum Closes

And then comes the part I don't like. I take down the decorations. The table disappears. The lights come down. The museum closes its doors for another year.

Sniff sniff.

But maybe I don't really put the memories away. Maybe I just put the decorations away. Because the children are still here. 

The little boy of the green plate is still here, just a grown man. The little girl who drew Jerusalem is still here, just working in it. The captain, the rabbi, the seven ushpizin... still here. Just taller.

And my mother is still here, too. Her blessings are still hanging on my Sukkah wall.

The chagim are over. The dishes are going back into the cabinets. The leftovers are almost gone. Regular life is beginning again.

But maybe this is regular life now. Making games for my grandchildren. Finding time to see them. Taking online classes, because at 70 I have decided there is still more to learn.

Finishing that book that has been sitting on my desk for years. Planning this year's “Dames of the Dance,” which is about Rebirth.

And so I tape up the last box. I write on it, in big letters: MUSEUM. REOPENS NEXT SUKKOT.

And somehow, as always, one safety pin ends up in my pocket.

B"H.

I'll find it in January, and smile.

Until next Sukkot. ❤️

The Game Is Still Good. So Is the Hat.

A couple of years ago, at the start of the war, I made a board game for my grandchildren.

It was called: B"H, LIFE IS GOOD.

At the time, life didn't always feel particularly good.

We couldn't visit the grandchildren the way we normally did. Everyone was waiting, worrying, and holding phones up so we could see each other's faces. Hugs had been downgraded to screens. And since some of our kids didn't have screens at all, we just listened to the sound of their voices.

I wanted to make something for the kids I couldn't see. Something that said, in my own Savta-ish way: Yes, things are hard. But B"H, life is good.

So, I covered the dining room table in plastic, to protect it from me. I sat down in my blue hat, with a pile of markers, and made a game.

And when I say made, I mean made. I drew the board. I colored the spaces. I wrote out the cards. I cut things out. I glued things on. I arranged and rearranged the board just so.

It was not exactly Hasbro, but the kids loved it.

Fast forward two years.

Last week, we traveled to visit our far-away grandchildren, and I brought along my new game - the one I've been calling The EVERYTHING Game, because it has cards for little kids, older kids, thinking, doing, talking, laughing, and generally making a lot of noise.

We played. They loved it.

And then one of them said, "We still play B"H, LIFE IS GOOD."

Still.

The game I made at a dining room table had not been sitting in some forgotten corner collecting dust. It had been played. Repeatedly. By actual children.

I brought the old game home with me.

And that's when I made three important discoveries.

Number One: I had the dates wrong.

Originally, I was sure I'd made that game during COVID. I'd been telling it that way. Then I found the photo on my phone. It was the war. 

Apparently, in our family, the hard times have started to blur together. Unfortunately, one of them hasn't ended.

Number Two: The game is good.

Really good.

I looked at it with fresh eyes and thought, “You know what? This actually works.”

And I can make it better. Because, once a person discovers she can invent board games, she cannot stop.

I now have opinions about cards. And spaces. And dice. And how many squares are necessary before a child starts wondering whether the game will ever end.

I have become the sort of person who looks at a board game and thinks: This needs more interaction and fewer rules.

It's a slippery slope.

Number Three: Look at the photo. I was wearing the same hat.

Two years later. Same hat. Different game. Different grandchildren. Different circumstances.

Same Savta.

The hat, I'm proud to say, stayed exactly the same.

And suddenly I thought: Maybe that's the real game.

The world changes. The grandchildren get older. Some of them get taller than I am, which, frankly, is rude.

New games come along. Old games stay.

We sit around tables. We try to give our grandchildren something that will stay with them after we've gone home. And sometimes, years later, we discover that they kept it.

Not because it was perfect. Not because it was professionally manufactured. But because Savta made it for them.

I don't know how long B"H, LIFE IS GOOD will keep getting played. Maybe until the board falls apart. Maybe until the grandchildren are too old for it.

Although, judging from the teenagers who recently played my new game for three hours, I'm not putting any money on that.

But I do know this:

I made that game during a very hard time because I wanted my grandchildren to remember something: B"H, life is good.

Two years later, they reminded me.

And, by the way... the hat is still good, too.

B"H. ❤️

 

Savta, Off Duty

I was wedged under a tilted ladder, catching grapes my son was dropping down from the top of our grapevines, when my two-year-old granddaughter, watching nearby, called out:

"Savta. Water." Oy.
"Savta. Water."

