To return to the Introduction please click here.

 

Preparations for the Tu B'Shevat party are going apace which is good news because we are creatuers of Murphy's Law. We had a security and logistics meeting last night. Sherman gave every one the drill. It sounds better coming from him than from Tamima. He said:

 

During the party all gates to the dormitory portion of the house will be locked. If you need to use the bathroom, use the guest/public toilets. We will also need volunteers to work security detail. This means making sure that parking in the parking lot outside is orderly and that no one brings in any clandestine recording equipment. We will probably ask guests to check their cell phones since many have cameras inside them and electronic cameras at the door. In addition, no one under the age of sixteen may consent to be interviewed by the media. Those who are sixteen and over, may consent to an interview. If the press wants to interview those under sixteen, they need to ask Naama, Tamima, Tamara, or me first.

 

I also pointed out that we would need a bag of dog food for the evening since one of the guests was bringig a dog.

 

Tamima asked if the dog was housebroken. I said I did not know, but the workshop was off of the kitchen and it was warm in there for a dog to be comfortable or even for a human to be comfortable. If any one had old clothes about which they no longer cared, they could be bedding for the dog as well. We'd probably send the old clothes home with the dog and his owner at the end of the night.

 

"Is this dog from that Spiritual Telegraph?" asked Sherman.

 

I ndded. Ba-Ba gave me a dirty look. Kelli shrugged. "You want to get interviewed?" Sherman asked Ba-Ba. "I might," she said. "I don't know..."

 

"Well ask me if someone wants to interview you or if someone wants to interview a younger person, I'll say you volunteer. There," answered Sherman.

 

Ba-Ba blushed. "What is all the big deal about the press?" asked Kelli.

 

"It's privacy that's the big deal," Tamima answered. "We have lives and we don't want to live them in a goldfish bowl."

 

"Er uh...what are we doing about Earnesty and Tareisia?" this time it was Kelli who asked.

 

"What do you suggest I do?" I asked Kelli.

 

"I want to know what Tareisia said about Earnesty's mother...."

 

"OK," I answered. "Earnesty's mother who has since gone totally crazy let Renard Duprey in to her house after Tareisia and at least one other person on the Telegraph warned her not to. The man had done time in jail for violent crimes. The man consorted with demons which are nasty beings despite that fact that they hve excellent senses of humor and don't seem to be the powers and principalities mentioned in Scripture. Maxine refused to listen and Renard raped her. She did not go to the cops. Tareisia called a spade a spade because Maxine let herself be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Camille Paglia would have been proud. Tareisia was right. But Earnesty, the daughter who these days is a semi-orphan, was justifiably angry. Her father is on the Good Ship Sirius Gate which is not much of a good ship any more, and her mother is a lunatic assylum on the moon. She has a lot to be angry at. Amd remember this is all five hundred years in the future on a world that is parallel to ours, so it's not our future...I hope."

 

Kelli rolled her eyes. "So Earnesty wants to come here and make drama with Tareisia."

 

"Not if I can help it. I'm going to get some seating cards made up at Uris Hall. I'll stick Peter and Earnesty at the far right table. Tareisia and her crew from Boynton will get the left table. That should hold the drama level down."

 

"Why does this have to be so complicated?" asked Kelli.

 

"Because," I answered. "It's a major event."

 

"Yeah, but you're treating it like a...wedding."

 

I smiled. So far so good, I thought.

 

Naama G. Roth

Head Steward

Rose Among Thorns #2

Mathematics Library

Mallot Hall

Cornell University

Ithaca, New York 14853

Point Two-Five

 

Tareisia K. Simmons --

 

Roberta, Lindsay who goes to Boynton (not to be confused with Lindsay the art major), Brittany, and I sat on the floor. Roberta's mother had finally dug the log making machine out of her basement in Renwick Heights, and now we could make logs out of newspapers. This really was more fun than it sounds like. We fed the old newspapers in and turned the crank and the machine wound them until they were tight compact logs.

 

"How many of these do we need?" asked Roberta.

 

"About a dozen," answered Lindsay, the art major who was supervising the log rolling. Meanwhile Isabella and Sherman were laundering clean laundry bags in the washing machines and driers. When these were done, they set them aside.

 

When we had a dozen newspaper logs, Lindsay, the art major, opened the plexiglass and wood case that holds the facsimile (I know it is authentic but the insurance people claim it is a facsimile of finest quality), Beyowulf scroll and removed the scroll from its velveteen covers and put it in the sacks. They then took the sacks to the walk-in cooler where they could be locked behind a stout door.

 

We then got to stuff the newspaper logs in to the velveteen cover and put it back in the scroll case. Anyone attempting to steal the Beowulf would have a nice little surprise when he or she opened the covers to examine his/her bootie.

 

TK Simmons

 

Note: I may not send this to the telegraph.

 

School got out and it was my job to walk most everybody home. Next week, we'd be going home to set up for the big party. I went down to Fall Creek Elementary to get Mendel who wanted to go to Triphammer Road and "learn." I told him "fat chance. They need us to work. And everyone has to study in the tutorie and eat in the kitchen because we're trying to keep the sanctuary/study hall/dining area clean until the party.

 

We then walked up to the high school to intercept Isabella, Codi, Basia (aka Ba-Ba) , and Kelli. Isabella was tired and moody. She's shifted her second dose of meds until right after school. Codi gets his at lunch. Both Isabella and Codi are ADHD. Isabella says the best time for dose number two would around seventh period but she doesn't have time to run to the nurse between classes. Isabella is the one who gets the side effects from her medication too.

 

I asked Isabella if she had gotten her meds.She said "of course," but some days they don't kick in on schedule. Codi looked bored. "Look Codi, I need the stupid things. I found that out in middle school. I can live with that." Codi did not reply. He and Mendel are the only males in our group. Athena's son goes to school on the flat lands in a different elementary school and his older sister, Bethany attends with him.

 

"I printed out the Telegraph while I was in the computer room waiting for Isabella," Kelli told me and she let me see it. We passed the latest messages around as we walked.

 

"What does Renard DuPrey have against sweets?" Ba-Ba began the conversation.

 

"He's a sex pervert with a very spartan style," I commented back.

 

Kelli made a face, and then imitated a macho man making a muscle.

 

"Not quite," I explained. "It's all in the head. Lately though he's had a willing girlfriend. Otherwise he finds a dumb lady, seduces, her and then date rapes her. He just turned sixty so he's too old for me and I'm too young to date."

 

"How do you know all this?" asked Ba-Ba.

 

"It was on the Telegraph."

 

"Mom believes in censor the reader not the writer so we get all kinds of lashon hara on the telegraph," Mendel chimed in. Lashon hara translates as unclean lips and means gossip or even true speech of a particularly malicious and harmful nature.

 

"I don't think you can make lashon hara on a criminal," I said.

 

"It depends who charges him with a crime," Ba-Ba replied.

 

Kelli blinked.

 

"There were some very corrupt countries in the old times," Isabella explained. "They taught us about it in Global Studies. Imagine if a Medieval Lord locked you in his dungeon cause het felt like it and said vile things about you, would you be a criminal."

 

"Well, Renard DuPrey told the whole telegraph about his crimes," I answered. "Now can you make lashon hara on a criminal."

 

"I think what Isabella says applies, plus how do we know if was rape or consensual. You said 'date rape.' That's a term for where a woman invites man in and then it goes too far or she changes her mind...." Mendel glanced at me.

