Closing Doors

by Linda J. Goldberg

May 19, 2009

At last, the sun shone through the blue gray sky. Bessie fastened her glasses squarely onto her nose and remembered the phone call from her son Harry. “Come next week for the High Holidays. We all want you to come.” Bessie pictured Harry’s dark bushy eyebrows frowning as she said, “I’ll let you know.”

We all want you to come reverberated in her ears as she remembered the days when she entertained the family for the holidays. She spent the week setting the table with her Israeli hand-woven red tablecloth, her mother’s Russian wine glasses, and her grandmother’s silver candlesticks. For almost fifty years her husband Sam had reminded her to “Clean my Pa’s brass samovar so we can use it for tea.”

Instead of focusing on past memories Bessie leaned on her cane and waited for the walk sign to cross Harvard Street to shop at her favorite grocery store, The Butcherie. How she wished there were more trees to lean on instead of just her cane.

Since her cataract operation, Bessie’s eyes were unforgiving when it came to adjusting from light to dark. The noises of the other shoppers, the babies and young children, smacked her in the face. Grabbing a shopping cart, she scratched under the neck brace her doctor had recommended.

As she turned down the freezer aisle, Bessie overheard a young woman whine, “Pa, get what you need. We are here with a car. Look around and see what you need.”

She craned her neck to see a young blonde woman. She knew the drill: get whatever you need so we won’t have to come and help you too soon. Too soon meant never to this blonde (the daughter- in-law, Bessie supposed). The old man looked disheveled and confused as he hurried along carrying his frozen packages following the blonde.

Harry’s wife - also a blonde- had an unforgiving whiney voice. It was especially whiney when Tracy had said, “Harry can’t be bothered to run over every time you need a light bulb changed. Doesn’t your building have a super?” Harry used to visit once a week and have supper, and every time he came he would look around to see if anything needed to be done. After Harry stopped coming for supper, Bessie never wanted to face Tracy again. It was soon after this conversation that her doctor had suggested the neck brace.

Winding her way to the bread section, she sniffed the dark rye to see if it was fresh. No aroma wafted through the plastic as in the old bakery days when she could go from shop to shop. Now she only bought what she could carry for the walk home along Babcock Street, and up the stairs to her apartment.

Pretending the two egg rolls were two challas, she placed them in her cart. Tomorrow night she would say the blessing over them for Shabbat dinner. Then she would pray for an answer to Harry’s question. Should she go to his house for Rosh Hashanah? There she would sit quietly, watching Tracy serve fish as cold as herself, on ordinary plates, before begrudgingly sitting next to her. From across the wooden table her granddaughter would make funny faces until Bessie laughed.

In the deli department the cabbage soup smelled inviting. A man brushed by, grabbed a fully cooked barbecued chicken, big enough for three, and said, “Pa, here’s for Shabbat dinner.”

The son smiled as if he cared, but Bessie pictured the old man saying the blessings over the candles and wine, then eating his chicken alone on Shabbat, as she so often did. How Bessie wished she were the type of woman who would invite a man who was not a close relative to keep her company for dinner.

Where is the special honey? On the shelf right in front of her. Sam used to say, “Buy my special honey so we can have a sweet year.” Those years when Sam was alive were our sweet years.”

She still had wine from the last time Harry had driven her here, his short legs darting up the stairs as he carried her groceries, including several bottles of her favorite red wine. Careful not to drink more than a smidge every week, Bessie made sure it would last until Harry had time to bring more. She had no idea when that would be.

She had watched what had happened as her friend Estelle began to complain that she needed help. Next thing she knew Estelle was in assisted living, very expensive assisted living. Bessie planned to do her best to avoid that.

In the refrigerated section she eyed the eggs.  If she had a list they would be on it, but Bessie did not bring a list. Her friend Estelle blamed list making for her poor memory.

As she took some unsalted whipped butter from a shelf, her neck started to hurt. As she edged toward the checkout line, a tall lanky girl jumped ahead of her, then stopped to let her pass. The girl reminded Bessie of her granddaughter: an awkward twelve, long brown hair, sweet smile. Did she remind the girl of her grandmother, she wondered. In any case, she was grateful for this act of kindness, whatever the reason.

The old man, his daughter- in-law and son were line ahead of her. She didn’t watch to see who paid. Sometimes children paid, to assuage their guilt or to make their parents think that they really cared. “Time is money,” Sam used to say.

When it was her turn, she placed her items on the counter and fumbling through her old black bag, Bessie found her wallet.

“That will be nine dollars and twelve cents,” the woman ringing in the groceries said. She gingerly put the eighty eight cents, same as her age, into her purse, happy to receive any change from ten dollars. Grabbing her cane out of the cart, she moved slowly toward the door.

The blonde woman held the door open for the old man. Bessie hoped she could get out the heavy door without having to push it.

Smiling smugly, as if this act of kindness forgave all, the son carried the old man’s plastic bags and took hold of the door till his father had passed through.

Bessie couldn’t see the door blow back toward her face, but could hear it as if it were a Shofar calling. She lost her breath and balance for only a second. A young arm assisted her back onto her feet.

Blinded by the light Bessie saw only long brown hair, but heard a young voice say, “I’ve never seen anyone let the door close on someone like that.”

As soon as she caught her breath, she said, “Thank you, thank you.” She would not tell Harry about the close call, but she would go to Harry’s for the Holidays, she thought to herself, if only to see her granddaughter’s funny faces, once again from across the table.

Linda Goldberg’s short fiction has appeared in Binah, The Jewish Spectator, The San Diego Jewish Times, and others. Her book of short stories about growing up in Jewish Boston entitled HERE I AM can be found at www.lindajgoldberg.com. She leads The Writer’s Workshop at the Morse Institute Library in Natick where she lives.