“Well, Jesus was a Jew.” I said.

Her resting face, which made me uneasy, erupted into a laughter that rated somewhere between a chuckle and a cackle.

She laughed for literal minutes before finally leading me back into the house. She stopped on the top stair and grabbed my shoulder, still laughing, and said to me, “Child, I have got to be the one to teach you. Jesus wasn’t Jewish. He was a Hebrew.”

I had never bit the inside of my cheek so hard. More out of fear than respect. I did not want to know how hard Penny could hit.