There is a name for the night on which we return our Pesach dishes to their storage. It is called, “Rumple Nacht”.  

I have heard the name used for the night in which we remove them prior to Pesach as well, but this is not the common application of the name. No, Rumple is the process of returning those dishes. 

I want to wax wistful for a moment, and assume the voice of a female blogger- like a mommyblogger – who can write sentimental thoughts about seeing her children growing up or her favorite coffee mug.  

Because amid the tumultuous rumble of the “Rumple” there is a ceremony going on that was familiar enough to the cycle of the Jewish calendar to warrant a name.  

So the ceremony evokes thoughts, and it also makes a person think about the previous year’s Rumple, and what has changed – or “how the kids have grown”- et cetera.  

The first thought that hits me with the Rumple is how “just yesterday we were taking these dishes down with the whole Yom Tov in front of us, and here we are putting them away already!” 

This is the Tempus Fugit moment in every Chag- and every anticipated event in our lives; the moment that the event switches from standing in front of us to fading behind us. We all know that reflective thought. 

But there is the Rumple-through-the-years sentiment that comes with this ceremony too.  

Because we only use our Pesach dishes for one week a year, they last for a long time and tend to stay within a family for generations.  

Sometimes, because of this, the Pesach dishes are not up to the trends of the day. You may have an avocado-green cereal bowl or a cake knife with a yellow handle. You can’t part with these relics, because they are the sole survivors of your childhood things. In my case, besides for those 1970s themed pieces, I have some knives with “P/M” (Pesach/Milchig) etched into the side with the precision that only a master–mechanic from another era and continent (Dad z’l) would care to devote to his Pesach cutlery.  

When Pesach comes, these keepsakes go into use again. A year older, both me and the cutlery, we meet again to dig ourselves into starchy Pesach sponge cakes and oily Matza Breis. But after a week of Pesach shenanigans, the green bowls and the yellow knives are again put to rest, and life needs to go on.  

The clatter of the everyday Rumples its clanky tune and the sweet childhood memories of Seders and visiting uncles- of Pirchei trips and afikomen hiding places- of childhood and grandparents- slip quietly away into the shoebox in the Pesach closet. Until winter will give birth to spring next year. 

Leshanah Haba’ah B’Yeruslayim.