“Are you available to officiate at the levayah of a woman who had passed away in Maryland and the burial would be in New York?” the caller asked. The woman was not observant but her two sons were interested in having a rabbi present. It would be at 11 on Friday at the Old Montefiore Cemetery in Queens.
I thought about the traffic in New York on “Erev Fourth of July weekend” nevertheless a Jew needs to be buried…
On Friday morning I headed off.
When I arrived I went straight to the most famous grave in that cemetery the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s ztz”l.
I davened and walked back to the building that serves as combination welcoming center beis medrash and library. There I overheard one man say to his wife in Hebrew “Do you think there’s anyone here from Bat Yam?”