 

"Mendel, if the boy goes too far and the woman says 'no' it's rape. If it happens on a date it's date rape." I hoed I made that clear. We were heading in to downtown Ithaca. This was the start of the month and I was flush. I suggested we make a detour to the convenience store on Geneva Street for soda. Who knows what physical labors awaited us back at the house and soda would keep up up for the job.

 

The vote was unanimous and soon we were at the store. Everyone could afford their own soda today. We all get either support or pocket money at the start of the month. "To Tu B'Shevat!" I toasted Mendel.

 

"To lashon hara," answered Kelli.

 

"You can't toast lashon hara or you shouldn't," complained Mendel.

 

"Why not?" asked Kelli. "I just did and if Renard's what you guys all say he is, he deserves some lashon hara. I wonder if Cheyenne will be as cool a language as Hebrew?" Kelli asked the air.

 

"All foreign languages are cool," answered Isabella.

 

We passed the big white Protestant church and the DeWitt Mall and turned to go up through the Commons. Codi wanted to look in the window of Harold's Army Navy Store and then we continued on up South Aurora toward Hillview. "They'll see our soda bottles," Ba-Ba warned us.

 

"It doesn't matter. They know we just got paid," I replied.

 

Tareisia K. Simmons

Back to work!

Rose Among Thorns #2

411 Hillview Place

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five

 

Naama Roth --

 

I dug the cell phone out of my purse and checked my messages. I dialed the Meadowcourt and hoped that Mr. McInerny hadn't gone out for breakfast. I got his room and his voice mail. I left him the following message...

 

Hello,

 

This is Naama Roth, the Head Stweard at Rose Among Thorns Ithaca. Thankyou for the offer to help out. The adults will start setting up at about 3:30pm this afternoon. Since you have done book signings nad public speaking, I have a special job for you. Leonie (aka Lay-Lay), our freshperson humanities tutor, is giving the sermon tonight. She's a good writer, or she wouldn't be tutoring as a freshperson, but she has never had a course in public speaking. If you could watch her rehearse in the tutorie and give her a few pointers she'd be very grateful. The poor girl is a bit rattled though she is trying to put a brave face on it. Yesterday, when they made the cut for National Service, Lay-Lay's number came up. She'll be leaving at the end of the semester. Thankfully, she is noncombat option. On the other hand, Lay-Lay has a September 19th birthday and so has been eighteen for all of six months. Lay-Lay and I will both be very grateful for your help.

 

Tareisia K. Simmons --

 

Dear all,

 

There are some things Naama won't talk about, but I'll talk about them as will Mendel and sometimes Kelli, though she's shy. Ba-Ba and Isabella are not on the telegraph and Codi is a waste of time.

 

Right now the house is in total chaos pending tonight's party so I am very glad I am at school. This morning Naama sent all the Rock Ledge boys who have cars on errands. One she sent to the pharmacy at Wegmans to buy some necessary supplies. This is not what you think. Naama made a very bad deal with me and I took it because somewhere in my heart there is compassion. I'll get to that. Anyway, she sent three boys on errands between bites of breakfast. My errand after school is to get a bunch of odds and ends at Greenstar. Our membership is good for this month, and there'll be no kids working there Friday. Our shift is Sunday.

 

Naama is on an errand herself right now to the Vet School at Cornell. She and I had a long talk last night. Actually, a lot of us had a long talk with Naama last night. We had to have it. It had nothing to do with the high school kids or middle schoolers or even the younger kids.

 

I guess all of you know what happened yesterday. They made the cut for the National Service Draft. They do this twice a year, the first week in July and the first week in February. They've changed the rules a bit now so that if you are called up, you don't have to deploy until the semester is over. Then you just go and right away. In a way this is good, according to Naama because families get all weepy when their daughters get drafted.

 

Naama won't get drafted. She is twenty-two which m akes her too old. My other foster mother, Alise, was drafted last summer and has been in the service (noncombat option) as a translator in Washington, DC for six months. She has a year and a half to go.

 

Yesterday, Leonie Rosenzweig, the freshperson humanities tutor, better known as Lay-Lay got drafted. I learned the news when I got home from school. It made Basia cry. "Aren't you going to do anything about it?" she asked.

 

"What can I do?" Lay-Lay answered. "My number came up."

 

"Yes, but there has to be something," Ba-Ba glanced at all of us. Then she started to cry. "Naama, can't you do anything? My parents...they'd be making phone calls to people in congress."

 

"That's not what we do here," Naama said.

 

"But...they drafted Lay-Lay!"

 

"This is not Russia under the Czars," Naama explained.

 

"You're just going to let her go!" Ba-Ba howled.

 

"I have to serve my country. If it weren't me it would be somebody else, and do you think I'm more entitled to be left alone than somebody else?"

 

"Yes but you're...." Ba-Ba stopped. She was going to say Jewish.

 

I've learned a little bit about this from Mendel and a bit more history from Naama. She explained that there was a time about a hundred years ago in Eastern Europe when Jews were not considered full citizens of the countries where they lived. Therefor,e the government was essentially an enemy power and being called up to serve whether it was army or national service would have been an anathma. This was how Ba-Ba had been raised. This did not help matters.

 

"You're just going to turn around and let the government take Lay-Lay!" screamed Ba-Ba.

 

"Yes," answered Naama. "At least they are letting her finish the semseter. I'll also be happy to vouch for her credentials and talent given the fine work you have done here, Leonie."

 

Lay-Lay thanked Naama.

 

"But she's going to go away from all of us," Ba-Ba pleaded.

 

"What can we do?" asked Naama. "Alise and Vijaya had to do it and Alise' boyfriend, Dov and thousands of others."

 

"You're just letting her go!" Ba-Ba sobbed.

 

"What aout putting Lay-Lay on the telegraph?" I suggested.

 

"Now there's an idea," answered Naama. "Lay-Lay would you like to get those sad messages about the Good Ship Sirius Gate and the middle schoolers with the big crush on each other?"

 

"I want to stay in touch," Lay-Lay answered.

 

"OK, Lay-Lay you're on the telegraph and you Ba-Ba and Isabella, I'm throwing you in for good measure since you're seeing the sheets getting passed around anyway. Is that any better?" Naama asked Ba-Ba.

 

Well the promise I made to Naama is not to reveal certain gross or embarassing things on the telegraph in exchange for all the high school girls and Lay-Lay getting on there. I know being on the Telegraph will help Lay-Lay when she gets deployed in May. By the way, Lay-Lay is giving tonight's sermon.

 

Tareisia K. Simmons

Boynton Middle School

1610 N. Cayuga St.

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five

 

Tareisia K. Simmons narrates

 

Dear Peter and Earnesty,

 

It was Naama Roth who was responsible for the piece of lashon hara about middle schoolers having a crush on each other. It was slang but it was also lashon hara. I'll explain why.

 

A crush means romance but it's not romance that adults take seriously. It is something vaguely laughable. It is the way older people talk about younger people who are in love. Now kids can say they have a crush on each other, but if a grown up says it and he isn't sure that is what the kid is saying, it becomes a cruel joke. This was Naama's sense when she used the word.

 

Second, middle school, is school for kids who are in fifth through eighth grade. I'm in eighth grade. Earnesty is either in seventh or eighth grade. (twelve or thirteen) and Peter is either eleven or ten which would make him a fifth or sixth grader. Earnesty, you attend a one room school house (or the equivalent...It means a very small school in a very small community) on Enceledus. I attend a middle school with nine hundred students in it and close to a hundred teachers and staff. There are two hundred and seventy-three eighth graders alone. We are in three teams of close to a hundred kids each.

