Malkah was in such awe of the tzaddik that she spent most of her time with him asking questions, and nodding at the wisdom of his responses. \u00a0Of course, his responses generally started with the need to do more research. \u00a0Look things up. \u00a0Even go to the library, when he was stumped. \u00a0But most of his real sources were at his fingertips.<\/p>\n
His own library consisted of wall to wall volumes and treasured manuscripts. \u00a0The paintings, he kept in the closet on the floor, inserted in rows exactly like the books. \u00a0If he wanted to look at a painting, he’d slide it out from the row and lean it up against the bookcase for a month or two or three. \u00a0And then he’d slip it back into place, and pull out another for contemplation.<\/p>\n
Nothing was new. \u00a0He never bought a new book in his life. \u00a0Not even as a gift. \u00a0Treasures were either old, vintage, or ancient. \u00a0They were in dreadful, poor, or fragile condition. \u00a0Some pieces required temperature control. \u00a0Those documents he made sure were in the museum’s library’s rare book room. \u00a0We were very proud when the climate control was installed, feeling the treasures were safe at last.<\/p>\n
The textiles should have been there as well. \u00a0Ach! \u00a0What a mess. \u00a0They’d be rolled up carefully \u2014 but textiles really need more care than cardboard boxes and rollers. \u00a0… They belong in a museum<\/em>. \u00a0I think Indiana Jones said that.<\/p>\n Every gift Malkah ever received from the tzaddik first belonged to someone else. \u00a0Usually, a lot of someone else’s. \u00a0There was that stamp collection from the 1930’s from the flea market. \u00a0With strange-shaped stamps from all over the world. \u00a0Malkah was expected to get interested in stamps and keep on collecting the ones that hadn’t been included in the volume the tzaddik had given her.<\/p>\n Wow. \u00a0Someone else’s stamp collection! \u00a0File under vintage, for it had been under 50 years old.<\/p>\n Then there was the gift, actually from Mrs Tzaddik, that took forever to receive.<\/p>\n “It’s coming!” Mrs Tzaddik would announce. \u00a0“Your birthday’s only three months from now \u2014 it’ll be ready by then!” she said excitedly.<\/p>\n Only it wasn’t ready. \u00a0And not three months after Malkah’s birthday either. \u00a0But at last the day came. \u00a0The present, not quite a year later from the first tease \u2014 and there it was. \u00a0A smallish object that fit in the palm of your hand, all wrapped in wrinkled white tissue\/liner paper. \u00a0You know, that paper they use on the inside of gift boxes. \u00a0That stuff.<\/p>\n It was lumpy. And almost jingled. \u00a0But didn’t quite.<\/p>\n Malkah tore off the tissue paper.<\/p>\n “What is it?” she asked. \u00a0It looked like \u2014 well, she didn’t know what.<\/p>\n Mrs Tzaddik gave her a look of both expectancy and exasperation. \u00a0She hadn’t expected such a lukewarm response. \u00a0But ingratitude was Malkah’s default setting. \u00a0What had she been thinking?<\/p>\n “A bracelet made of civil war buttons!” Mrs Tzaddik said excitedly. \u00a0“Put it on!”<\/p>\n Malkah obeyed. \u00a0The thing was enormous. \u00a0About four inches wide and sewn together on some stretchy gold band. \u00a0It felt like a hundred bulbous brass military buttons. \u00a0It felt like a thousand. \u00a0And it was too big for her. \u00a0And it was heavy. \u00a0And probably breakable. \u00a0And the ‘buttons’ could fall off. \u00a0And it was a ‘treasure’ \u2014 Malkah thought in dismay. \u00a0Oh. \u00a0And it was hideous \u2014 but you figured that one out already, right? \u00a0Malkah was twelve. \u00a0Where would she wear such a treasure?<\/p>\n “Thanks,” she said. \u00a0What else could she say?<\/p>\n When she grew up, Malkah had a child. \u00a0Actually, she had two. \u00a0But this story concerns the first and not the second. \u00a0The second was too young to notice. \u00a0Malkah’s eldest must have been about four at the time.<\/p>\n It was Chanukkah.<\/p>\n The tzaddik had brought the little one a Chanukkah present.<\/p>\n “What is it?” said the Malkah’s firstborn son.<\/p>\n “It’s a \u2014 ” to tell the truth, I don’t remember at all what it was. \u00a0But it was a great find at the flea market.<\/p>\n “How does it work?” the brilliant boy asked.<\/p>\n “Well it would go like this, but it doesn’t work \u2014” replied the tzaddik.<\/p>\n “You mean you got me something used and<\/em> it’s broken?”<\/p>\n And Malkah’s brilliant firstborn took the tzaddik by the hand and went upstairs to his room. \u00a0They came back down about 20 minutes later. \u00a0Both with grins on their faces.<\/p>\n Malkah’s firstborn had negotiated something Malkah would never have dreamed possible. \u00a0The tzaddik was allowed to give his grandson something used \u2014 as long as it wasn’t broken. \u00a0Or something new. \u00a0That also wasn’t broken. \u00a0Or a used book \u2014 but it couldn’t be missing pages, especially the last page of a story. \u00a0They had shaken hands on it. \u00a0Deal.<\/p>\n Firstborn son went to the brass tray and picked up a tiny gift-wrapped something and handed it to Mrs Tzaddik.<\/p>\n “Here, noni, this is for you,” he said.<\/p>\n She tore open the little wrapping with ‘nona’ crayoned on it.<\/p>\n “I don’t want this,” she said. \u00a0“It’s a Christmas tree ornament!”<\/p>\n Unnegotiable. \u00a0She was already out the door.<\/p>\n Malkah’s firstborn grew up to be a lawyer anyway. \u00a0You just don’t win every case.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Malkah was in such awe of the tzaddik that she spent most of her time with him asking questions, and nodding at the wisdom of his responses. \u00a0Of course, his responses generally started with the need to do more research. \u00a0Look things up. \u00a0Even go to the library, when he was stumped. \u00a0But most of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[250,216,269,222],"tags":[364,226,334,470,446,192,1020],"class_list":["post-3089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-essays","category-kaddish-in-two-part-harmony","category-seymour-fromer-zl","category-tzaddik-stories","tag-collector","tag-dads","tag-malkah","tag-moms","tag-mrs-tzaddik","tag-seymour-fromer","tag-tzaddik-stories"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/beitmalkhut.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/beitmalkhut.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/beitmalkhut.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beitmalkhut.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beitmalkhut.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3089"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/beitmalkhut.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3089\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3093,"href":"https:\/\/beitmalkhut.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3089\/revisions\/3093"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/beitmalkhut.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beitmalkhut.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beitmalkhut.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}