The menorah was still burning when I hauled the Christmas tree inside, out of the rain.

Between the nights I work, the two afternoons at the YMCA, and a weekend trip, this was the first night I’d been home to see the candles get lit; as I began to sing, “Baruch atal adonai, don’t poke me in the eye,” She poked me in the ribs and said “Stop!” It turns out she knows – and can sing! – the real prayer. Who knew?

Nothing makes you examine your own loosely held agnostic disbelief as ardently as the possibility that you might accidentally pass it along to someone else.