“A king’s daughter must be meek.” And if I hide in my abode, people will say, “You are why he left yeshiva.”
If my calling is to teach, how will I make ends meet? All that I earn from work so bitter will go straight to the babysitter.
“Do not misunderstand my intent,” they say. “You must work to pay the rent, to care for money and payment, but heaven forbid enlightenment.”
Though if I abandon education and deviate from expectation, sullied and disparaged will I appear for choosing the worst of all — a career.
From “Elegy to a Working Haredi Woman,” by Leah Meizel.
Meizel is “a mother of 17,” it says here. I hope that’s a misprint, but many of the Haredi—who have fascinated me since I visited Israel back in March-April—do have very large families.
Even the penguins (as some Israeli seculars call the males for their black suits, white shirts, and black fedoras), who used to be strictly on the dole, are going to work now.
THE TEXAS SCRIBBLER 
a mother of 17 – not necessarily a misprint. Oh well, what can one say?
Probably a misprint. She’d be lucky to be able to walk after that, let alone teach.
Good to see the Haredi men are not spending their whole time studying the Torah and Talmud and are finally getting off their posteriors and going to work.
That 17 children may not be a misprint. A close friend has 10 siblings and yes all eleven have the same mother and father.