Three Baskets

Sunday morning a friend calls.

“I know this sounds crazy — but you know what I did after I heard they were calling up my son to the front line? I went to the hardware store like I had time for almost nothing else and I bought three baskets. For 25 years my laundry’s been in piles on the floors in the hallways. I felt like I’m living in one big laundry room.

“So this Erev Shabbos I ran out to the hardware store as the doors were closing pushed my way in ran to the back of the store and took three matching beige baskets.

I was like a driven person — I thought about these baskets all Erev Shabbos until finally at the last minute when I knew the store was just about to close I ran over there.

“My son’s on the front line in Gaza sirens are going off and I’m obsessed with buying three baskets. Isn’t this pure meshugas?” she asks. “The minute Shabbos was over I got to work — whites with whites darks and colors towels and socks.”