Passover panic - The Jewish Standard

It’s here! The most important night of the year! The Olympics of parenting! Will this seder be the dreamed-of combo of delightful lessons, delicious food, and devoted family coming together in a beloved annual dedication to our freedom? Or will it be the dreaded devolution into bickering about how long it’s taking, begging to skip parts, and bawling in hunger? Will the hours of cleaning, shopping, and cooking pay off with blissful family memories? Will the younger kids make it to the meal or conk out by Dayenu? Will cousin Marlene show up at all?

As the soup simmers and the brisket braises, more than four questions are running through my mind.

If we think we’ve got it tough, just think of those mamas back in Egypt! Not only did they have to slay, cook, and eat an entire animal in one night, they had to pack the entire family to move! Running from the Egyptian army seems practically relaxing compared to that. I really hate packing, so one of my Lazy Mom moves years ago was switching from packing the kids to sending them a list of how many and what types of outfits they would need, and letting them pack for themselves. True, my own mom would often ask why I let them wear whatever it was they ended up taking, but eventually they realized they’d need to answer Bubby’s inquiries and learned to select accordingly. Today my sister called me with her own packing conundrum, trying to fit her husband’s huge box of costumes and props for the seder into their luggage to Israel. Heaven forbid they forget some rubber frogs!

Each year we reflect on the best of seders past. There was the time my daughter, then 9, corrected my brother about the source of a biblical verse. She had just learned it in school and was absolutely certain. My brother never liked a bet without a real win, so the two wise ones decided that whoever was correct would get to pour a glass of water on the head of the other. (Too much inspiration for pouring out cups of wrath, I guess.) When she won, my daughter hesitated to soak her uncle, but he absolutely insisted, all the while praising her for knowing her stuff. She beamed with pride and got him a towel.

Another epic seder was an assembly of the most unlikely cast of characters, a collection of guests who not only did not know each other, but barely knew us. A college classmate who I had met at my reunion a few months earlier brought his entire family, including his wife and five kids, plus his mom, brother, niece, and nephew. Then we found out that a wonderful shaliach family with their own posse of kids had to remain in the States over chag, so of course we had them too. A woman we knew from our shul in DC, a convert from the Ivory Coast, joined our crew, along with our neighbors and my brother’s family, for a total only slightly above the number of chairs we currently possessed. Good thing our guests brought some slivovitz, or my husband may never have forgiven me.

Each guest contributed something of their own tradition, making the discussion one of the most fascinating we ever had. Our Israelis brought a trivia game for the kids and handed out unshelled walnuts as the prizes for correct answers. My classmate’s athletic offspring crushed the walnuts in their hands, making a lasting impression on my show-tune-belting kids, who used them to tap out a tempo.

Each year, the lessons of the seder seem freshly relevant. As a parent, I always find new meaning in the discussion of the four sons. The last few years have seemed to invite us more than usual to divide humanity into wise and wicked, naive and ignorant. It has become especially easy to categorize people based on their views and allegiances, and tempting to huddle in our wise tribes while declaring others to be unworthy of our attention or empathy. But the Haggadah teaches us otherwise. Each personality type must be dealt with differently, as appropriate to their attitude and understanding. But each must be dealt with; we neither ignore problems nor accept them as permanent. And isn’t each of us really an amalgam of all four archetypes, sometimes displaying our brilliance or generosity, other times succumbing to our inferior qualities? When those we love have moments when they seem wicked or ignorant, there is a formula to get through to them. Redemption is not just for our nation, but for each of us as individuals.

Wishing you and yours a seder to remember!

Lori Fein of Teaneck is a full-time litigator, mother of five, and host of the podcast Mommash: The Oy & Joy of Family. She serves on the Board of Harvard Hillel and is a founding VP of the Harvard Jewish Alumni Alliance.

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