Tu B'Shevat: Planting a Legacy

Charlotte Jewish News February 2022

By Philip Schreibman

On a recent Tu B’Shevat holiday, my children and I planted trees at the Hebrew Cemetery. What more powerful symbol of legacy than trees? The sun was shining, we muddied our hands with dirt, and we handled large baby trees. I will remember the hours watching my children smile and play, helping me do something good to honor our family and honor the community we cherish.

One tree was special. We buried a ball, pictures, and a pocketknife in its hole. Someday, my grandkids will sit in the cool shade of that tree their parents helped me plant years earlier. Such are the meaningful traditions and rituals handed down by Jewish families for centuries. I suspect with some good work, our family will differ very little.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about growing up as a Jew here in Charlotte and all the drips of water over 40 years that have helped polish my stone. My family was active in the Jewish community, and I grew up in the Jewish Community Center (JCC) and at Shalom Park. I remember The Hebrew Academy, splinters from the old wooden playground, and games of hide and seek. I remember game room bumper pool and quarters from the front desk, hours of pickup ball, sleepovers, Dad playing tons of racquetball, and lots of Sunday bagels.

Funny what is sticky from my past. Sure, most childhood memories are selective and rose colored, but I still get to touch the same brick in the JCC hallways, sit in Gorelick Hall, see banners in the rafters, or get truckin’ down Providence Road, again, on my way to synagogue — many times with the same albums playing on the player.

One big difference is that when I get home, I won’t ever hear the soft Alabama drawl of my dad saying my name. Those days have ended.

Dad, or our Papu, died in February 2016 from Parkinson’s disease, and technically he stopped saying my name years before he passed away. I thought I bared my soul giving his eulogy, but lately I get pretty choked up when I think about the beautiful family and life I’ve made that he will never know. He was a family man, and I think he’d be proud. That doesn’t keep me from wiping away the tears. Random songs and daydreams can break me quickly. Recently it happened on the way to a family portrait photoshoot, and Renee wasn’t too happy with my swollen eyes (the pictures will be amazing). The song, nothing too sentimental, was “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.” It’s a lovely ballad, but Papu was more of a Neil guy.

These days I humor the kids with stories of Dad’s peccadilloes and favorites and wistful reflections of how I, and they, are like him in so many ways. We feel Dad’s presence when we hear crickets and cicadas sing at night by the fire. The kids cannot look into his eyes anymore, but I see him in their eyes all the time. It’s a beautiful tribute — like the pocketknife buried in the hole of the tree we planted at the cemetery by his grave. For my kids and for the next 50 years, Papu’s legacy is visits to his grave and hugging that tree.

Another holiday season of joy, service, and gratitude has passed. If you’re not in that mindset, I wish it for you soon. We reflected on a year well spent and look forward to a fresh slate of decisions to make. We’ll slip, trip, and fall, but we will learn and grow too and surely laugh and smile. Without ever knowing, we will make memories that could be sticky for someone we really care about, who one day will not be able to look into our eyes anymore. Isn’t that how traditions are born? Isn’t that why we go to plant trees? Our Jewish mothers and fathers inherited that legacy ages ago.

Fifty years into the future sounds long, but it’s not. Hopefully you were able to plant a tree this Tu B’Shevat; we didn’t. Tree planting is the long game, and I will not wait to fill my hole with Lego’s or Led Zeppelin CDs! I will enrich every moment of my living legacy with smiles, songs, and love, especially at the dawn of each year.

Photo Caption: Families plant trees at Hebrew Cemetery for Tu B’Shevat 2019