Today is Erev Pesach 5783 (the eve of Passover 2023). The holiday begins at sundown tonight and lasts for 7 or 8 days, depending on one’s level of observance. Passover commemorates the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt, our liberation from slavery and journey to the Promised Land. We celebrate this holiday in a myriad of ways, including a gathering called a Seder where we retell the story. The recounting process is interspersed with different blessings and customs and eventually we get to eat a delicious meal, but it takes a long time to get to that part. As I’m sure you can imagine, children tend to get antsy, so there are lots of songs and such to keep them engaged, and one particular tradition involves the reciting of the Four Questions, which is a task that is typically set to the youngest person present. As such, children tend to learn this part of the Seder early on.

The Four Questions harken to the theme of “what makes this night different from all other nights” and are as follows:

1) On all nights we need not dip even once, on this night we do so twice?
2) On all nights we eat chametz or matzah, and on this night only matzah?
3) On all nights we eat any kind of vegetables, and on this night maror?
4) On all nights we eat sitting upright or reclining, and on this night we all recline?

My daughter is still a bit too young to participate with this by herself this year, and I’ll be the next youngest one present at my in-laws’ Seder tonight, so hopefully she’ll join with me when we do the Four Questions.

After all, she’s very good at asking questions, and that’s a big part of Passover tradition. That being said, this morning she asked me a question I had both long anticipated and not been at all prepared for.

“Mama…do you have a mom?”

I knew one day she would ask me this. She knows that her grandparents are her father’s parents, and we talk about how different people in our family relate to us and each other (last week she learned that her aunt and uncles are her dad’s siblings, color her surprised!). I’ve told her little benign details about my own father on occasion. It was a natural next step for her to ponder.

What did I respond with, you ask?

Well…I told her no.

She then replied with, “But you have a dad…” Then it got even hairier, because I said I did, past tense, and she asked what I meant, so I told her he had passed away, and she didn’t know what that meant either. I told her that he isn’t with us anymore, that that’s what happens in life. She then got distracted by putting her backpack away in her classroom, and I leaned into the distraction and dropped her off with a cheerful kiss goodbye. I have to go pick her up soon; we’ll see if the subject arises again.

I’m not sure which question from her was more off-putting, the one about my deceased father or the one about my very-much-still-alive mother. I wasn’t ready at that moment to dive into a serious conversation about death of people (she has some frame of reference after losing our dog, but still, it’s not an easy topic to broach). However, I think I was even less ready to try to explain why I “don’t have a mom” in a way she might understand. I don’t ever really shy away from talking about difficult things with children in ways they can process them, but when it comes to the subject of my parents, I needed more time to figure out what to say.

If, or when, the subject comes up again, my intention is to explain that I do not have a mom in the same way that she has me. However, I am very blessed to have a bunch of people who love me so much, and I am so thankful for that. For a four-year-old, I think that will suffice. If she asks for more detail than that, she’ll have to wait until she’s older.

I happened to have a therapy appointment this morning, and spoke about what happened. My therapist asked me if I thought it would be worth considering saying that my mother, like my father, had passed away. While that might be simpler in the short term, in the long run that won’t work because it will complicate matters when my mother actually does pass away and I’ll have to explain things then. Even besides that, it doesn’t sit well with me to say someone is dead when they aren’t; that feels very foul spiritually. Still, the whole thing shook me today.

“Mama…do you have a mom?”

Not, “What is your mom’s name?” Not, “Where does your mom live?” Not, “What is your mom like?”

No. She asked me if I have one. Four years of life, and it’s finally dawned on her that there’s a figure that’s never mentioned. There’s an absence that she’s finally noticed. Do I have one?

That role isn’t a given. She has made no presumption that I have a mom because Daddy has one, and she has one, and her friends have them. She’s picked up on the fact that if I did have one worth sharing or discussing with her, that person would have come up by now.

Maybe my mother could learn to pick up on that fact too (ha ha).

Passover…a holiday of questions. Some we’ve been asking for centuries. Some sneak up on us even if we know they’re coming someday, like when you take a bite of maror (bitter herbs, for which we often use horseradish), and it’s much sharper than you anticipated. That question this morning went straight to my sinuses.

I wish you all a lovely spring holiday season. Welcome the questions, one and all! Even the difficult questions are good. Take time and care to figure out how to answer them, in ways that make sense for you and for the askers.