Read Blessings for Free Online Page A

to do much. But then I got lucky. I met Sam.”
    Sam, too, has a story to tell. Unlike his wife, though, he refuses to tell it. It is through her mother that Jennie learns how Pop survived the concentration camp: An expert tailor, he was put to use making uniforms for the Germans. He has unspeakable memories, and now he will not touch a needle, except that once in a long while he will copy a suit or coat from Vogue for his wife or daughter. He is more or less cheerful in his delicatessen, making sandwiches and ladling salads, while Mom takes the cash.
    Jennie is an only child. Her parents’ labor is for her alone. Their savings, the things they do not buy for themselves, and the vacations they do not take are all for her. They never say so, but she knows it. She is aware that they are giving her “good values”: work, family, respectability, and education. Their daughter must have the education they missed. The world’s evil must not touch her. They keep her safe.
    Pop is the more religious parent. Orthodox, he closes the store on Saturdays, even though it could be the busiest day of the week. He is clean-mouthed; she has never once even heard him swear. She thinks she will remember him best at the table on Friday nights, washing his hands before prayers, while her mother holds the basin and the little white towel, and the flames waver in the brass candlesticks.
    Jennie doesn’t share all their beliefs, but she respects their beliefs and them. They are gentle parents, overworked, grateful for what they have, disappointed over what they missed, and sometimes remote; lost, she understands, in their remembered experiences. And while, even when she was still in high school, she knew she would leave their world, she also knows that in spirit at least she will always be part of it.
    “So he lives in Atlanta?” Mom says. Her hair is in curlers. She looks chubby, even in her enveloping house-dress. Now she frowns a little, trying to decipher the letter’s smart-looking backhand script. It is a woman’s writing on thick gray paper. The envelope is lined and the paper is engraved in navy blue. Mom runs a finger over the raised letters. “Nice that the mother writes to invite you.”
    “Mom, it’s proper. She’s supposed to.”
    “Atlanta—it’s far?”
    “Only a couple of hours by plane.” Jennie feels delightful excitement. “They live in the suburbs. They’ll meet us at the airport.”
    “They’re rich people, I suppose.”
    Now, for some reason, Jennie feels embarrassment and irritation. “Mom, I never asked.”
    “Who said ‘asked’? Of course you didn’t. But a person can tell.”
    “I don’t care. That doesn’t interest me.”
    “Doesn’t interest her, she says!” Mom leans on her elbows and holds the teacup between both hands. Her eyes, glinting green-brown over the cup’s rim, are reflecting and amused. “What do you know? You’ve never been without money, thank God. Do you know what it is to wake up at night where you’re hiding in your bed, and you look at the clock and in a few hours you have to face the landlord and the butcher—they want their money and you haven’t got it? No, you don’t. So it doesn’t interest you. Tell me, what will you wear?” And without waiting for an answer, she says, “Listen, your father will make you a spring suit, a traveling suit.”
    “Don’t bother Pop. He’s tired. I can find something.”
    “One suit won’t hurt him. A few nights and he’ll finish it. What color do you want? I’ll tell you, it should be gray. Gray goes with everything. A nice suit so you’ll look like somebody when you get off the plane. He’s a nice boy, Peter. Why do they call him Shorty?”
    “Because he’s six-feet-three.”
    “He’s a nice boy.”
    And Mom, wearing her familiar, warm little smile, pours another cup of tea.
    It had begun even earlier than that, soon after the start of Jennie’s first year of college. Having skipped lunch to study for a test, she had