Gladys and Esther: A family's history - feature

Some years ago, I interviewed Gladys Sturman to record her life stories. One of these memories involved her daughter Esther. When Esther was 17 (in the late 1970s), she went from home in Los Angeles to Israel, presumably to attend a school to learn about Conservative Judaism. But one day, Gladys and her husband, Herman, got a call from Esther, informing her parents that she was actually in an Orthodox school because she had decided to become Orthodox and stay in Israel. Gladys and Herman were more than surprised. 

“We were devastated,” said Gladys. “Here was an extremely brilliant young girl who had understanding and insight and intelligence beyond normal, and she was going to enter a patriarchal society? We flew to Israel and we talked to the Rosh Yeshiva, the head of the Orthodox school she was attending – without our permission. We said to this man, ‘What about our daughter’s cultural interests? What if she wants to go to a play? Or a concert?’

“He said, ‘We decide what cultural experiences she has. if we say no, she can’t go to that play or concert.’

“My heart broke,” said Gladys. “I ran out of the room crying inconsolably to think that she was entering such a culture.”

But the Sturmans were not the kind of parents who would drag their daughter home or deny her their support and love. As Gladys recalled, “I wasn’t in a position to tell my daughter, even though she was just a child, what to believe and what to do with her life or forbid her from doing that.”

And her daughter Esther Sturman Rabi is grateful.

“In spite of Mom not being 100% on board with my becoming Orthodox,” Esther said, “she’s always been supportive. She’s never tried to undermine the Orthodox lifestyle to my kids. I know part of what bothers her about my being Orthodox is that it seems to complicate my life in a way that seems unbearable to her, so it’s my well-being that concerns her, not her own pride or philosophical objections. Which is the highest praise – selfless concern for her child. That’s a real accomplishment.”

Esther did begin an Orthodox life, got married, and she and her husband, Gavriel, have 10 children. What follows is Gladys’s story about helping Esther when her second baby was due.

ABOUT 35 years ago my daughter, Esther, was having her second child and, like a good mother, I went to Israel to help her. I got there on a Thursday. On Friday night, at around 11 o’clock, my son-in-law, Gavriel, woke me up and said, ‘Mom, you’d better get up. Esther’s in labor.’ 

He and Esther were sitting at the dining room table trying to decide how they were going to get her to the hospital. Because it was Shabbos, if they called a cab they wouldn’t be able to hang up the phone, and their line would be tied up all night and all of the next day. 

They could call a neighbor and have him drive her to the hospital, but although you can turn on the car for an emergency, you can’t turn off the car when you get there. So his car would have to be parked at the hospital with the motor running all Friday night and all day Saturday. 

So it was decided that Esther and I would walk to the hospital. 

Before we left, Gavriel said, ‘Esther, don’t forget it’s Shabbos Zachor and you have to hear the Torah reading.’ 

I thought to myself, ‘We don’t have enough things going on? We have to hear the Torah reading?’

Unlike most women in labor who put a change of pajamas and a magazine in a suitcase, Esther’s suitcase was full of books. She handed it to me.

And we embarked on our trip to the hospital. 

On a sunny day, the hospital was about a 20-minute walk. But this was at night. Cars aren’t permitted on Shabbat through Bayit Vagan where they lived, so there were no cars driving. There were not too many household lights on because most people were asleep. So it was very dark where we were walking.

There was a lot of construction going on in the area, and the sidewalk had nails and sandbags and boards and loose sand all over. 

Meanwhile, Esther ducked behind a bush every once in a while to relieve herself. 

When we get to the end the street, there was a huge empty lot – like a solid city block. On the other side of the empty lot was the hospital. There was a sidewalk running around the exterior of the empty lot, but it would be faster if we cut across the lot to get directly to the hospital. 

Esther, very much in labor, said, ‘I think we’d better cut across the lot.’

And I was thinking if she has to all of a sudden deliver a baby on this empty lot with the goat droppings and tin cans, and all I’ve got to help me with is a suitcase full of books, it’s going to be tough. 

We slowly made our way across the dirt and uneven ground, and, thank God, we made it to the front entrance of the hospital. 

But the door was closed for Shabbat. There was a note: ‘Please go around to the emergency entrance.’

It was a big hospital, and it took time to walk around to the emergency entrance. We walked in, and I was thinking, ‘Oh, thank God. Somebody will be here.’

The lobby was empty. There was not a nurse, not an attendant, not a guard. There wasn’t even a bum sleeping on the bench. Nobody. 

The maternity wing was on the seventh floor. They do have a Shabbos elevator, but Esther wouldn’t use it. So we walked up seven flights of stairs, Esther dripping fluid, me schlepping a suitcase full of books. 

