orthodox Walking down College Avenue a few weeks ago, I fell in step behind an Orthodox Jewish pair, a little boy and what looked like his uncle, holding hands. They were a study in contrasts: the light and skipping boy in knee socks and short pants next to the solemn, dark presence of the uncle, who looked to me like Abe Lincoln, quite tall and skinny and somber and awkward in his black long coat, black big flat shoes, black hat. At the top of the hill down into the Faculty Glade on campus, they stopped, and it seemed the uncle was scolding the boy, or admonishing him. The Uncle bent way down, explaining something very earnestly to the now-serious-faced boy looking up. They turned to face the hill down the glade, surveying the scene for a moment before taking off running down the hill, the uncles' coattails flying as he ran, all knees and pumping elbows, as light on his feet as the boy's laughter bubbling up beside him.

< back to little stories main page
next story>