Last Night.

Hey, what would you do if you knew you only had one more night in your house?

I would sit on my couch in the living room and light a fire in the fireplace, cozying up with a good book or my homework as my mom works on the couch across from me. There would be snow outside and I would have just come inside from playing in it. I would look outside at the tracks I made and measure how much snow has fallen based on the clean pile on the porch table that looks kind of like a huge cake.

I would make Wacky Mac and invite over all of my friends, the ones who are off living their lives in Israel or doing grown up things.

I would turn around the couches and pull down the screen and host a movie night. It would be Star Wars, maybe. Or maybe Miracle. I’d forget that I never actually liked the movies and remember that I loved the movie nights.

I would light the Chanukah candles by the windowsill and look onto the street and press my nose against the window to distinguish between what was outside and what was reflecting from inside.

I would sit in my den at the little plastic table as Fievel: An American Tale played for the fifth time, and I would color a really great picture for my babysitter who left three years ago.

I would go under the covers of my babysitter’s bed and watch PBS on her crinkly TV, home sick from school.

I would sit at the kitchen table in my pajamas as the sun streamed through the windows, basking in the rays and feeling the ice cold tile floor on my feet. I would sit there until the rain started, until I could hear it against the windows on the ceiling.

I would sneak down to the kitchen for a nighttime snack of crackers, or maybe an apple with cheese.

I would sit on the kitchen island counter with my cousin and friends and crack the marble all over again. It would be an accident, because we’re not the types to be able to crack a counter. It would follow a great night.

I would sit at the dining room table and welcome Shabbat with Shalom Aleichem and Eishet Chayil and fresh challah and perfect chicken soup. I would sit at the table with my feet up, hugging my knees.

I would sit on the porch and have a summertime dinner with my family, one of the ones where there were really too many bugs but the barbeque lamb chops were worth it.

I would run around my backyard and swing so hard that my stomach dropped and I could feel the swing set move with me. I would climb to the top of the slide then take the ladder down because of the cobwebs and the spiders, but really because I was too scared to slide down again.

I would run to the basement and create makeshift clothes for the Barbies whose clothes were lost long ago. I would play Legos on the carpet with my brother, and I would step on one lightly just to remember how it felt.

I would tickle my nephews and nieces then chase them up the stairs.

I would sit on my carpet and lean against my bed and write, promising myself I would go to sleep soon but knowing that something great was happening.

I would stay up until the birds started chirping, reading a life-changing book in my bed.

I would video chat with my friends and take all the pictures as we talk about things that might not matter in a year but are very important at the time. I would send them my writing and smile as they read.

I would dance around my room and sing like no one is watching, because they aren’t, and of course I would check my moves in the mirror. Because how else would I improve?

I would stay up all night talking to a friend about the boys that we like, giggling and promising to each other that we would go to sleep soon until she fell asleep mid-sentence and I grinned and closed my eyes.

I would sit shiva again, I think. It sounds weird. But I would hear it all over again and not understand it all over again and sit on those short chairs in my living room and the plastic chairs in my den.

I would learn with him again. I would sit at the dining room table with my dad when he asked and learn with him for my bat mitzvah. I would soak in everything he had to say and write it down if I could.

I would crawl into my mom’s bed and say I couldn’t sleep. I wouldn’t want to wake her, but she wouldn’t mind.

I would lie in my brother’s bed as he read me The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. I would probably understand more of it. I’d sit on my sister’s bed as she read me that Care Bears book I borrowed from school.

I’m sitting on the couches crying and texting my friends and thinking about all the things I would do…

*********

The couches remind me there won’t be any more movie nights, and that makes me think I’d be a lot better off if I didn’t think in metaphors. If things weren’t symbols.

I keep thinking in terms of lasts. And I’m haunted, it seems, by something I haven’t even left yet.

I would ignore the metaphors. I really would if I could.

 

Last Night, Take Two.

That last last night was a fakeout. It’s a few weeks later, I’m sitting on my carpet surrounded by boxes, and I’m what you might best describe as “a complete wreck.”

But my aunt sent me a video of Zaydie Buddy, and it’s calming me down with a mysterious power. He’s talking to my cousin’s class when my cousin was in second grade, and I’m listening to my Zaydie talk about the family history, about his past in front of his future. About his parents’ turmoil and successes, telling this to a class filled with his grandson and other people who are adults today. Zaydie Buddy passed away two years ago, and these kids are out there shaping the world.

I have a long way to go.

One day I’m going to tell my kids about this house.

About my dad, about the Wacky Macs on the stove, about Yolanda, and about writing on my walls. About late night conversations, and maybe someday about the two nights I packed up and cried—not one night, but two—for an era that had passed. I’ll know then that I’ve always been okay.