Reunited

S

everal months ago, my grandmother a”h had a major flood in the basement of her home. The basement was a storage area of sorts for our entire extended family. As the floodwater rose, we were met by the devastating sight of dozens and dozens of half-soaked cardboard boxes slowly disintegrating into the rising water.

A family emergency was declared, and my parents and I began the arduous task of sorting and repacking the contents of the boxes into dry cartons. Since we’re the only relatives living in town, it fell on us to figure out what belonged to whom, what was salvageable and what was, unfortunately, not.

The most pressing matter, obviously, was where to relocate and store the boxes for the duration of this sorting process. Since my garage is at the bottom of a driveway too steep and icy for a car to climb in the winter, and was therefore unused, I became the lucky recipient of about 30 family boxes. They were duly transferred to my garage, where they waited patiently to be sorted through and their contents sent to their respective owners.

Of course, as much as I intended to tackle the boxes immediately, and have an empty garage by the next Yom Tov, life got in the way and about half of the boxes are still down there. Every once in a while, I take an hour out of my routine to steal down to the garage and sort through a box or two.