I was just about to figure out how to unmesh myself from the ladder situation when my five-year-old grandson called out, "I'll get it, Savta."

And he took off.

That didn't sound right to me. How was he going to get his sister a drink? He'd have to find a cup, reach the sink, fill it (well, at least an inch) and somehow get it to her without spilling. This was a two-part Savta job, minimum.

I got myself untangled and ran into the house. (Well, I was running in my imagination.)

And there he was. One leg on a stool, his knee on the sink, leaning over the water filter with a little black paper coffee cup. He had figured it out.

I was about to exclaim, "Amazing! What a boy!" when I felt my eyes getting misty instead. So I just said, "Thank you, darling. What a good brother."

SUDDEN INDEPENDENCE

We sat down to play one of the games I'd invented. A few minutes later, he disappeared. Then he returned, wiping his hands on his pants. He'd gone to the bathroom by himself. And washed his hands. Without a reminder. Without a single "Savta, come."

Had I been fired? Not exactly. Just quietly downsized.

Where had the "Savta, help" gone? The "Savta, read me a book"? I realized a whole slew of cherished little-kid jobs were disappearing off my desk - the potty songs, the swing pushes, the running into my arms at preschool pickup, the booster seat buckle, the hand held down the street. Those small, unglamorous tasks are part of what binds a grandchild to each of us. And in one splash of filtered water, I'd been quietly promoted to Consultant. Emeritus. On Retainer.

I felt sad. Also, oddly, proud.

A few minutes later, we went out to the porch where my son was helping us build our sukkah. My grandson watched for a minute and announced, "I can help." Of course he could. Every little kid wants to help.

Then he thought about it. "I left my tools at home," he said. "But I'll be able to figure it out."

I looked at him differently. I actually believed him.

Then a fly started dive-bombing my head. "Don't worry, Savta," he said. "That's my pet fly. I brought him from home."

B"H. The job may have changed. The boy hasn't.

The Grapes Miss Them Too

There have been lots of cartoons flying around the internet lately showing grandmothers dancing and frolicking because their grandchildren have gone back to school.

I understand.

Many grandmothers spent the month of August helping out while their children worked and their grandchildren had nowhere to go. They ran Grandma Camps, with or without sleepovers. They took the kids on vacations and day trips. They cooked and baked and played and cleaned and hugged and bandaged and refereed fights.

After thirty days of making pizza, wacky mac and pita with chocolate spread, I suppose many grandmothers are ready for a salad and a martini.

I am not one of them.

Yes, I also had my grandchildren for August. And while I can certainly see the advantages of having my house back, I am not celebrating their return to school.

True, my house is a disaster area. My coat closet needs a complete overhaul after umpteen games of hide-and-seek. (The coat closet is a favorite hiding place.) And I am missing more teaspoons than ever. (I have a suspicion that some of them were tossed out with the half-eaten yogurts.)

But bits of our summer keep turning up anyway. My grandson's favorite green T-shirt was mixed in with my linen laundry. Plus, as I got ready for Shabbat, I found my daughter-in-law's white woven shawl and my two-year-old's Mickey Mouse hat on the dining room table.

But honestly? I miss the mess. I miss the noise. I miss the kids. I'm heartbroken to say goodbye to August.

Of course, it isn't really goodbye. I'll try to see as many of them as I can - at least once a week or every other week. But it isn't the same as having them here for days and evenings, swinging on the porch, playing game after game, reading books until the pages curl.

I loved having the sinks filled with cups and dishes, keeping the oven ready for the next pan of French fries, and constantly replenishing the cereal. I loved the noise. I even loved the bimba races around the kitchen.

Apparently, I am the grandmother who misses the chaos.

HOLDING ON TO SUMMER

So I did as many things as I could to prolong our being together.

I took the girls for our annual back-to-school shopping spree. We commandeered dressing rooms in stores all over the mall, because when one girl finds a cute top, suddenly cute tops are popping up all over the store for the other cousins. And of course, they must try everything on at the same time.

I think the women and girls waiting in line to get into the try-on rooms were watching their goings-on like an internet reality show.

(This year, two of the guys joined us, but that was an exception to our yearly adventure. Culture shock. They didn't know what hit them.)

GRAPE HARVESTS

And then there were the Friday Grape Harvests. So far, there have been two.

Some kids came over in the afternoon and picked as many grapes as they could in an hour. Then I served them pizza, we played pen-and-paper games, and eventually the ones who had to go home kissed me goodbye and hopped on the bus.

