Sheer Delight

Ever had an experience that triggered such a powerful memory that it takes you back in time? I imagine we all had such moments. I had such two such moments this week, within the same 24 hours. I left the Berkshires earlier this week to travel home to Newton for the first time in over three weeks. In part, my purpose was to take care of errands and tasks at home. But if I am really honest, my real motive was to visit my children and our grandson, Ian. I mean, it’s been over two weeks since they were out to visit, and in the lifetime of this grandfather of a not-quite 17-month-old, that felt like forever.

There were moments during both of my two visits while I was playing with Ian when I was transported back almost thirty years to a time when his father, our oldest son, Benjamin, was Ian’s age. It was quite a different time in our lives. Not only were we new parents, and relatively speaking, newlyweds, we were also in the early part of our time in Mississippi. Just three months before Benjamin was born, Laura and I moved to Jackson, Mississippi where I became Rabbi of Beth Israel Congregation. We lived in that community for five years. It was the birthplace of three of our four children. We still maintain close contact with quite a number of folks from those years. Indeed, I am eagerly looking forward to spending a weekend back with the community this Fall as I visit as a scholar-in-residence.

We moved to Jackson from Manhattan's Upper East Side in the summer of 1987. We loved our time in Mississippi. But we missed the "City," and we would periodically make trips to the “big cities” around us in the South. Our most frequent visits were to New Orleans, which became a favorite destination for us as we came to love its many treasures and curiosities. We could also buy bagels and kosher meat there! Most of our visits were made with very young children in tow. We learned to seek out the city's many family-friendly sites.

The Louisiana Children’s Museum became a family favorite. From a very young age, Benjamin loved the place, as did his sister Sarah as she was born just a bit over two years later.I have incredibly vivid memories of Benjamin’s early years - and especially of the time he and I would spend on the floor of our family den playing, reading books, as he taught me to become a father. On one visit to the Children’s Museum, I spied a poem on the wall which I simply loved. To me, it summed up my experience as I learned the role of father. Every time we would visit the Museum I would steal away to re-read the words of the poem which struck me as so poignant and true about learning the role of parenting.

I was even more struck about a year later when, on Father’s Day, Laura presented me with a needlepoint she’d made of the poem. Somehow she had managed to copy down the poem during one visit to the Museum, and then under my very nose surreptitiously create and complete a needlepoint of it for me. To this day it hangs in our den (practically the only non-Pez decoration in the room! For those who don't know, Laura is a serious collector of Pez dispensers, but that’s a story for another time.)

Not once but twice during my visits with Ian this week, I was brought back to those moments in the Children’s Museum when I first encountered that poem. I was sitting in our children’s Dining Room which is, essentially, Ian's playroom. While we were together, more than once Ian wandered off and would come back to me with a book. He’d hand me the book, and proceed to crawl into my lap so we could read. He’s done that on a few previous visits. But for some reason, the intensity and comfort he seemed to find in sitting in my lap took me back to those words I first read on the wall at the New Orleans Children’s Museum. Each time he’d let me know he wanted to read the book again, or that he wanted a different book. If it was a different book, he'd get it, hand it to me, and then crawl right back into my lap. I was transported back to the days when his father would sit in my lap and teach me again and again the truths captured in that poem.

Ian, you filled my heart to overflowing!! I cannot completely find the words to express the love and gratitude which filled my heart and nourished my soul. You made time collapse and you transported me back three decades go your father's childhood.

What a gift children - and grandchildren are! I am grateful for that gift of family, even as I am mindful that there are those in our world, and sadly within the boundaries of our nation, who have been robbed of that joy and those blessings.