 

Middle schooler meant young kid. Used with crush this was a way of saying Earnesty and Peter are way too young to be in love and therefore their romance is laughable. That is class one lashon hara. Aunt Naama ought to be real pleased with herself for her hypocrisy.

 

Tareisia K. Simmons

Rose Among Thorns #2

411 Hillview Place

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five

 

Leonie Berith Rosenzweig

 

Dear all,

 

I got out of Chem 208 lab at 4:35pm and headed through the main campus and down in to College Town. If I had a dollar for how many times I have made this walk, I could take you all out to dinner. I remember making this walk for the first time during Orientation back in August. I walked all the way from North Campus where I live (I'm in High Rise Five, but don't spend much time there) to College Town and then I followed my Mapquest maps to the pedestrian bridge to South Hill. I knocked on the door and asked for Naama Roth or Alise Lidell. That was how I learned Alise had been drafted. I begged to volunteer and got shown to the kitchen. I said I'd rather tutor. I got the third degree. Rose Among Thorns all ready has too many tutors.

 

I took out my portfolio of work from high school. I showed it a couple of older students and they blinked. Then they pretended to be high schoolers and asked me to teach them something basic in English and French. Well, it turns out I passed and got my job tutoring. That was only a beginning. You learn a lot when you teach others, but that is a cliche. I was seventeen when I started working for Rose Among Thorns. I have a September 9 birthday. That makes me a bit younger than most freshpeople. It puts me close in age to the high schoolers who are foster kids. That is a humbling thought. There is Isabella who is an artist and who also has ADHD. She is an excellent math student. I've been teaching her how to write paragraphs and essays. If Isabella could live without talking, I think she would. She thinks visually not in words. That is the best way I can describe it.

 

Kelli is a Native American and she arrived Christmas Day. She has bleached her hair a weird shade of red. I practice French with her sometimes. She is an excellent French student. She is going back to Montana this summer to learn her native language, or one of them. She is half Cheyenne half Blackfoot. Her father is in parts unknown and her mother died recently. She doesn't talk much and never complains of the cold. She often is suspicious about new things in the food. We have very creative house cooks here. I think the food is excellent but I share many of the cooks' ethnic and religious background. Kelli does not.

 

Then we have Ba-Ba who escaped from the Lubavitchers in Lakewood. She is here because Rose Among Thorns supports genreal education. She ran away from home to Syracuse at first because Rose Among Thorns' founder, Marguerite, was raised Lubavitch or as they sometimes say, frum from birth or FFB for short. Basia is here to learn and get ready for secular university. Her parents do not send her any money. I hear these things when I don't want to and it hurts. Basia loves grapefruit and pomelo. Basia is an excellent student and afflicted with insomnia. Basia is utterly stoic to the point where I fear she will crack or it will frighten me. Then again, Basia brought me dinner in a bag during finals. She also engages in interesting philosophical discussions with Tamima, Mendel, and Naomi. Naama is too much an administrator to get philsosophical. I think Basia is trying to find herself. I also suspect her family and previous environment did a lot to confound her way. I am beginning to wonder if Lubavitchers can really call themselves Jews but that is the subject for another letter.

 

Some time in January the Liturgy Committee asked me to write and give the Tu B'Shevat sermon for Friday night. Well, that is fine, but tutoring is one thing and public speaking another. Now, Naama called me on the cell phone at lunch and said she might have a speaking coach for me. I could always take help from another student. I headed in to the tutorie and expected to find a student in there, but instead there was a professor or some other grown man....

 

"You must be Leonie," he said in a lovely accent. "I hope you expected me . Naama asked me to come help you. I'm Brendan McInerny III." He very gallantly bowed slightly then shook my hand. He said, "I'll be after just sitting here and listening. Why don't you go agead, if you are ready."

 

I pretended to address and audience and read my speech.

 

"Tonight as we all know is Tu B'Shevat. Tu B'Shevat is the Jewish New Year for trees? Now why is that important? The sages of old say that

trees bear fruits including the fruits of Israel such as dates and pomegranates and of course olives, but of course this is a very narrow definition of trees. After all there are many more forests than orchards, and before we start debating logging, I'll ask all of you: What good are forests and what good are the trees that just spring up wild that nobody plants?

 

The man was listening attentively, I could tell. He started a bit, though, and pointed to himself quizzically. "Do you want me to respond as the .. um.. congregation?"

 

I nodded.

 

He said, "All trees are valuable. They give off oxygen like other plants and use the carbon dioxide we nreathe out. And they can be used for many things we need." He gave me a look that said, "That OK?"

 

"Does any one remember their biology from high school or Bio 101-102 or even Bio 330? What are trees greatest contribution? I'll give you a hint, it's not what trees give us. It is what they take. Trees at least in the summer perform photosynthesis. This means they use CO2 as Mr. McInereny said, and they turn carbon dioxide and water in to glucose which they in turn make in to cellulose and lignin. What's another name for cellulose and lignin?

 

"I have no idea," he said with a wink. "Wood?"

 

"Right!" I said. "And for whom do trees perform photosynthesis?"

 

"Och, well, they do it to stay alive. It's like asking for whom do I eat this apple?"

 

"That's right, NOT, for us. By simply taking care of themselves and being trees, the forests of the world take carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and moderate temperatures. They clean up from our burning fossil fuels though sadly not enough. They also hold down the soil and prevent erosion and help keep soil and silt out of watersheds.

 

"Would the world be a better place if we were more like trees? I don't think you have to answer that. Just think to yourselves. Of course just taking care of yoruself is not easy as any one who has survived finals here knows, but if each of us takes care of ourselves, then we can take care of others and caring for others won't be that hard. Even though they are not sentient beings, the trees are our guide. Let's follow their example and look aftter ourselves..."

 

Sometimes science and relgion do support each other but I had no idea what Mr. McInenrny thought of the speech.

 

Then he said, "Lovely, lovely. Done? Do you want pointers on your presentation then?"

 

He told me I had a lovely resonant speaking voice, but that I needed to relax and enjoy myself. "You need to do your sermon from your heart and soul. Don't act like you are afraid no one will accept you. Two thing in life, if you'll pardon an old Irishman preaching to you, that make you a success in whatever you do are a cheerful heart and a confident manner. Do you believe what you just told me?"

 

I nodded, "Of course. I learned most of it in school, and it's based on real science."

 

He smiled, stood, and took one of my hands in both of his. "Then say it, sing, shout it. It's pure poetry, lass. And anyone hearing you and how much you feel this, and listening to your lovely voice and see your beautiful presence, will take a gift from you of that insight."

 

Somehow the way he said it, in that accent, made it sound like he was quoting poetry himself.

 

Leonie Berith Rosenzweig

Rose Among Thorns

Ithaca, New York

 

 

Tareisia K. Simmons Narrates

 

I don't care what Ba-Ba says, maple simmered carrots are good, and yes, I pulled my weight. I peeled nubbed and sliced fifteen carrots and broke up three pounds of snap beans. I also got to chop celery. We had a big discussion over whether to use the leafy ends of the celery. The leafy faction won and wanted more carrots, so I dug through the bag. I estimated by then that Stigand had gone through a pound and a half of carrots. Ba-Ba refilled the sugar bowl. Tamima who was patting chopped up fresh dill weed dry asked: "Tareisia, can you refill the blue milk pitcher. Stigand emptied it."

