The  shiva  candle burns in the house window, a  signal  of
death.  Inside eleven people stand in minion to morn a death.   A
sixteen  year old has died, I did not know him, but I am here  to
morn  him.   Another  person was needed for minion,  I  am  their
neighbor, I took my brother I went to morn.
     I never met the kid, his parents are divorced, he lived with
his  mother, this minion is at his father's, but in death he  has
been  born within me.  Sixteen years old, a car crash, could have
been  me.  That is not why I came to morn, it is what I feel.   I
am  morning because I am Jewish and a tenth was needed.  One more
family  friend and I would never have known of the kid's life  or
death.  There was no question about my action, I walked the block
to  their house in the dark, if it had been raining I would  have
driven, thinking on the irony as I came.
      The  entire  incident is made of two things  for  me.   The
minion  that needed another, that brought me to morn.  The  death
that  could have been mine, that was what brought me to  morning.
Should  I  be  happy, another has taken my place  in  statistics.
Should I be sad, I don't even know the kid's name.
     My parents tell me that the rest of the minion was impressed
by  my  actions.  Coming, offering condolences, participating  in
the services, these actions came instinctively, not as part of  a
special behavior.  As the service continued I pursued the idea of
death  and what should be done.  Last month I received  a  letter
telling  me  that  a  person from my trip to Israel,  during  the
summer, had died in a car crash.  My trip to Israel, where I  had
tried to expand my horizons, now brought me to the final horizon,
the earth.
      Two people, two deaths, two cars, and two accidents, add up
to  a  lot of pain, a lot of morning, and a lot of tired  people.
One  I  knew,  one  I did not, one I was able to  participate  in
minion, one I was only able to send a condolence card.  There  is
nothing left for either of them, no happy times, no bad times, no
time  at  all.   I morn one because I knew him, and  I  knew  him
because I am a Jew.  I morn the other because I am a Jew, and now
I know him.  This is how I am, I will morn and I will remember.