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wonderful singing voice. (Even if my voice didn’t break as I chanted, I had no ability to carry a tune). We made quite a picture.
Taking no chances, I had actually brought a copy of my haftorah sec- tion to camp in the summer of 1957 and was lucky enough to have obtained a phonograph record of a cantor performing my part from my cousin Harry, who also had a November birthday and, as the astute reader will recall, was indirectly responsible for my being stuck with the name Harvey. In addition, starting in mid-September, I would ride my bike to the synagogue and meet frequently with a very old man with a very strong accent whose job it was to somehow get me to turn in a suit- able performance. (I was by that time the proud owner of a Hermes Jet, which was my first multigeared, thin-wheeled bicycle; it was not a more expensive Rudge, which Larry Itkin had, but it was nevertheless a beau- tiful “English Racer.” On one occasion, somewhat emulating my father, I was riding down Avenue J to my lesson at EMJC when a car went through a stop sign at East 21st Street and hit me, knocking me to the ground. I recall immediately jumping to my feet to assure the driver that I was unhurt. This was, of course, well before I went to law school.)
I did turn in a suitable performance. But that is not what I remem- ber best about the service. The rabbi at East Midwood Jewish Center, Harry Halpern, was a very respected and powerful man in Jewish circles who had been the rabbi at EMJC since 1929 and still had decades to go as the rabbi there when I faced him. With the ceremonial part of the bar mitzvah behind us, the three of us had to stand for Rabbi Halpern’s charge. There is little doubt that rabbis’ charges to bar mitzvah boys are generally cut from the same tallis, which is the Ashkenazi way of saying prayer shawl. (Tallit, pronounced “tah-leet,” is the more upper-class, Sephardic, way. Tallis is to “Good Shabbos,” which is said in a level tone, as tallit is to “Shabbat Shalom,” which is almost always sung with two lilt- ing iambs. Take your pick.)
The typical charge, delivered by the typical rabbi, sounded some- thing like “I’ve watched you with pleasure since you were a little boy entering our school; I’ve teared up as I lit the Sabbath candles with you,
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