Most of us have probably experienced a flash of recognition at one point or another that we owe someone an immense debt of gratitude for having changed our lives in some significant way. Often times however that recognition comes long after the fact — even a half century or more — and it may no longer be possible to express our hakaros hatov.
After a recent leil Shabbos speech in Philadelphia a woman approached me and asked me if I remembered her. She then told me her name. Not only did I remember her I even remembered her class rank in high school which says a lot about how competitive our high school was.
In Nancy’s case we not only went to high school together but college as well though I doubt we spoke five times throughout. I did know however that she had become shomer Shabbos while still in university.
Nancy and I were in the same Advanced Placement English class in high school. Unlike other classes that reshuffled the deck every year that group of 25 or so remained intact for the last three years of high school and maintained its own tight-knit ethos. “I prefer not to” the watchword of the eponymous hero of Herman Melville’s “Bartelby the Scrivener” (which we studied for weeks during sophomore year) and Melville’s summing up of Bartelby’s career in the department of “dead letters” — “Dead letters! Does it not sound like dead men?” — became identifying shibboleths for class members.
