Passover

I’ve been missing my dad lately, and this time of year always makes me miss my stepmom too. I used to love celebrating Passover at their house.

           Passover was my stepmother’s favorite holiday. She used a 1940s Haggadah that she inherited from her grandmother. Over the years, the book acquired dog-ears, stapled-in addendums, pencil-under-linings and stars, wine stains, and charoset sticky spots. My stepmother kept finding quotes, poems and songs to add; she was especially fond of putting an orange on the Seder plate in honor of women’s rights. She’d also frequently say Goddess instead of God when she read the prayers, which made my father roll his eyes and cringe. My dad was not a fan of Passover, or large get-togethers in general, and always said, “Let’s get this damn thing over with. I’m hungry!”

           Over the years, my father condensed my stepmother’s beloved holiday into ‘The Speed Seder’: he’d skip whole paragraphs on one page and give you the Cliff-notes version of the next as he thumbed through the Haggadah like it was a waiting room magazine. He’d reach the end of a line, and say “And we all know what happened next. Amen!” Another page would get turned, and we’d down another glass of wine. When it was time for guests to participate, he’d behave as if he was teaching his high school accounting class.  He’d bark a name, point a finger and holler, “You! Page seven! Second paragraph. Go!” If you didn’t read fast enough, he’d cut you off and assign your part to somebody else. He’d say, “Okay, XX. That’s enough! Let’s give someone else a try,” then he’d freeze out poor slow-talking XX for the remainder of the Seder.

           We did have a few traditions: For twenty years it was my job to read The Four Questions and make the charoset in my great-great-grandmother’s wooden bowl. My oldest sister always got to open the door for Elijah. My sister’s Jewish husband was the Wise Son. My Protestant husband was the son who didn’t know to ask. My stepmom was in charge of reciting the plagues. We liked to see who could make the best wine-drop designs on our dishes and we’d display our handiwork across the table. My dad would scowl and say in his teacher-voice, “Put your plates down. Moving on!”

           But we did have fun, and the food was delicious, and it was familiar and lively. 

           One year, my grandmother was taking farfel muffins out of the oven and touched her ancient oven-mitt to the burner, lighting it on fire. She stood there frozen, watching the flame, with her arm above her head like the Statue of Liberty with her torch. My cousin yelled, “HOLY SHIT!” and shoved my grandmother’s smoldering arm under the kitchen faucet while the rest of us watched from the dining room. Totally deadpan and serious, my middle sister leaned over and whispered to me, “Why on this night, but not all other nights, does Grandma catch on fire?” We held our sides and cried from laughing.

Every year, my stepmother would invite, as she called them, “strays”, so at the table there was always some artist or student or ex-pat or Seder-newbie who didn’t know what they were in for, so we all, for the most part, behaved ourselves.

           My family did the Afikomen backwards, which I never knew until recently. My dad put the matzo, wrapped in a paper napkin, behind a pillow on his chair. Sometime during the Seder, my son would steal the Afikomen and hide it in the house, and my dad was supposed to find it in a game of hot-and -cold. However, at the end of the Seder my dad always refused to look for it. He’d sit at the head of the table and bark my son’s name, “Zachary! Get over here!” My six-year-old son would dutifully stand next to my dad’s chair and try not to tremble in fear as my dad fished a twenty-dollar bill out of his wallet and said, “Here’s the money. Enough fuckin’ around. Go get the mutzy.” (my dad always called matzoh ‘mutzy’.) My son would trot away with the money, disappointed that he didn’t get to show off the clever hiding place—which was never clever, and usually made a hell of a mess that I would have to clean up before my dad found all the crumbs and freaked out.

           After dessert, while the rest of us scattered to help wash up or play cards, my stepmom would clear the table and pat my dad gently on the shoulder as she went past him on her way to the kitchen. My dad would linger at the dining table.  He liked to sit alone and survey the empty chairs and plates. He’d look at the mantle clock and polish off the Ring-Jells when he thought no one was looking.