My Own Backyard

S uccos has come to the holy city of Yerushalayim. And so have I.

I sit on a tiny porch on the fifth floor overlooking hills and homes and 1001 succahs. Stately succahs ramshackle succahs constructed from wood or curtains or corrugated iron. Or all three. On rooftops surrounded by sun boilers leaning out of porches and elbowing for space in parking lots.

A Sephardic family launches into a spirited rendition of “V’samachta.” From other succahs chatter and laughter and Ulu ushpizin and hamotzi catch on the breeze. It is my first time here for the chag. I am an outsider looking on observing in a kind of wonder feeling like I’m in so many succahs at once.

Across the street a lone chassid warbles a soulful “Ana Hashem.” I don’t know him or his struggles but it’s there — all his pain and all his heart. It fills the tune and the notes rise lightly into the air and I imagine that something of his load flutters away too with the strains of song.