 

"Add in a quart of milk," I thought. I've been hungry but not like that. I've eaten everything off a school breakfast tray and horded rolls but that has pretty much been it. I never got to the point of grossly starving because either my dad was around most weekends before he ran off or the school had breakfast and lunch, or I had hoarded rolls and were those rolls gross and stale or we'd steal Grandma Rosalynne's food.

 

I opened the big fridge and took the plug off the tube at the end of the two percent "cow." A "cow" is a twenty-quart container of milk that is made of plastic and laid sideways in a fridge. We had a two percent milk fat cow and a skim cow. Skim means one percent milk fat. Yes, this is a world of plenty where obesity is the problem.

 

I started heating a wad of butter in a big kettle to prepare the maple simmered carrots. That meant I got to just watch the stove and think. The maple syrum in its tan ceramic jug was at the ready. What could be more appropriate for Tu B'Shevat than pure one hundred percent maple syrup? So what if it wasn't a fruit, it was definitely a tree-based delicacy and I know the people on the Good Ship Sirius Gate which is not anything but good are not reading this.

 

I tossed the carrots with the syrup because the butter was on low. Once it melted it would sizzle if I didn't get the flame down very fast. I knew the drill. I dumped the maple tossed carrot pieces in to the melted butter and covered the pot with a stout lid and went to wash the carrot bowl. We watch the fat in the milk but not the cheese and we eat tons of sugar, brown sugar, and honey. It's an army that travels on its stomach and with everyone walking four miles a day through the cold, the calories burn off. That's the theory anyway.

 

I'm growing so I burn my caloires that way. They measured me in school and I stand 5'1". I've grown three inches since I was eleven. I've grown one inch this year. That is probably why I don't menstruate yet. They say you have to have your growth spurt first. Aunt Vijaya says when she was my age she grew four to six inches a year. If you grow like that you never get fat.

 

I watched Tamara pour the snap beans in to the blanching water and I took her bowl to wash at the sink. I was glad they had Ba-Ba cutting up scallions for the string beans salad. I tried not to watch Tamara watching her watch. "You have this down to a science," laughed Bethany, the Hotelie.

 

"I'll say," commented Mendel. "Will that boy be a glutton at dinner as he was a few minutes ago."

 

"I'll know if we run out of food," answered Tamima who was working on the red sauce for the vegetables at the bottom of the mousaka which was to be our main course. The rice for the pilaf was all ready cooking in fine vegetable stock.

 

"Mendel," I said. "You're getting the juice from the pineapple. Stigand will probably just inhale it."

 

"You're lucky Naama is not all over you," Mendel told me. "You shouldn't have snuck off in the computer room."

 

"She wasn't in there for long," Tamima reminded him.

 

"Stigand is a glutton," complained Mendel.

 

"Stigand is bleeping starving," I corrected him. Read the Telegraph.

 

"Then we just turn him around and send him back to starve," asked Mendel.

 

"He can stay here forever. He's deloused now and he's working security outside not with a cushy job as a mashgiach like you, Mendel."

 

"You think he'd fit in?" asked Mendel.

 

"He'd learn."

 

"He'd probably be special ed," said Kelli who was chopping up mushroms she just washed. She had all ready done the cabbage and onions for the mousaka. Eggplant is not in season in February and Naama could not see angeling it, "but that's not such a big deal."

 

I winced. Mendel shrugged. "Naama didn't come after you becasue she is worried," he stated.

 

"This is a big deal of a public party," I responded. "There is also at least one Telegraph nasty coming. We know who that is."

 

"Would you guys mind turning of fthe lashon hara. I got out of middle school three years ago," complained Ba-Ba.

 

"Grownups are the best at lashon hara," I replied.

 

"Not nice grownups," answered Ba-Ba.

 

"Are most grownups nice?" I asked.

 

"I'll play weird Al Yankovich on the boom box if you two don't quit bickering," snarled Tamima.

 

Just then Naama returned to the ktichen and started grating cheese for the bechmael. She sniffed at the rice and watched Tamara drain the blanched beans and squirt them with the spray device and then stick them with a dish under their colander in the walk-in cooler. "When we locking the cooler?" Tamara asked.

 

"Right before services start," answered a nervous Naama. "At least security is up and running."

 

"Did you see Mr. Dupree yet?" I asked.

 

"No," answered Naama. Mendel rolled his eyes. I went to open the can of pineapple chunks. I drained the juice in to a tumbler and handed it to Mendel. "A treat for you..."

 

"If he runs on the wall in his combat shoes, I'm going to die laughing," Naama retorted.

 

"You may really die if he shoots you. The nudnick has a gun."

 

"Exp-le-tive de-leted!" snarled Naama. "Hopefully he won't give the Rock Ledge boys any grief when he gets told to check the weapon."

 

"What will you do if the Silver's stage a food fight?" I asked.

 

"Call the cops," answered Naama with disgust. "Let's just hope everyone can behave for two hours."

 

I checked the carrots. They still weren't done. I watched Mendel drink his pineapple juice.

 

"What if they don't get here in time?" asked Kelli.

 

"They'll get here soon enough. This isn't North Dakota."

 

"I used to live in South Dakota," Kelli corrected Naama.

 

Taerisia K. Simmons

Rose Among Thorns #2

411 Hillivew Place

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five

 

 

Naama Roth narrates

 

I was about to swipe myself through the secuity gate and get dressed in a skirt and stockings for tonight when Erin, the import burst in to the kitchen. "Code One!" she shouted at the top of her lungs. "Sherman sent me. Code One!"

 

"Ex-cre-ment!" I answered.

 

"Make that excrement with a cherry on top!" echoed Tareisia who had snuck in to the office to monitor the Telegraph for trouble.

 

I chucked my apron and prepared to get my coat when in to the kitchen came Lay-Lay. "Code One in the tutorie."

 

"In the tutorie?" I asked.

 

"Renard Dupree came in the back door," echoed Tareisia from the command post in the office.

 

"Make that excrement with two cherries on top," I said putting on my coat. "Who's at the front door?"

 

"A family in leotards with a kid carrying big swords," said Erin the import.

 

"OK, Lay-lay," I said. "Does Mr. Dupree have any visible weapons?"

 

"No," she answered. "OK, front door gets priority. Lay-Lay keep an eye on Mr. Duprey for me. Also please lock the back door." I snapped my coat and bolted back outside to where Sherman who is anything BUT vermin was holding the line.

 

"Mr. and Ms. Silver," I addressed the parents. "This is Point Two-Five. I am the Head Steward at Rose Among Thorns Ithaca. We do not have super hero licenses here. You are going to have to check your weapons. We do not permit weapons in the sanctuary." I folded my arms and looked assertive.

 

To be continued.....

 

Naama Roth

Head Steward

Rose Among Thorns #2

411 Hillview Place

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five where we DON'T have superheroes.

 

 

Isabella McGloughlin debuts

 

A bunch of us were setting up for services. Tu B'Shevat was of course a typical Friday night so we needed to put folding chairs in to rows and put up the mechitzah, the curtain that separates the men from the women. Everyone can get a good seat though. Young kids can sit on either side and the younger kids get to roll the twenty sided dice at the bimah.

