M
y friend Chava is the closest thing I’ve ever had to a sister.
We spent three years in Gateshead sem together and were married within one year of each other. When she moved to Yerushalayim with her new husband I was ecstatic, and I found her an apartment not far from where my husband and I live. Of course I invited her for Shabbos seudos in those early days; after all, she was living far from family and I’d already been in Eretz Yisrael many months by then. I helped her acclimate and we’ve been there for one another ever since.
Many years have passed since those newlywed days. Our children are now in school, and while our lives are independent and our families aren’t that similar, we’ve been fortunate enough to remain very close and consider each other family.
The only issue in our relationship, one which we’ve never openly discussed but is ever-present, is the fact that our husbands aren’t fond of each other. They tolerate one another — after all, they’re mature adults — but when we get together, it’s simply awkward. My husband has expressed his feelings to me over the years, and while Chava has obviously never indicated that her husband feels the same way, it certainly seems so.