This year's grape harvest has been amazing. The kids found grapes hiding everywhere on the vines - behind my wooden bench, along the sides of the palm trees, tucked into places I never knew grapes could grow.

The big kids climbed up to reach the clusters hanging from the top of the metal trellis. I held the ladder with one hand and a bowl with the other. They tossed the grape clusters into the bowl. They didn't always hit the mark. Sometimes it was absolutely raining grapes.

And there were so many.

This year's harvest has already produced dozens of kilos of grapes, and there are more to come. I think the vines felt something was happening. I think they know the children have gone back to school.

Because somehow, after an entire summer of having grandchildren underfoot, there are still grapes hiding everywhere. Behind the bench. Along the palm trees. High up on the trellis. Just waiting to be found.

I think the grapes miss my grandchildren too.

 

A Summer of Theater

I love taking my grandchildren to the theater.

Well, what would you expect? Theater is such a big part of my life. And I'm not selfish. They don't only have to watch me on stage. :-) [Although that is nice.]

I'm happy to take them to whatever age-appropriate English-language productions are around. [I wish there were even more.] And this summer, for the first time I took them to two Hebrew shows.

Fortunately, I was familiar with both. The first was Frozen on Ice. The children were enthralled. They loved the Frozen movies and knew all the songs. They watched the skating and singing and special effects with wide eyes. They kept saying, "I love this! I don't want it to end!" [Really.]

Meanwhile, I was thinking, "Okay...nice." It was nice. But the rockets didn't exactly go off in my theater heart.

A few weeks later, I took another group of grandchildren to see the Hebrew production of Annie. Now, that was different.

In more than thirty years of theater-going in Israel, I had never once seen a Hebrew production of a Broadway show. I genuinely didn't know what to expect. I have no basis for comparison, and no complaints to file - the performers were terrifically talented. Real voices. Real performances. And even though they weren't on Broadway, they did a good job and really put over their songs.

History Lesson?

I wasn't sure how the children would relate to a story set in post-Depression America. Did they need to know about the Stock Market Crash of 1929? Should I explain how suddenly-poor folks were living under the bridges of New York City, or that people sold apples on the street to earn a few pennies? 

Should I tell them who President Franklin Delano Roosevelt was? Should I mention that my father, obm, once worked in the Chrysler Building, which appeared as one of the backdrops?

I wasn't sure. I could give them a history lesson before the show. Or I could just let them watch Annie. I decided to leave out the lesson and let the music do its work. 

I had seen Annie on Broadway. Not just any Annie, either. I saw the original production in 1977, with Andrea McArdle and Dorothy Loudon. Almost fifty years ago.

And somehow, sitting in a theater in Israel in 2026, watching a Hebrew-speaking Annie onstage, my mind was playing the Broadway Annie of 1977 at the same time.

I understood almost not a word of the Hebrew. But I knew the story. I knew the songs. I knew what was happening. And then the show began with: "The sun'll come out tomorrow..." Except tonight it was something like מחר תזרח השמש.

And it was wonderful. And I cried.

I cried through most of the performance - right up until the finale, when something happened that yanked me straight out of 1977 and back into my seat: the big tap number.

I think you know that I tap, and love all things tap dancing. So, I waited through the whole show for the big tap number. And when the ensemble launched into the finale, I sat up, ready.

There were no tap dancers.

Instead, "Daddy Warbucks" seemed to be wearing little tin toe taps - the kind you clip on to keep your soles from wearing down - and he sort-of, kind-of, approximately tap danced. A shuffle here. A f-lap there. He did his best, but my tap-dancing heart let out a small, private sigh.

Nobody else in the theater noticed. Nobody else cared. Only me - disappointed about the tap number  that never came. Still, when the song ended, Annie hugged Daddy Warbucks, and I was moved anew.

Part of me was watching the little girl onstage. Part of me was watching my awe-struck grandchildren. Part of me was back in 1977, watching Andrea McArdle and Dorothy Loudon. And part of me, apparently, was still thinking about those toe taps.

When the orphans sang It's the Hard-Knock Life, I didn't understand all the Hebrew words, but I understood the feeling. And I understood something else. The children didn't need my history lesson. They didn't need to know everything I knew about 1929, or Roosevelt, or the Depression. 

The Theater Experience

They just needed the heart-warming story. And the music. And maybe, most importantly, the experience of sitting in a theater and being transported somewhere else.