 

Caufeld Banks had charge of set up detail. He is tall and skinny and in his last year in law school. He was my Guardian Ad Litem down in Whitney Point when we were trynig to straighten out my order of protection that I don't want and that my crazy mother with whom I don't live (See Lay-Lay I'm learning my grammar) got. It's a mess and my dad is still in hiding and I'm at Rose Among Thorns.

 

My meds had just kicked in and inside the kitchen I could hear the crew putting the hot food under warmig lights so they could go get changed for services.

 

Caufeld may be in his third year of law school at Syracuse but he is not the kind of guy you could picture in a suit and tie even though I've seen him in a nice blazer a few times. Naama says he used to work for the Cornell Lunatic, which is the campus humor magazine and sometimes the humor in it can get gross.

 

(Note: the whole song may not show up on the Telegraph. I don't think I have the nerve to post it.)

 

At the moment he was leading us all in song:

 

Oh they're all going to die on the Serious Gate

They're starving to death so they have to wait.

They get excrement

Cook it in a pot,

And then they serve it out with a cherry on top

Oh they say "chocolate sundaes can't be beat

But for now excrement's what they're going to eat.

 

(Censored version of song)

 

Oh you get excrement

You put it in a pot.

And then you serve it up with a cherry on top

You call it chocoalte sundae

You say it's really neat.

You scarf it down,

It's the next cool treat.

 

Oh you get excrement

That's what you call it.

We have an Epithet jar. You can't say BLEEP!

 

Tamima cut the singing short. She poked an angry face through the pass through window between the kitchen and the sanctuary. "Caufeld, you are going to make me vomit," she advised him.

 

"Get a stronger stomach," he retorted.

 

"Are you really that nervous?" she asked him.

 

"You get excrement," he began agian.

"That's what you call it.

We have an Epithet Jar, you can't call it...

It belogs in the toilet

Or in the flower bed.

But it's going to end up in your stomach instead....

 

"Is that what they teach you in law school?" asked Tamima.

 

"In law school you get crazy enough to make up songs like this," answered Caufeld. "Try law school sometime."

 

"Now I know about the stench on the bench."

 

"Caufeld we have to move chairs please," I pleaded.

 

Tamima shoved the boom box in to the window to drown out Caufeld's ditty.

 

"Please!" I begged.

 

"Please what?" asked Caufeld.

 

"The noise is going to make me scream!" I pleaded.

 

"If she blasts that boom box, I'll just sing louder," complained Caufeld.

 

I went back to moving chairs. I tried not to listen to the boom box which played a CD of oldies. "Jeremiah was a bullfrog!" sung a male singer with a noisey eletric guitar. "Was a good friend of mine!" By now the whole kitchen crew was singing along.

 

"Oh you get excrement," Caufeld sung as loud as he could

"You put it in a pot.

Put a cherry and some walnuts on top.

Serve it with a dollop of cream

It's the best dessert you've ever seen...."

 

The kitchen crew sang....

 

"Joy to the world

All the boys and girls now.

Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea.

Joy to you and me....."

 

I slammed down the last of the chairs and bolted for the security gate. I looked behind me to see if any one was following. I knew we were supposed to wear skirts to services. I remembered getting my skirt at our favorite used clothing store in College Town. I swiped the gate and swiped it shut behind me and headed for the room I share with Kelli who was still duking it out in the kitchen. I wanted to shove my head on to my pillow and cover my ears. I could still hear that singing though it was only in my mind. I wondered where Naama was. What would our guests think.

 

Isabella McGlaughlin

Rose Among Thorns #2

411 Hillview Place

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five

 

 

Naama Roth narrates

 

After the Silvers' arrival most of what went on at the gate settled in to routine. Most of the chairs and the mechitzah (the dividing curtain) were in place in the sanctuary and the covered long dinner tables placed off to the side with their place settings stacked up and ready to be spread out.

 

In the kitchen Tamima and Tamara had the food under hot lights or headihng that way or else in to the fridge for the cold salads. I was about to lock the walk-in cooler when the noise pollution hit me. Everyone in the kitchen was boisterously singing Three Dog Night's Joy to the World....

 

"You know I love the ladies

Love to have my fun

Well I'm a high night flyer

And a rainbow rider

And a straight shooting son of a gun

I said a straight shooting son of a gun....

A singing joy to the world...."

 

To where had decorum fled. I watched asTamima, Tareisia, and Tamara stopped work to poke their heads through the pass key and sing so that any one in the sanctuary heard the performance. Then I heard a few lone notes drift in from the sanctuary:

 

"You get excerement

though by now your butt is sore.

But everyone's hungry,

They've got have more.

The sweetest fruits grow from behind your lap.

So you've got to work hard

To squeeze out a crap"

Do you want to know what I felt like doing to Caufeld? You don't. I bolted out in to the sanctuary just in time to hear.

 

"You take excrement

You put it in in a pot.

And then you scoop it out and put a cherry on top.

They're lining up round the block for their treat.

They think that little turdlings

Are the best thing to eat...."

 

Caufeld's eyes shown with mirth. The cheeks in his long face were rosey. He was really enjoying himself blowing off steam after a long week with a silly song. "Caufeld, people are coming in for services. Can you please tone it down?"

 

"Oh...and you're not even dressed yet."

 

"Two code ones, one of which is inside. The second code one at least has manners. I figured he would fail in business if he didn't. The author from New York let him in by accident....Caufeld can you please stop singing and start showing people to their seats. I think half the crowd here is not used to separate seating....er uh... and where is Isabella?"

 

"She went to get dressed," Caufeld answered.

 

I barreled back in to the dormitory and only barely remembered to look over my shoulder before swiping myself through the security gate and finding Isabella sitting on the edge of her bed rocking back and forth. She had on her stockings half way. "Come on, finish dressing," I coaxed her.

 

"Caufeld gave me a headache," she pleaded.

 

"Then you have brains where you sit," I told her.

 

She blinked. Then she smiled. "Yeah, he's a pain in the rear," she commented as she finished dressing and limped out to start showing the guests inside. I went back and put on my own skirt and hose and then rounded up Kelli from inside the kitchen and told her to help people find their seats.

 

The sanctuary was starting to fill and the crowd looked a bit less disoriented. The oldies still blasted from the kitchen boombox. I turned it down. Sherman and Naomi stood at the bimah, a table in the front of the room. In a regular synagouge, a bima serves as the table upon which torah scrolls are laid for reading. Here we use it for other functions and as a kind of low lying lecturn.

 

"Welcome to Rose Among Thorns," Sherman introduced himself. "I am Sherman Taylor, head of the Liturgy Committee. I am also a linguistics major in Arts and Sciences class of 2009 if I don't get drafted. We'd like for all the children to come down to the bima. We are going to roll for tonight's musical selections. Sherman removed the oversized twenty sided dice from its bag. Kids who had been here before and a few shy newcomers made their way down to the bimah. Services at least had started. I looked around anxiously for Lay-Lay and found her seated near the mechitzh around six rows back. "So far so good," I thought.

 

Naama Roth

Head Steward

Rose Among Thorns #2

411 Hillview Place

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five

 

 

Isabella McGlaughlin narrates

 

I got to pass out the siddurim or prayer books while the little kids rolled for hymns and psalms. I've been told though I don't pretend to even fully understand it that Rose Among Thorns in Ithaca follows the Jewish liturgy for its services, but only partly which is why we have our own prayer books. They are offset printed at Gnomon Copy on Eddy Street in College Town. The cover is a kind of dark peachy orange and has the Rose Among Thorns logo, a Gallica rose of course.

