Like a Foyer is Burning

Tales of the Chelm First Ward

Within a few months of moving to the city, Stefan Krause was getting used to many things about Chelm. Work was still hard, but he could go home and look at Shayna and laugh about it. He’d given up on correcting his mother-in-law, Fruma Selig, when she said that he and Shayna might not have been married in the Church, but they’d brought their marriage to the ward. He let himself be flattered by her happiness instead—and quickly found it to be contagious. That joy reached all the way back to Leipzig, where his employer was still celebrating how long he’d lasted in the Chelm office. 

Once in a while, though, he still struggled. Church could be especially hard because back home, the ward had always been his safe place, the little village that watched out for him against the backdrop of a big and bustling city. There, the rhythms of worship were part of his muscle memory. He knew by rote what to do and what it meant. Thanks to callings, he always had a way to give back. He might not agree with every crackpot comment people shared—but serving and being served, there was no question he belonged. 

In the Chelm ward, they practiced the same religion. But the culture was just different enough that he fell easily out of step. The hymns were familiar but the singing was strange. The testimonies never seemed to fit into the familiar grooves in his mind, even though he recognized the conviction. He’d sometimes finish sacrament meeting feeling like someone who’d had a stroke and was once again learning to make sense of language. 

And then came the second hour. In elders quorum, President Gronam’s tone always managed to make him feel guilty. But for the life of him, Stefan couldn’t figure out what he was feeling guilty for. And Sunday School? He came to class and by reflex, he started the scriptures from what was apparently now the wrong side of the book. It made him think of Jonah and all those poor, lost Gentiles in Nineveh. The way everyone else so easily turned pages, he wondered briefly if he could still tell his left hand from his right. Stefan was part of the covenant people, yes, but he also felt so foreign here. 

Some weeks, he just needed a breath. Shayna had a calling in primary, so she would head off to class, and he would find himself hesitating in the hall, then sitting in the foyer. Zelda Gottstein was always there, but she didn’t feel a need to speak. The first time he skipped class, they both just sat in the quiet. Without words, there was no sense. Without sense, there was no nonsense. It was nice. 

Sometimes, Zelda brought sweets to share after the meetings were over and she’d let Stefan get a little head start. Over food, they’d chat about nothing in particular. Communication went so much more smoothly, Stefan realized, when you didn’t have a goal. And wasting time? That was a universal language. 

Soon Stefan got quite used to skipping the second hour. He didn’t really miss elders quorum; this foyer quorum was better. Different people would drift through each week, and he’d get to see a different side of them. But he and Zelda were the regulars. One week, he finally thought to ask her how she ended up as the space’s anchor. Why did she sit in the foyer all the time? 

Zelda looked off into the distance for a moment, then began. “It started when Chava—that’s my granddaughter, Heshel and Gretele’s girl—learned how to say amen. When you’re that young, every word has a use. She’d say more to ask for food, mama to ask for comfort, and amen when she thought a person should be done talking and go sit down. Whenever a talk felt long—and it doesn’t take long for most talks to feel long—she would say it loud and clear, like a command. If the speaker kept going, she would say it again, louder and louder. Amen . . . amen . . . AMEN!” 

“And you brought her out here to keep her quiet?” Stefan asked. 

“Only if the speaker didn’t get the message,” Zelda said. “I didn’t want her to get frustrated and give up—it’s good for a child like that to keep her faith in language.” Her eyes settled on the crumbs left behind the Silber baby’s first rice cakes. “It turned out all right. Most of what trained her immune system came from this floor.”  

Stefan nodded. His own body’s library of antibodies had been stocked in much the same way. 

“Eventually, Chava learned to raid her mother’s bags, distract herself, and stay quiet through sacrament meeting. So if a speaker ran long, I was the one who would cry and needed to be taken out.” She smiled. “Although it’s good I brought myself here, because when Chava hit running age, she started sneaking off the bench and making a break for it.”

“The children run in Germany, too,” Stefan said. “I suppose that children are the same everywhere.”  

“Watch closely,” Zelda told him, “and you’ll notice that there are actually two kinds of children, who turn into two kinds of people: those who run for the stand, and those who run for the door.” She shrugged. “Chava ran for the door, but she was cleverer than most children. At the most chaotic moment in nursery, she would seize the opportunity to run again. That’s why I started to stay and guard the foyer through the second hour as well.”

“And afterward, you just stayed?” Stefan asked. 

“Who said anything about afterward?” Zelda said. “Now that she’s a young woman, the only thing that’s changed is that she tries to bring friends. And it’s only a matter of time before she’ll be running off with some boy instead.” Zelda shook her head. 

“You said she’s a clever girl,” Stefan pointed out. “She’ll be all right.” 

Zelda leaned toward him. “Gretele is clever too, and she married Heshel anyway.”

Stefan frowned. He liked Zelda’s story, but he still wasn’t sure if he knew why she stayed. There had to be more keeping her here, orbiting the meetinghouse at the edge of its gravity, than her granddaughter. “In a few years, she’ll be grown up,” he said. “Do you think you’ll stay in the foyer then?” He paused. “And if you don’t, is it back to sacrament meeting and classes, or off to other Sunday adventures?” 

Zelda gave him a long, searching look. “No, I won’t leave. I wouldn’t know what else to do with myself.” 

They were quiet for a moment. 

“And I like it here,” Zelda said. She pointed to a specific spot on the wall. “You see that? That dent, right there? Gimpel and Dudel were wrestling with each other one day. I think Yossel had just taught them about Jacob and the angel. In any case, you can still see where Gimpel’s shoulder left a mark!” She pointed to the carpet. “Right there; you see that dark spot? My son-in-law the clerk tripped over his feet and dropped some lard, which turned out to be Beynish Finder’s tithing. The stain will linger for years. So many things do.” 

And then Zelda stood up off her usual couch to show him a small tear in the fabric behind the very chair he was sitting on. She told him it had been made by a goat Leah Kantor brought in for a choral number. On the wall inside the window sill, she showed him faded crayon marks, which never quite washed all the way off. This faded blue one from Chava, the trace of yellow from Bina, this big, dark swirl from Dinah Peretz just last week. Every stain, tear, or dent had a story, down to the drop of juice spilled by Elijah the prophet on his way out of the blind beggar’s ward Passover feast. 

As she spoke, Stefan felt an overpowering sensation: one that was familiar, one that would nevertheless always be strange. It radiated out into the room, the spirit rushing through the years like a mighty wind. Translating this world for him, translating him into it. 

Zelda looked over at him quizzically.  

Stefan leaned down and fished under the couch until he found an orange crayon. Then he pulled back the curtain on the windowsill and made his mark on the wall. 

James Goldberg is a poet, playwright, essayist, novelist, documentary filmmaker, scholar, and translator who specializes in Mormon literature.

Artwork by David Habben.

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Tales of the Chelm First Ward: Introduction