When the show ended, my granddaughters sang the Hebrew version of Tomorrow all the way home. I sat in the car listening to them, part of me in 2026, part of me in 1977, and - fine - part of me still thinking about tap shoes.

I decided that I'll keep taking my grandchildren to the theater. Not because I need them to understand what theater means to me. Not because I need them to love every show that I love. And certainly not because I want them to better appreciate me on stage. :-) [Although that would be nice.]

I'll take them because I want to give them the chance to discover what happens when the lights go down, the curtain goes up, and a story comes alive in front of you.

Frozen on Ice was nice. Annie made me cry. And somewhere between the two, I realized that this summer had become a summer of theater.

A dozen kids saw Frozen on Ice. They oohed and aahed at the special effects and were thrilled to see Olaf. Others saw Annie. They discovered a story I had loved for almost fifty years, and they sang Tomorrow all the way home.

The shows were totally different, but the kids will remember the lights going down, the music filling the hall, and hopefully, sitting in a theater with Savta and experiencing the magic of a live show.

I've spent a lifetime loving theater. Now I get to give a little bit of that love away.

THE GAME BOOK

My five-year-old grandson has been spending August days with me while his parents work or care for his two-year-old sister, who recently had her adenoids removed.

We split up the day. Breakfast together (he'd already eaten at home, but eating with a friend is so much more fun). Then prayers - well, I pray out loud, usually singing to kid-friendly tunes like Barney might use, while he climbs onto the overhead bar of my porch swing and dangles by my side. B"H, he has not collided with me yet.

We're done just in time for the wonderful and adorable mother's helper to arrive - old enough to watch him, young enough to still enjoy the park herself. I can see them from the porch: climbing, hiding, swinging, the tips of their shoes coming into view as they fly back and forth on the big blue web swing. When she reads to him, he stares at her in adoration with big Bambi eyes.

(Every day in my head, I have her married off to one of my 12- or 13-year-old grandsons. I can already hear the conversation with their kids 20 years from now: “Abba, how did you meet Ema?”

“Well, when Ema was 11, she was a mother's helper in Savta's house. Savta made sure that, IY"H, Ema and I would meet ten years later.” And everyone will crumble in laughter.)

But that is not the subject of this blog. :-)

The subject is my game book.

My Game Book

It is not easy to entertain a five-year-old. His interest in any activity seems to last about 15 minutes tops. So one day early this month, we ran out of games.

Candy Land, done.

Chutes and Ladders, done.

Memory Match, done - and only missing at least three cards.

Out of desperation, I grabbed the sketch pad we'd used for our Family Art Exhibition and drew a very rudimentary game. Sort of like Candy Land, but without the colors, the Chocolate Forest, or the Ice Cream Mountain. Just a path, a page, and dice.

(Kids love anything with dice. And I have COLORED DICE. Bazingo.)

Wellllll, he loooooved it.

So I drew something else: a big rectangle full of dozens of little boxes. Players roll the dice and fill in that number of boxes. A giant hit. Then a path of circles - roll the dice and make your way to the end. Another success.

Then a path with instructions: land here, go forward two; land here, go back one. He thought I was brilliant.

But the pièce de résistance was his game. He asked for a pen and made his own. It didn't really have a shape - maybe a blobby shape. It didn't really have rules either (well, the rules were made up as we went along).

We colored part of it with blue squiggles. We gave it a name: THE WATER GAME.

We've played it a dozen times. It's the game he loves best. 

Not the fancy games we bought. Not the games Savta invented. The game he made himself. 

Because sometimes the best game isn't the one we give a child. It's the one we give them the chance to create.

The Secret Society

Last week my husband held a celebration for six of my grandsons - the ones who were just Bar Mitzvah and the ones who are about to become Bar Mitzvah. It was a lovely evening.

It was also a very unusual evening for me. I was the only woman there, and that was only because someone had to take pictures. Once I had finished my photographic duties and dinner arrived, I was graciously excused. Apparently, this was a boys-only occasion.

My husband - let's call him “Sabba” - wanted the boys to have the spotlight. Just them. No womenfolk. And I think I understand why.

For the past year, Sabba and his boys have had a little secret society going. Who knows? They may even have had a secret handshake. They called themselves The Tefillin Team.

Once a month, six of my grandsons met with Sabba in the lower level of a synagogue. It was the sort of place that is usually empty except for Shabbat Kiddush, which made it the perfect headquarters for a secret society.

