A Season of Miracles by Ed Goldberg Page B

and the Brooklyn sunshine poured in like a
deluge.
    Sammy started public school, and took to it. He was curious, smart, aggressive, and he
needed some manners. All agreed, however, that he learned fast and got along well with teachers and
other pupils.
    Sammy was constantly amazed. His classmates were a picture of the ferment he saw in the
streets in his working-class neighborhood: gruff, hearty Irish; dark, mercurial Italians; stolid, silent
Slavs; Hasidic Jews with black hats and long sidecurls; colored people with burnished skins in many
shades, who he quickly discovered did not like the names most often called them.
    By the end of the school year, Sammy had many friends. He got on well with all of them, his
experience with GIs having been a valuable training exercise. That summer, he was introduced to
major league baseball, and the Brooklyn Dodgers. He shared the thrill of watching Snider and Furillo
and Erskine, and the magnificent Jackie Robinson, whose significance was lost on no one.
    He adored Stan Musial, whose people had come from Poland, and he hated the Giants, like
he was supposed to. He would take long subway rides to watch Joe DiMaggio, who seemed to be a
being of a higher species, play in Yankee Stadium.
    He went to Coney Island, ate Nathan's hot dogs and rode the rides until he was on the verge
of throwing up. He went to the beach with his parents, and they saw the haunted, pale-skinned
refugees, many of whom tried to hide the numbers tattooed on their arms. Once more, they blessed
the Polish farmers and their hole in the ground.
    On the Fourth of July, they oohed and aahed with everyone at the
fireworks display, and Sammy tried to explain the meaning and importance of the whole thing.
"Momma, Poppa, it's just like the Hanukkah candles, lights for freedom. Only bigger, like everything
here, and in the sky. Hanukkah candles in the sky!"
    America, Brooklyn, was a land of make-believe, a paradise. And all the while, secretly in his
heart, Sammy anticipated his first Hanukkah/Christmas/Sammy's birthday in this magical place.
    The time rolled by. Labor Day. The new school year. The World Series--even though neither
the Yanks nor the Bums played. Then, Halloween.
    "Let me get this straight," Sammy asked his friend, Irv Feigenbaum, "you dress up in some
kind of weird outfit, and you ring doorbells of perfect strangers, and they give you candy or cookies
or money. And if they don't, you do something mean to them?"
    "Yeah," said Irv.
    "And this is allowed?"
    "Yeah, schmendrick, it's Halloween."
    Sammy shook his head in amazement. "Irving, this is the greatest country on earth."
    Then came Thanksgiving, and Sammy learned of the Indians and the Pilgrims. The Pilgrims
came here because they were badly treated at home. They nearly died, and the Indians showed them
how to survive. It was almost like his family were the Pilgrims, and the Polish farmers were the
Indians, and helped them to survive. Then he thought of the Poles in buckskins and feathers, with
painted faces, and he laughed so hard that the teacher, Mrs. Catalano, made him leave the room until
he composed himself.
    The morning of the Thanksgiving holiday, Mrs. Feigenbaum took Irv, his sister Marsha, and
Sammy into Manhattan to see the Macy's Parade. Sammy, who had been in nearly a continuous state
of astonishment since landing in America, reached a new level.
    Besides the marching bands, with pretty girls in little short skirts and guys blowing tubas
and hitting glockenspiels, and floats that looked like locomotives and gingerbread cottages, there
were big balloons of funny people and animals. The balloons were as big as buildings and floated
like feathers, and lots of strong men had to hold them down with ropes. A dog as big as a house, and
it wants to fly away!
    On the subway ride home, Sammy said little. His brain had overloaded. All he could think of
was: if this is for Thanksgiving, what will be for Hanukkah/Christmas/Sammy's birthday? The very
last thing