Kaddishel

Book excerpt: Aharon Golub is the kaddishel for his family - the only son upon whose shoulders falls the responsibility to recite the prayer for the dead, the Kaddish, for his parents. And as the kaddishel, he honors his parents by remembering both the joys of his early childhood in Ludvipol and the hatred that sought to destroy Ludvipol, and his childhood. Aharon bears the burden of an entire generation of children who made promises to their parents, promises that are relived at every Yahrzeit, every anniversary of the death of their parents: Never to bask in the luxury of forgetting.