Seidemann: Passover trust and company

Posted

From the other side of the bench

by David Seidemann

Issue of March 26, 2010/ 11 Nissan 5770

It’s been about 15 years since my entire family has experienced a Pesach seder together. It’s been way too long by anyone’s standards. But the family has become so large, spread out across two continents, with children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, that an ingathering would seem impractical. Truth be told, as rewarding as it might be, since my mother’s passing some 15 years ago, it would seem strange, too strange, to conduct a family seder without her.

My mother was so much a part of the holiday, from the tireless preparations weeks in advance, to the cleanup immediately after the holiday. Her work, my father’s work, and the rest of us, or at least me avoiding the post Passover cleanup, would conclude at about 3 a.m., after which my mother would bake bread so that we would have food for the next day. Yes, the memories are so strong that the family seder without her would seem so lacking.

In lieu of a family seder this year, my siblings and I decided to collect some 40 years of memories and present them to our father, may he live and be well; present them to him in written form so that he can relive the wonderful Passover holiday memories that he and my mother created for us throughout all those years in Columbus, Ohio. When we started this project a few weeks ago, the submissions came fast and furious. Each of us — children, sons-in-law, daughters-in-law and grandkids — favored the family e-mail loop with one tale after the other. Some evoked laughter others tears; the dishes and glasses, the company, the special holiday dishes made the same way, year after year that we never tired of, family customs brought over from Germany, and we hope that we are creating such wonderful memories for our children.

The big green chair that my dad sat on twice a year on the two seder nights, the wine-stained Hagadah that was my father’s father’s, and on and on and on. To list the personal memories in so public a forum would almost cheapen them. However a few are so memorable, and not so personal, that it’s worth the risk of sharing them.

My youngest brother was about nine when he assumed the job of wine server. One seder night he spilled what appeared to be half a bottle of Schapiro’s best Malaga on one of our guests. Four months later that male guest got divorced.

The very next Passover, brother number four, still serving as the human wine decanter, repeated his gaff and once again introduced Schapiro’s Concorde grape to a new guest’s expensive suit. Wouldn’t you know it, later that year that male guest was divorced as well. You can only imagine the fun we had at my brother’s expense. He was so traumatized after we led him to believe of the direct connection between him pouring wine on a guest’s pants and the breakup of the guest’s family.

My youngest brother is in his 40’s now but I’m not certain he can pour wine on Passover for male guests without the assistance of sedatives.

Another memory is one that, for numerous years, actually occurred before Passover even began. My eldest brother and I were in charge of supervising the milking of the cows for the ‘Kosher for Passover milk’ that was to be made available in Columbus, Ohio. Two weeks or so before Pesach the representatives of the Borden’s milk Company, a non-Jewish entity, would pick up my brother and or me at 3:30 in the morning and drive us an hour or so to a farm where we would try to stay awake and watch the cows make their donation for Passover. We watched for an hour or so, made the trek back home for an hour, and went right to school. Hours later we would return home from school smelling, you guessed it, like a farm. It seemed as if no matter how many showers we took, we could not rid ourselves of that farm smell until Shavuos.

I remember one year the farmer asked me, “What exactly do you guys do to make the cows Jewish?” I jokingly told him that when the farmer turns his back we give the cows a “barn mitzvah.” Then, in all seriousness, I explained to him that we were there to make sure that only cow milk and no other type of milk hits the bucket.

“But it’s all done by machine,” the farmer said. “It would be impossible for any other animal’s milk to get into the bucket.” “Yes,” I said. “But I have to make sure that the milk that hits the bucket is the same milk that goes into the truck and then into the cartons.”

“Wow,” said the farmer, “and the entire Jewish community trusts one little 13-year-old boy?” I remember those words as if they were said yesterday. “Wow, the entire Jewish community trusts one little 13-year-old boy?”

I wore that comment as a badge of honor and every year remove that comment from the closet where the Pesach dishes are stored. I carry that comment of ‘trust’ to every Seder as my father, may he live and be well, and my mother, may she rest in peace, ‘trust’ me, to carry on their traditions for my children.

David Seidemann is a partner with the law firm of Seidemann & Mermelstein. He can be reached at (718) 692-1013 and at ds@lawofficesm.com