 

By the time I got done passing out prayer books to the people who forgot to take them, Unity, our Music Director, was down by the bimah along with Naomi and Sherman who gets called an unfortunate rhyming name.

 

"Can I have everyone's attention?" Sherman asked. He had to ask twice. This was a rowdy crowd.

 

"Here is how a service like this works. This is a prayer book." He held up his copy. "You can use this to follow along. Here on the peg board is a page indicator. Naomi's going to be good enough to keep all of you current. These red numbers on the peg board are the numbers of our hymns. If you've ever been in a Protestant church, they use this method and we borrowed it. There's a word for borrowing customs and traditions, syncretic.

 

"Now I'm going to first ask all of you to look around you and notice if anything here in this room is missing...."

 

"Can any one tell me what is missing?"

 

I all ready knew the answer. Someday when Sherman earns his PhD, he'll be the best college professor. I looked around to see how long it would be before any body got it.

 

A gawky middle school boy on the other side of the mechitzah raised his hand. "Stand up," Sherman ordered.

 

"There's no sound system," said the boy.

 

"Right," answered Sherman "so what does that mean you have to do?"

 

"Sing loud!" called out Tareisia from her place several seats away.

 

"OK, and one more thing, about half the hymns we sing and a good deal of the prayers are in Hebrew. There are translations and transliterations in the prayer book, but if those of us who know the songs sing them loud, you should be able to sing along phonetically and understand what you are singing or praying. If you find you can't do this, you are always welcome to read along silently in the English while listening to the Hebrew. All right let's go...."

 

Our first song was Shalom Alecheim which is sung to a jazzy tune which according to Tamima is less than fifty years old. Most Orthodox schuls, according to Tamima, use tunes developed in the last century. When you lack instruments or a sound system, the music has to be singable. I remember Tamima telling me how her parents' Christian colleagues understood why Tamima wanted to be observant. She said that they told her parents she went to schul "for the music." I used to go to the nondenominational Pentacostal church for the music in Oswego when I was in middle school. It too was full of college students who liked to sing.

 

Then we had the Barchu and other prayers. These are sung but also recited in unison and sometimes responsively. When people had to rise (unless they were sick or very tired), Sherman would say "everybody up!"

 

Then we sung our second hymn which was Day by Day from the musical, Godspell. We did several choruses of it and even split it in to parts. I am not really part of the "we." I can carry a tune, but all this singing is more for listening than participating.

 

Then we had the silent prayer or Amidah. This is the hardest part of the service for most people. I could see people looking down and shifting their feet and glancing at their neighbors chafing at the silence. I glanced back at my siddur and made myself read by moving my lips to force concentration. This is a trick that Mendel, Naama's little, taught me. It works.

 

After the Amidah we had Special Needs and Praise Reports. The praise always came first. Several students were thankful for "beating the mean" on their last prelim which means they did well on an exam at Cornell. Ithaca College exams are not always curved but a woman who was studying to be a physical therapist was glad to have "survived her lab practical" as she put it. A boy who went to Boynton, our local middle school, said he was glad his ice hockey team had a six and zero record. An older woman said she was glad that a cyst she had removed was benign which means not cancerous. Another lady was glad that her cat's vet had been able to remove all her cat's cancer and the cat would have good quality of life once she healed from the surgery. Another woman said she was glad her asthma had been under control all week. A teenage boy with an English accent said he was thankful for his puppy, Brother.

 

Then came the prayer requests. There were two older people with spouses in the hospital. There was a boy on crutches due to a sports injury. There was a man whose colleague lay dying at the big SUNY Upstate Hospital in Syracuse and we had to pray His Will Be Done. That is a hard prayer because it means you can really do nothing but want to pray anyway. There were two hotelies with a demo dinner next week who wanted it to go well, and last but not least there was the good ship Sirius Gate. They are goners on that ship or so I have read in the archives. I tried not to think of Caufeld and his digusting and insensitive song as we prayed a very lound "HIS WILL BE DONE" for the crew of the good ship. Tareisia says she secretly prays for a miracle, but you can't ask the whole service to pray like that.

 

Then we had two more prayers and it was time for Leonie's sermon which was scientific and intelligent. I think it may have surprised people who think we are a bunch of Bible thumpers or something. Then we had two more hymns. We sang "I Don't Feel No Ways Tired" which is in English and can be sad enough to make some people cry, especially college students who have finals or a big prelim, and then we sang Adon Alom (Hebrew for God of the World) to the same tune as Knick Nack Paddy Wack Give the Dog a Bone and then it was time to eat. I turned around for the ritual shake the hands of your neighbor which every house of worship does and after shaking a college student's hands went over to help move the chairs and tables in to position and take down the mechitzah. The crowd looked restless and hungry.

 

Isabella McGlaughlin

Rose Among Thorns #2

411 Hillview Place

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five

There, I did it right!

Please this really needs other contributions. I'm hoping I got the spirit of the thing across

 

Leonie Berith Rosenzweig narrates

 

I was glad the speech was over. I was giddy and tired and glad to be able to be up and about moving chairs around. Naama and Sherman had gone in to the kitchen for grape juice for kiddush and I helped pull the tables forward. Meanwhile, Tamima and Mendel emerged from the kitchen with two empty steamer pans and several plastic pitchers full of water and several smaller two handled plastic pitchers that were empty. I knew the drill. It is something any one who becomes newly observant learns.

 

Sherman poured the grape juice in to small paper cups and handed it out. "We're making kiddush!" Caufeld yelled to get the restless and hungry crowd to quiet down.

 

Then Naama Roth said the blessing over wine in English. Grape juice is a fine substitute for wine by the way in case you are wondering. Rose Among Thorns is dry with a vengance.

 

Blessed art thou King of the univrese

who has created the fruit of the vine.

Blessed art thou our Lord King of the universe who

has given us the sabbath in memory of the Exodus from Egypt

and in memory of creation.

 

We drank our grape juice and Caufeld, Naama, Sherman, and Naomia as well as Tamima started herding the guests toward the makeshift washing stations set up on the bimah. They also showed them how to make 'a natilas yadaim' or ritual washing for bread. To make a natilas yadaiam, one pours some water in to a small pitcher and pours it three times over each hand, right hand first and left hand second. One then says in either Hebrew or English

 

Blessed art thou our Lord King of the Universe

who has given us the mitzvah of the washing of the hands.

 

After that we gathered around the tables in silence as Tamima and Mendel doled out the bread and a bit of salt in which to dip it. The braed had its own blessing known as hamotzi.

 

Blessed art thou Lord our God King of the Universe

who gives us bread from the Earth.

 

A blessing on bread covers all food eaten during the meal. This was a three part grace. It is complicated on paper but not so hard to carry out in real life. I helped dismantle the washing station while other members went to fetch food from the refridgerator and the hot lights in the kitchen.

 

Leonie Berith Rosenzweig

Rose Among Thorns -- Ithaca

 

 

Tareisia K. Simmons narrates

Finally, it was time to eat. Yes, I was hungry. I wanted especially to see how the maple simmered carrots came out. Real maple syrup is le plus ultra delicacy. I remember Naomi explaining how thrips had been eating up the sugar maples, but eventually any population gets resistant.

