The Jewolic (5 page)

9

Shalom

Gram died.

10

As the World Turns

I stayed behind after the funeral and brought out a deck of cards; Gram and I played our last game and chatted for a bit. I finally admitted to Gram that I would never have touched her uppers with my big toe, no matter what. She nodded, not completely convinced. Then she admitted that when she had called me a schmuck all those times, she only meant it some of the time and that she was proud of my C+s, but if I wasn’t so lazy I could have done better, maybe even a B-, never mind an A, God forbid. I nodded and promised to do better — when she was right, she was right. I said goodbye, leaving the cards behind in case she wanted to play solitaire.

We sat Shiva for a week. Which is another good thing about Jews
— they close the coffin quickly, go home and people bring you food. Plus, it’s a week off from regular chores, work and sweeping the sidewalk, if one has a sidewalk. Unfortunately, I had graduated and could not get a week off from not going to school. I added that to my permanent record of things that the universe owes me.

I wasn’t busy so I showed up at Gram’s reading; it turned out that she left my siblings and me seven thousand dollars each, the proceeds of her house in Coney Island that I didn’t know she had. She had also requested that I read aloud my account records; I guess that she was pretty sure that I would show up after all.

I cringed as I opened Gram’s purse; a bit apprehensive about what I would encounter. I reached in and came up with an old box of Kent, which held two stale cigarettes, a button, and nine dollars in old, but neatly-folded, bills; a small change purse which had seen the better part of the A & P cashiers for many years; her pencil stub, which I stuffed into my pocket; and an envelope containing several large folded papers which I very delicately unfolded and hand ironed. I snapped the purse shut and, feeling an immense sense of power, I opened it and snapped it shut again; no wonder she enjoyed doing that.

I scanned my family who sat patiently unaware that they would soon hear my history of misdeeds, large double solitaire losses and whatever else Gram had secreted away.
Gram knew everything and I was sure that I was about to be outed for multiple unsolved infractions, many that I misdirected to my brother or the dog. I cleared my throat hoping that my parents would get bored with this and pass on this part of the proceedings. No doubt that afterwards, I would be sentenced to my room for life and fined the equivalent to two years of allowances. I prepared for the ultimate humiliation and admission of guilt for all of the infractions on Gram’s list. After all, how could I disagree with her now?

I glanced at the paper, preparing to r
ead my own list of petty crimes and deductions, which would be most of the seven thousand, plus whatever additional penalties my parents sought to impose. I could not hold back the smile.

“Mox nix,” I read. There was no reference to my bequest, no list of misdeeds, no compendium of chores undone, no mention of the
errant Bar Mitzvah, no total of how much she cheated me out of in cards, no deductions for not taking out the garbage or just being an annoying little putz. Nothing. Just the words:

Mox nix.

“Mox nix.” I repeated — more for what it didn’t say than what it did.

The lawyer, obviously a gentile not well versed in ethnic vernacular
of the Jews and Jew-lites, looked at me curiously.

“It matters not,” I explained
deliberately.

He continued to stare.

“Mox nix.” I went on, taking care to enunciate and educate the Unjewed. “That’s what it means: mox nix. No diff. Six of one, half a dozen of the other.” His eyes grew wider and more distant as I continued on my synonym soliloquy: “It’s not important, it doesn’t matter, it doesn’t make a difference, irrelevant, no importante, nada, nothing mit nothing.”

He
nodded as he considered my linguistic and cultural foray. I nodded in return. A thank you was not necessary, as most likely I had not thanked those before me who educated me in much the same manner. The simple knowledge that I had, in my small way, spread the word and enlightened yet another individual to the secrets of my heritage and quasi-religion, was thanks enough. Yes, I had done good today.

“From my people.” I
said proudly.

My people.
Gram would be proud. I felt her smile.

It was the saddest and happiest of funerals. I nodded reflexively every time Uncle Hy, who was a quasi-uncle due to lack of familial connection, looked directly at my eyebrow and uttered:

“She i
s in a better place.”

“Can she watch
As the World Turns
?” I retorted.

“Huh?”

