Poem A Special Shabbos

Poem about a Special Shabbos

Dovid Eidensohn

Oh! What a lovely Shabbos when my son from Israel visited us with his family,

And my two children in America came for Shabbos to meet him,

And brought their children along.

And, to get things moving here, I am a grouch.

Now, I am not a grouch when I talk to you. But if you would be a child, say two years old,

I would pretend I was a lion. And they loved it even as they ran away from the ‘lion.’

On this Shabbos when the house was filled with young children and some not so young,

I was busy roaring and chasing and the house was just popping with good will.

My son came from Israel only for a tiny visit. He is perhaps the leading expert on children in the world

And countries around the world pay him ridiculous sums to visit their schools and help with children,

And I his father was thrilled at the opportunity to talk to him about my ideas,

Which had to do with publishing my ideas on family and marriage

Because even secular magazines

Want my material.

Our lovely Shabbos came to an end,

And my son prepared to return home

And while finishing his packing, I approached him,

To show him my treasured Olympus,

A device which allows me to copy music, or sing my own music, or make audios.

He quickly understood how it worked,

And was especially interested in its ability to play music.

I have hours of music on my Olympus and computer,

And he, who travels around the world regularly in his task of helping Yeshiva children,

Needed some music and material to listen to while flying.

Then my son produced his surprise.

He showed me a device which cost five times what my Olympus cost

He took it and copied my material

And my voice boomed out.

So Shabbos came to an end,

A lovely day packed with food brought by all who visited

Meaning the three family of children who live in America

And my son packing after Shabbos indicated

That he was returning home the next morning.

I spoke several times at the table on Shabbos

And emphasized that when my children were young

I would speak on Shabbos for an hour or two

About the greatness of a mother who has children and raises them.

And these children grew up in a small house,

Packed with boxes from my wife’s business,

And that small house was packed with boxes,

And a growing family of children who loved each other and their parents.

Today I have daughters in Israel who are regularly paid large sums of money

To speak on “What it was like to be raised in the Eidensohn family.”

One of the stories was when my son, who now travels the world to help Yeshiva students

Asked me for permission to sleep at night underneath the kitchen table.

This Shabbos he and the other children gushed forth with happiness for those times,

And for their success with their own children, which is considerable.

Once at a grandson’s wedding, I, the grandfather, was honored with the first call to pronounce the wedding blessings

When I finished and turned to leave, the leader asked me,

Give a blessing!

I was stunned. I devoted my life to making happy family and children,

But just what kind of berocho should I give?

Then heaven helped me,

I said “May the couple be blessed with children who make them jealous.”

I then walked quickly from the Chupah into a New York sidewalk

And somebody asked me,

What blessing did you give?

I told him, “May you be jealous of your children.”

I explained that the Talmud says,

Nobody is jealous of their children and their disciples

But if somebody is jealous of his students and disciples,

It is because they are special.