 

I was glad I was sitting with Isabella, Ba-Ba, Lay-Lay, Kelli, and a couple of other tutors, and Mendel. Isabella prodded at her pilaf trying to decide whether to surgically remove all the vegetables. I tried not to look. Kelli took tiny tastes of everything. The mousaka was not her favorite, but she liked the pilaf just fine and the string bean salad was new and the carrots.... She paid me a big compliment.

 

Only Mendel griped. "We can have carrots made in maple but not Jerusalem kugel," he ventured.

 

"Maple syrup is a delicacy. Sugar isn't," I reminded him.

 

"Back to the woods," sighed Mendel.

 

"It's one of the joys of living in Ithaca," commented Lindsay the art major.

 

I glanced over at Naama and Caufeld at the middle table. Some things are off limits for me to discuss, but Naama is my foster mother. Here I was boycotting her because I felt nervous. It wasn't fair.

 

"I know a lot of people who don't make Jerusalem kugel for health reasons," Ba-Ba reminded Mendel.

 

"They're balae t'shuvim," stated Mendel. Balae t'shuvim are those who became religious as adults. Usually though this doesn't just mean observant but totally frum.

 

"There's more than one Jewish culture," Ba-Ba retorted, "even among Lubavitchers."

 

"You know what this reminds me of," I said.

 

"What?" asked Lay-Lay.

 

"It reminds me of how some black folks think others are too white and call them oreos and such."

 

"Yes, but there are traditions," Mendel tried to explain.

 

"The traditions don't belong to everyone. What makes Lubavitch traditions more authentic than American Jewish tradition?"

 

I had Mendel stumped. "Ba-Ba you need to learn more Chasidut to see what you walked away from."

 

"I know what I ran away from," Ba-Ba retorted.

 

"At least the Christians say the ones who don't believe are going to Hell," I commented.

 

"No one says any one is going to Hell," snorted Mendel. "We are talking about surface knowledge versus a deep understanding."

 

"Your usse of the word 'surface knowledge' reeks of social control," Lay-lay spat back.

 

It went on like that for a while. Mendel is in a mixed house that is actually an interfaith house and sometimes he forgets. Actually I was glad he was in a fighting mood tonight because it got my mind off the fact that Aunt Alise was not here on this very important night. When you work on the government's time you don't always get leave when you can most use it. Thinnking of Alise not being here made me very sad.

 

Tareisia K. Simmons

Rose Among Thorns #2

411 Hillview Place

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five

 

Tareisia K. Simmons narrates

 

"I need you in the kitchen," said Tamima and her word was law tonight, especially since Caufeld was regaling his table with tales of life at Syracuse University Law School. Law School is very hard, and Caufeld has a love-hate relationship with the place. Any grown man who'd sing about what is not table conversation has to be under some serious chronic stress. Let's just leave it at that.

 

I helped take the livestock, the serving dishes with food still in them back to the kitchen. I made sure to give Stigand last call and told him the leftovers would be in the fridges all evening should he be hungry later tonight. After the good came inside and was put away, it was time for the pies and platters of dried fruit to come outside along with the earns of hot water and brewed coffee and the little wooden boxes of assorted individually wrapped tea bags.

 

There were three sets of everything due to the extra table. Usually we just have two tables and one is always more empty than the other. Santa Claus, or the person who calls himself that on the Telegraph (I don't really believe in Santa Claus but there are all kind of strange folk on the Telegraph. All I had to do was look at the Silvers in their dumb costumes to know that.) and Mr. Dupree had not yet returned from going out to have their private discussion. I wondered if IT was going to wait.

 

I glanced at Naama who was talking about permanent teacher certification in New York State and waited for her to make the announcement that we could all have some pies. I watched the pies get passed and carefully cut and watched parents and kids root around in the fruit platters too. We even had St. John's Bread which is also called buchshir or carob. It was a funny brown pod with a taste somewhere between cinamon and chocolate.

 

People filled cups with hot water and tea bags and coffee with sugar and milk or often diet sweetener. Never underestimate human hypocrisy where food is concerned. Well, this was it. It was time. I glanced at Mendel who knew much as I did what Naama and Caufeld would say. It wouldn't mean as much to Ba-Ba, Kelli, Isabella, Lay-Lay or the rest of the crew, but Naama is my foster mother. My other foster mother was drafted. My real mother is in Texas and my real dad is in Ohio. I have a right to be scaird no matter how any one reassures me that nothing will change.

 

Tareisia K. Simmons

Rose Among Thorns #2

411 Hillview Place

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five

 

 

Naama Roth narrates

 

I stared out over the crowd at three tables. Come Monday it would be in three newspapers, the Ithaca Journal, the small weekly that serves the town of Altamont, New York in the Southern Tier which is where Caufeld's parents live, and the New York Times because I still have family in the New York metro area.

 

It would not be worded in the usual way because Caufeld and I were making the announcement ourselves rather than letting either of my parents do it. This is a more common style for older couples. I am twenty-two and Caufeld is twenty-four. We are still at the age where the prospective bride's parents do the announcing. A couple, however, may choose to take matters in to their own hands as Caufeld and we were doing.

 

Caufeld rose and I rose with him. "We have something we'd like to say to everybody here and we need your attention," said Caufeld. The dinner conversation grew softer. I picked up a coffee mug and banged on it with a fork. The room grew silent.

 

"Last week," Caufeld began. "I asked Naama Roth if she wanted to marry me and she said yes." That was all Caufeld had to say.

 

I responded that the pleasure had been mine. Then Caufeld dug in to the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out a small rust colored velvety box and poppped it open. From inside it he took out a ring. It was a gold ring with a rose carved out of apricot colored coral. I showed the ring to those sitting next to me. I wished Tareisia was at my table and Ba-Ba and then I wished Alise and Vijaya were here to share this moment, but they had been drafted. Lindsay, the art major, took out an electronic camera and photographed the ring. "This is to send to Alise and Vijaya" she said and we passed the ring around the table so everyone could see it.

 

And people began to say "congratulations," and then the singing began. Ba-Ba started it but Mendel and Tareisia picked it up.

 

Siman Tov

a Mozel Tov

a Siman Tov

a Mozel Tov

Siman Tov

a Mozel Tov

Mozel Tov a Siman Tov

Yay Lanu

Yay Lanu,

K'ol Yisroel

Yay Lanu

Yay Lanu

K'ol Yisroel

 

Soon the singing had carried to all the tables. Even those who did not know the song or its meaning had joined in, singing clapping, and stomping feet. I did not even mind that neither of my parents was here. This after all was not their night.

 

Naama G. Roth

Fiancee to Caufeld Banks

Rose Among Thorns #2

411 Hillview Place

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five

 

 

Naama Roth and the Media

 

We had just started bringing the livestock (Unfinished pies and fruit plates) in when we heard the gun shots. "Code ze-ro!" announced Tareisia who was in the office again. "Let me guess who it was?" Tareisia went on just as Erin and Steve flew through the kitchen doors. "Three people just got shot..." she sputtered.

 

"Who?" I asked, throwing off my apron. "Also we've got WIXT and WSYT from Syracuse out there with live cams."

 

"Really," I said, "grabbing my coat." There are no television stations in Ithaca which incidentially is remote and rural enough to have had cable TV since the 1950's. The major networks have their operations in Syracuse and Binghmaton, and both have more or less given up on us since we don't let them film services or celebrations. The journalists who like to visit us are mainly from the Ithca Times, Cornell Daily Sun, and the Ithacan.

