***“Surely we won’t get to the wedding?” he teased me with a mischievous grin. Berel never ceased to amaze me: he spoke Russian with me; with the dark-skinned medical staff, whom he mistook for gypsies, he switched to Hungarian; to women with covered heads, he spoke Yiddish; and to those without head coverings, Czech! He always greeted me with a question about our little calf’s health. He measured the distance from the floor to my waist with his hand, but I deliberately lowered it much further down—signaling, alas, that the kelbele had not grown! But then I noticed he wasn’t rushing toward the wedding after all… There was another woman in the picture. After lunch, I rolled my 96-year-old “fianc;” in his stroller out to the courtyard, where all those craving fresh air gathered. Berel scanned the crowds, often distracted from his siddur lying before him… Suddenly, his face flushed rosy pink, his eyes squeezed shut, neck tensed, fingers gripping the stroller handle so tightly he even rose a little! Hava, a slender Hungarian blonde of about fifty, pushed a special stroller in which her elderly husband dozed with uncovered hair. He puffed and panted, admiring the graceful blonde (while I was stout and dark-haired), but I wasn’t fooled; I instantly guessed the type of woman my “fianc;” preferred. Shifting in his stroller, Berel addressed Hava in Hungarian: “Yes — this is my husband,” she replied, apparently crushing Berel’s hopeful heart. He drooped, his face hollowed, opened his prayer book and muttered to me: His body seemed to melt before my eyes—stooping, eyes glazing over; in that moment, he resembled a snail: if only he could, he would crawl back forever into his turbo-spiral shell… Berel never ceased to amaze me: he spoke Russian with me; with the dark-skinned medical staff, whom he mistook for gypsies, he switched to Hungarian; to women with covered heads, he spoke Yiddish; and to those without head coverings, Czech! He always greeted me with a question about our little calf’s health. He measured the distance from the floor to my waist with his hand, but I deliberately lowered it much further down—signaling, alas, that the kelbele had not grown! But then I noticed he wasn’t rushing toward the wedding after all… There was another woman in the picture. After lunch, I rolled my 96-year-old “fianc;” in his stroller out to the courtyard, where all those craving fresh air gathered. Berel scanned the crowds, often distracted from his siddur lying before him… Suddenly, his face flushed rosy pink, his eyes squeezed shut, neck tensed, fingers gripping the stroller handle so tightly he even rose a little! Hava, a slender Hungarian blonde of about fifty, pushed a special stroller in which her elderly husband dozed with uncovered hair. He puffed and panted, admiring the graceful blonde (while I was stout and dark-haired), but I wasn’t fooled; I instantly guessed the type of woman my “fianc;” preferred. Shifting in his stroller, Berel addressed Hava in Hungarian: “Yes — this is my husband,” she replied, apparently crushing Berel’s hopeful heart. He drooped, his face hollowed, opened his prayer book and muttered to me: His body seemed to melt before my eyes—stooping, eyes glazing over; in that moment, he resembled a snail: if only he could, he would crawl back forever into his turbo-spiral shell… © Copyright: Анна Шустерман, 2026.
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