Life, death and my boy's big day

We’ve been to flashy BMs and frummy BMs with separate dancing. At one, a phalanx of rabbis trooped in (why the multiple rabbis? Was there a deal — rent one, get five free?), a sudden sea of black fedoras, and my father-in-law said loudly, “Watch out, here comes the cavalry.” At dinner, they and their wives sat rabbi, rabbi, wife, wife, rabbi, rabbi etc so that no woman would be sitting next to a man not her husband.

In the run-up to the barmitzvah, everyone has some expert advice to impart. A woman at my exercise class tells me authoritatively, “There are just two things you need to worry about...” (I imagine it’s helping your son manage his nerves and not dropping the scroll, but I am wrong); it’s “your dress and your shoes.”

I am as shallow as the next person, but even I don’t think that our son’s barmitzvah is about what I’m wearing. This is unquestionably his day. I don’t mind having a lovely proud bask in any naches that comes my way, but my main job is to organise the party (and Ben’s actually done a lot as my elderly mother is terminally ill in hospital) .

Some women are clearly perturbed when I tell them that I might have to wear whatever I can fit into in my wardrobe (possibly the wardrobe itself as I’ve been stress-eating cake in response to my mother’s decline). If it comes to the question of spending time with a dying parent or going to look for the perfect dress, then who on earth would worry about the dress? It’s not as if I’m going to show up naked or in ripped jeans — I do own clothes.

We go for a pre-BM meeting with our lovely rabbi to discuss logistics. While stroking his beard fondly, as if comforting a much-loved but ailing pet, he asks us about the music. Do we want the choir? How do we feel about guitars? The Boy pipes up: “Well, Mum finds all the guitar-strumming on Friday nights way too happy-clappy!” I’m so glad now that he’s growing up he feels able to express himself so clearly…

At least the Boy is practising. The opening few verses are now so familiar that we all find ourselves singing them as we go about other tasks — I hear the Husband warbling away while dead-heading the petunias. I’m making soup and belting out the third verse when the Boy cuts me off.

“It’s my barmitzvah,” he yells at me (in case I had been unaware that he has a barmitzvah coming up), “There’s no need for you to sing.”

My son sweetly sings his parasha by my mother’s bedside in hospital as clearly she is not going to make it to the BM. It is almost unbearably heart-rending. In the end, she dies just a fortnight before the barmitzvah. The Boy is sad but copes with this sudden rush of adulthood with amazing maturity. He has truly come of age.

At last the big day arrives. Having sobbed like a baby when my niece had her batmitzvah, I am prepared with waterproof mascara and enough tissues to mop up the Red Sea. I have been honoured with holding the Torah for the first procession, and I head for the steep steps leading down from the bimah. I can’t really look down as the scroll is of course in the way. I’m tempted to tuck it lengthwise under one arm like a Frenchman with a baguette but I’m fairly sure this is Not Done.

Amazingly, I manage not to fall over or drop the scroll. With a sigh of relief, I pass the scroll to the Boy, who then turns rather smartly and whacks me full in the face with a jangly Torah crown. Still, I have other front teeth after all and it makes me feel like a proper Jewish mother at last because I am suffering….while my little dollink soaks up all the glory — it’s a win-win.

 

Zelda Leon is half-Jewish by birth then did half a conversion course as an adult (half-measures in all things….) to affirm her Jewish status before a Rabbinical Board. She is a member of a Reform synagogue. Zelda Leon is a pseudonym