 

Alicia, who covers the religion beat for the Daily Sun was all ready throwing on her coat. "Don't bother calling 911," she called out. "The whole neighborhood heard and someone all ready phoned it in."

 

Just then we all heard the sounds of sirens speeding up South Aurora Street. "One of our guests either has connections or called the media and I'm not going to guess who..."

 

It was one of two parties, the blue demon who I was none to happy to see for his brief party crash, or the superheroes who back on their own world, are used to performing their feats before the cameras. They'd been playing second fiddle all night and now...the unthinkable had just happened. I cursed the demon; for I was sure he'd had a role in it somehow.

 

I stomped out through the foyer and past the dumbfounded security squad and through the crowd through which the paramedics were trying to get three stretchers. There was blood and vomit all over the ice, salt, and sand which covers the pavement in our parking lot. I could see one very angry teenager in a superhero suit with question marks on it and three very wounded costumed superheroes, and one sad sick superhero. I also saw some very unhappy cops. These were a combination of Ithaca city police and Tompkins County sherriff's patrol.

 

I spoke first to our security group. "Steve, Eric, Sherman, Erin none of you have to talk to the people from the television stations. You have every right to go inside and wait in the kitchen. We're keeping the dormitory gates locked. Tell Naomi to spread the word that the gates stay locked and tell everyone who is inside not to come outside. If you want to speak to the reporters, you can come out after the word is spread. You choose to whom you speak. As for the police, my guess is you're going to be giving statements. We'll try to get the police to take statements in the tutorie."

 

Suddenly I felt something nuzzling my elbow. I turned around and a pretty blond reporter with a microphone as huge as a baseball bat nuzzled away.

 

I made the edgewise symbol with my gloved hands. "I'll speak to you when matters are under control," I told her. She looked disappointed. "That won't take long," I added. Now she was genuinely peplexed. My security crew was inside getting all in order. The paramedics had gotten through by now and were bending over the wounded.

 

I went over to the police who asked me if I had seen anything. I asked to speak to the officer in charge. I got to speak to two cops. I explained: "You probably want to speak to our security detail since they witnessed the shooting. I was inside at the time and just heard the shots. We have rooms used for tutoring students. We'd be happy to make our tutorie available for taking statements."

 

"Thankyou," said the city cop. "And have you any idea which one of your guests at the party might have done this."

 

I nodded. "One of our guests bragged about bringing a gun to the party in his letters to an email list called the Telegraph," I said. "I'll be happy to give you letters from the list."

 

What I'd give the police would be zero help in the end, but Mr. Duprey had tarnished the repuation of the whole Rose Among Thorns organization more than any drunken frat boy ever could. On the other hand, I had to protect everyone's privacy. This meant walking a tight rope of sorts. It was not going to be pleasant.

 

It was even less pleasant because I'd let Renard Duprey walk around armed all night. On the other hand, a lot of what was in his letters would come out as gobbledygook unless one was a regular of the Telegraph. Of course none of us knew how much ammo he was carrying and a shooting in the house would have been a hundred times worse than one in the parking lot.

 

I continued: "I'm going to give you permission to search the public areas and kitchen at Rose Among Thorns. Searching the private areas which are behind locked gates, will require either a full house vote which will take less than half an hour to get or a warrant. I appreciate your patience." I stared at the cops. They cleared their throats. Then they made noises about caring for my privacy and that I was also a victim.

 

I led several cops inside and found Erin, Steve, and Eric standing in the foyer. Sherman had gone in to the kitchen. Nearly everyone else was in either the kitchen or the sanctuary. "OK, the police are going to take statements in the tutorie!" I announced. I led the way in and found each of the cops a room so the statements could go fairly fast.

 

Then I came out again and found the blond reporter. I also found a camera crew with a reporter who was balding and had a light brown beard and mustache, and I found the newspaper reporters too. "OK," I said. "I'm going to give one statement to all of you. The press policy here is still in effect. No cameras or recording devices inside. You may interview any one over the age of sixteen who gives consent. All right, this is going to be on the record..."

 

"I want to start out by saying that I am sorry tonight. My name is Naama Roth, and I am the Head Steward here at Rose Among Thorns #2 in Ithaca, I am the person in charge. I am responsible. I let down everyone who attended this party. I let down those who are our neighbors and who have welcomed us. I let down the city of Ithaca who had to approve a zoning variance for this building. A terrible and violent act like this should never happen at any Rose Among Thorns house. It happened here...." I paused for breath.

 

The male reporter asked why I thought it happened tonight.

 

"It happened due to a breach in security," I continued. "Someone in our house left the tutorie door unlocked, and I did not check it. About 4pm a gentleman who was armed entered and did not go through our security checkpoint. Rather than risk disarming him or asking him to leave and risking a shoot out in the house, I did nothing. I regret that decision. There are three people injured and a house full of people terrified and a neighborhood disturbed."

 

The reporters then asked if I knew the man who was armed. I gave his name. They asked if he had anything against the house. I said "no." I said he did have a running feud with the people he shote. They asked why I invited the man to our party and I explained that he was an angel of sizeable proportions, one of our major donors.

 

"Thankyou Ms. Roth," said the blond reporter. Then she turned off her mic, reached out with a sweatered arm, and gave me a hug. I felt cold and my guts were a knot of cramps. It was not over yet.

 

Sherman was gathering the residents for the house meeting in the sanctuary. I joined them. I was still the one who had to do all the talking. Sherman should not have to carry that burden. I faced forty some odd souls ranging in age from five to their mid thirties, plus a dozen or so student volunteers.

 

"The issue is simple," I said. "The police would like to search the premises. I have all ready given them permission to search the public areas. They are right now going through the tutorie. They will search the kitchen and the walk-in coolers and the pantry and the workshop and in here. I told them that if we consented, they could search the private areas tonight. If not they would need a warrant from a judge. It is up to us whether we grant the consent. I don't think the search will do much but it will keep our good will with the community which quite frankly we need. The man who fired those bullets also shot holes in our reputation tonight. On the other hand, we do have privacy concerns. It will be up to you. Straight majority vote," I said.

 

"I call for secret ballot," said Sherman.

 

"Cut up the papers," I replied.

 

"Student workers do not have a voice," answered Sherman. "They don't live here and this is a search of our living quarters."

 

"Agreed," I answered.

 

"Leonie, Eric, and Erin please chop some paper in the tutorie for ballots."

 

It took six long minutes for Leonie, Eric, and Erin to return from the tutorie with the ballot papers. I handed them out. "Yes, or no, no comments, no discussion"

 

We put the votes in a bowl from the kitchen and then dumped them in a pile on a cleared space of dining room table. Steve and Caufeld, neither of whom are residents counted the votes. The final results were thirty-two for the search and eight against. I went in to the tutorie and told the member of Tompkins' County's Finest that he had permission to search the whole house. Then I took my swipe card and opened the metal gates and let the police through. There were well over a dozen of them and by now State Troopers had joined the mix. I thought about the police who had looked after Vijaya when she was groped just outside of Rosebud, South Dakota last fall.

 

I tried not to think of the future of this house or my tired face on the 11pm news from Syracuse. I thought back to when I lived in Arizona the summer after I graduated from Hunter and learned to cook for others for the first time. It had been simple then. It stopped being simple a long time ago.

 

Naama G. Roth

Still Head Steward

Rose Among Thorns #2

411 Hillview Place

Ithaca, New York 14850

Point Two-Five