One Shabbos, a couple I’d never met before walked into the Chabad house. Eitan and Jennifer, as they introduced themselves, had recently moved into the neighborhood. The parents of one of Eitan’s clients had become a baal teshuva through my parents, and when he heard Eitan was moving to S. Monica, he insisted he visit the Chabad house. They joined us for the kiddush, and returned again a couple of weeks later.
Eitan and Jennifer were soon “regulars,” and were taking massive strides on their journey to Yiddishkeit. They were eager to explore all they could, and we learned with them regularly. As their wedding date approached, we began teaching them about mitzvos pertaining to marriage. They accepted everything with equanimity, except for when we brought up wearing a sheitel. We could see that the very idea made Jennifer extremely uncomfortable. She agreed to cover her hair with a tichel or a hat; wearing a sheitel was clearly off the table.
I officiated their wedding, and they moved to an established Jewish community to begin their new lives together.
They celebrated the birth of one child, and then two more, but then Jennifer started to experience difficulties when trying to have more children. She decided to create a keili, a vessel for blessing, by starting to wear a sheitel. A short while later, I received a text from Eitan.
“Holy cow, Rabbi.”
My heart dropped. What had happened? I quickly called him.
“Jennifer is pregnant,” he told me.
“Besha’ah tova!” I congratulated him.
“With triplets!”
“Woah! Now I understand your text!” We continued chatting for a bit, until a sudden thought struck me. “Eitan, how many sheitels did Jennifer buy?”
“Three!” he answered.
“Incredible! She bought three sheitels, and right after that, you discover you’re expecting three babies! What a bracha!”
“It’s a miracle!” Eitan agreed. “The doctor told us that in all his thirty years of practice, he’s never seen a triplet pregnancy that was completely natural!”
*Names changed to protect privacy