We finally got to the maternity floor, and out came this wonderful, smiling, plump, elderly midwife who was greeting us enthusiastically. 

‘Good Shabbos, good Shabbos!’ 

She checked out Esther and said, ‘She is in labor. However, it’s not an emergency. It’s only one o’clock, and I can’t write on Shabbos. So you can’t be admitted until two o’clock when the Arab comes.’

So we were sitting in the lobby, and Esther was leaking more fluid. 

At two o’clock, sure enough, the Arab showed up. She took Esther’s history. ‘How old are you? Is this your first child? How old is the father? Did you have any problems?’ 

Finally, she admitted Esther. Got tzu danken. 

In the delivery room, the doctor arrived, and he got Esther onto the table with her legs up and her bottom exposed. 

And her tichel, her head covering, which she wears for modesty sake, slipped off. She said to me, ‘Mom, my tichel fell off.’ 

I said, ‘This isn’t actually a time for modesty, but okay.’ I adjusted the tichel, and the healthy baby, my granddaughter Shoshana, was delivered.

It was about 4 o’clock in the morning. Esther said to me, ‘Did they read the Torah portion yet?’

I said, ‘I don’t know; I’ll find out.’

So I stepped out into the hall for a minute and I came back. ‘Yeah, it’s too late. You missed it.’

If I hadn’t said that, Esther would have gotten right up off the table. 

Once Esther was settled in a room and the baby was in the nursery, I had to go back to their home. 

It was still dark out. I had no money. But even if I had money, I couldn’t call a cab. 

So I walked home in the dark, across the sand and the broken boards on the sidewalk. 

I got home and I told Gavriel, ‘You have a healthy baby girl, and mother and daughter are doing fine. I’m going to go to sleep now.’

He said to me, ‘Mom, I hope you don’t mind this. But it’s not appropriate for you and I to be alone in the house when Esther’s not here. So I’ve arranged for you to sleep at the neighbor’s.’

Oh, okay. So I went the neighbor’s to sleep. 

After a few days, Esther and Shoshana were home and doing well, so I headed back to Los Angeles. 

And I was telling everybody the story of getting Esther to the hospital on Shabbos. And everybody was laughing.

About two years later, Esther was pregnant again. And I went to help out. I had never told Esther the story that I’d been telling people. And my friends were writing or calling me in Israel and asking, ‘Are you going to bring back another story?’ 

Esther asked, ‘What’s this story?’

So I told her the story, just as I just told others, and she sat there and said, ‘I remember everything that you’re saying as it happened. I remember it, but I never put it together the way you just did as a story. And now I’ll never be able to think of it in any other way.’ 

So that’s the story of walking Esther to the hospital to have her baby. 

I want to say something else about my reaction years ago when Esther decided to become Orthodox. 

As I said, I realized that I just needed to accept it so that we could have the mother and daughter relationship we both wanted. So when Esther’s first babies, Yacov and Shoshana, were born, I said, ‘Esther, I want to promise you something. I will never, ever, no matter what happens, try to convince them against your lifestyle.’

I remember her astonished look at me. I guess she figured if anything happened to her, I would raise the children as Reform Jews or something. And she thanked me for that. She said she felt reassured by me saying that. 

It’s now 2024, and I still relate to Esther and her family with that acceptance, even if I don’t always understand or agree with their lifestyle.

“I BELIEVE that my mother thinks I rejected the lifestyle in which we were raised,” Esther Sturman Rabi said recently, “but really, I took what she taught me to its logical conclusion. I had the freedom to do that. I’m so deeply grateful to Mom for giving me the foundations for life – my love of Judaism, my understanding of relationships, my love for books and education, and curiosity, and self-confidence, and showing me how to be responsible and to enjoy life and to see the humorous side of things. 

“The older I get, the more people I meet who didn’t have as stable a home life as we did or who didn’t have as happy a childhood or as good a relationship with their mother as I did. It’s so obvious to me that Mom gave us the biggest gift any human can give. 

“I keep trying to thank her for it, but she keeps shrugging it off. I don’t know if she’s being modest or she really doesn’t think she did anything amazing, but she did. So I was able to deal with the walk to the hospital and all the complications of life without any hysteria, no drama, just doing what has to be done.”

Over the years, Gladys has often been asked by friends to describe this experience with Esther.

“The story has become like an urban legend,” Gladys said. “My friends keep telling the story to others. I go to a party and I hear people telling the story, and I don’t even know who these people are. So the story continues!”

Gladys Sturman, who turns 95 at the end of May, now has 27 great-grandchildren. Twenty-one of them are Esther’s grandchildren in Israel. ■

 Ellie Kahn is an oral historian and journalist. She can be reached at: www.livinglegaciesfamilyhistories.com or ekzmail@gmail.com