The boys would arrive carrying their blue-and-white striped paper bags. Inside were two books. Books about tefillin.

You see, when each of our grandsons was born, Sabba bought him a pair of tefillin. Even little Chaim David, who is three, already has his pair waiting for him, IY"H.

Sabba didn't want the boys simply to put on the tefillin one day because they had reached Bar Mitzvah age. He wanted the boys to understand them. To love them. To appreciate the mitzvah and the incredible tradition they were becoming part of. So he decided to learn with the six boys every month.

This sounds simple. It wasn't. Six boys. Three different communities. Six busy schedules. Yeshiva. Basketball. Swimming. Babysitting. Youth group. Tests. Life. Coordinating a meeting between these six boys was sometimes more complicated than a military campaign.

But Sabba was determined. He called. And called again. And called again. Eventually, they found a date that worked.

My Part in this Enterprise

And where did I fit into this very male enterprise? Well, someone had to get them there.

Sabba picked up two of the boys. I picked up the two who lived farthest away, and we all met in the middle. I became, for lack of a better term, the Tefillin Team's Uber driver.

I also became the official food-delivery service. Every month I picked up hamburgers with all the works on the side, along with two giant trays of French fries - which are called “chips” here - and delivered everything to the boys. Then I left them to learn.

While the boys studied with Sabba, I played with my granddaughters. It was a win-win arrangement.

Except for the part where I eventually had to get back into the car and drive the boys home in the dark. Have I ever mentioned that I am not a fan of driving in the dark? Night driving is not my favorite sport. (Then again, I got to see my far-away kids and share some kisses, so another win!)

Friends, for months, this was my view of the Tefillin Team.
Transportation.
Hamburgers.
French fries.
Granddaughters.
Dark roads.

And then, when I started writing this blog, I realized something rather embarrassing. I didn't actually know what happened at those meetings. I wasn't there for any of it - not the boys' questions, not the moments of real learning, not whose stomach growled loudest waiting for those hamburgers.

So I asked Sabba to tell me some stories. Had anything funny happened? Had one of the boys surprised him? Did they ever ask questions he didn't expect? Did he notice friendships developing between the six cousins? Anything. Something. Please! I wanted to bring the story to life.

He looked at me. “I can't tell you any of the stories that happened between me and the boys.”

Excuse me? I wasn't asking him to name a boy who threw a spitball! I just wanted a cute story for my blog. But apparently, I had stumbled upon the first rule of the Secret Society: What happens in The Tefillin Team stays in The Tefillin Team.

So I am left to imagine.

Six boys, ages ten to thirteen, each with his own personality, his own level of knowledge, his own sense of humor, sitting with their grandfather in a synagogue basement.
Learning ancient laws.
Asking questions.
Figuring things out.
Probably laughing.
Probably teasing each other.
Probably not always sitting perfectly still.

And, I hope, slowly realizing that they were doing something pretty special. They were learning with their grandfather. And Sabba was doing something even more special. He was passing something on.

At the celebration, he told the boys how proud he was of them and that he had learned from them, too. Then he told them about the future he hoped they would have.

He hoped that one day, when they were grandfathers themselves and bought tefillin for their grandsons, they would tell them, “When I was a boy, I learned the laws of tefillin with my grandfather, and now I am learning those same laws with you.”

Well. I was taking pictures and videoing his speech. And I started crying. Of course I did. I am a grandmother. One of the boys noticed his grandmother crying and started laughing. What can I say? Grandmothers are emotional folks.

The "Graduation" Ceremony

Each of the boys received a certificate. Then they ate falafel. And just like that, the first year of The Tefillin Team came to an end.

Except I don't really think it ended.

Because the whole point was never just the twelve meetings. It was the connection. A grandfather who loves a mitzvah. Six grandsons learning from him.

Six cousins who became, in the truest sense, a team.

And a tradition that, if Sabba gets his wish, will keep traveling down the family line.

Someday, perhaps, one of those boys will be sitting with a grandson of his own. Maybe he will take out his tefillin. Maybe he will remember a blue-and-white striped bag, a synagogue basement, a hamburger dinner, six cousins and a grandfather who cared enough to keep calling until everyone could make it.

And maybe he'll say, “When I was a boy, I learned this with my grandfather.”

Because in the end, isn't that what we want for our children and grandchildren? Not just that they know the mitzvah. But that they know they belong to something - that they're on a team.

And that, I think, is the real secret of The Tefillin Team.