“
As the World Turns
; does she even have a color TV or even a small black and white with rabbit ears? Can she play canasta or double solitaire? Can she smoke a Kent there?” I didn’t wait for my pseudo uncle’s reply as the moment flowed out of me. “I don’t think so. If she can’t smoke and iron and watch
As the World Turns
, then it’s not a better place. You know where a better place is? Here. Here is a better place.”

Mucous flowed from my eyes and nose. I reached in my pocket and pulled out a neatly folded yarmulke that I copped off the front table to give to Hochman who collected yarmulkes
like most kids collected baseball cards. I wiped my nose with it and stuffed it back into my pocket. Uncle Hy glanced askance — first at the yarmulke that I had secreted away as if he could see into my Robert Hall suit pocket, and then straight at my eyebrow, making direct and admonishing eyebrow contact. He followed this with a slight nod, head askew, brow furrowed, which I had learned over the years meant “is this how you were brought up?” or “you don’t have cream cheese?”

I assumed that the first interpretation was in play because we were at least two hours away from the post funeral feast, which, as everyone knows is the best Jewish meal one could consume. If I were going to open a restaurant, I would call it
:

The
Shiva King: try a bisel.

The
finest deli in real plastic containers

H
ot coffee in a cardboard cup with a handle.

B
ring your own bridge chairs.

I reconsidered giving the yarmulke to Hochman.

Uncle Hy reached up to wipe my tears
as a pseudo-uncle might do but, as he was about a foot shorter than I, he awkwardly hooked his pinky in my ear. After my mini soliloquy, we were both aware that it was his turn to speak. We stood frozen in funeral protocol. It was simple; I had an emotional outburst, now it’s his turn to comfort me. Considering that we never connected on any meaningful level before, I did not expect anything other than the standard funeral sentiment of a Hallmark cliché and, of course, the imminent withdrawal of said pinky.

“God’s will.” He whispered, as if he had just received a text message from Upstairs.

I considered questioning the whole premise of God’s will and death and the hereafter and other comforting rationalizations but decided that it would only serve to prolong the conversation, which we were both seeking to ditch.

“Baruch.” I whispered, conjuring up the only comeback that I could.

“Baruch.” He acknowledged.

“Monashadana.” I mumbled and phlegmed, contriving a few syllables of guttural insignificance, which meant nothing but sounded profoundly Jew
ish. “Aleichem,” I added, momentarily regretting the absent Hebrew School training. I placed my hand empathetically on his shoulder.

He nodded without responding. I had him. I had actually out-condolensced my ersatz uncle.

“Mox nix.” I whispered.

“Mox nix.” He agreed and added: “She was a good lady.”

“The best.”

“The best.”

“I miss her already.”

There was an extended beat as we stood there, once again, out of commiserative dialogue. It was time.

“Unc.”

I could tell that he was clearly touched; as this was the first time I had referred to him in such as way as to anoint him as being officially related to me. I had called him Unc, a breakthrough of sorts as we could now bond at another level. He was no longer quasi-Unc, or pseudo-Unc or half-Unc as I called him prior to today. He was now Unc and I was Glebe. I wondered how I would break this to my Uncle Irving, my mom’s bro and real official uncle, who I had been calling Unc since forever. Uncle Irving took pride that he was my only uncle, forgetting that Uncle Charlie, my father’s brother in law, was, in fact, an uncle as well.

“Yes?” Uncle Hy inquired.

“You can remove your pinky now.”

“Yes.”

We hugged. It was a victorious breakthrough hug.

Gram was old; she died. But she was always old; why did she have to die now? Why couldn’t she die when I didn’t care as much? I miss her. I will miss her every day.  I really don’t think that God designed solitaire to be played alone. For a long moment I regretted not being Bar Mitzvahed; she would have been proud. But I can’t undo what I haven’t done; the moment passed. Every time I smell an iron burning my underwear, I will think of Gram.

I snapped Gram’s purse shut for the last time and spent the next d
ay watching
As the World Turns.

11

All of the above

I was tempted to question God re Gram’s departure but I figured that was too easy an out. I mean if she had some disease like gout or consumption, I could understand it. If it was God’s will, then why did He will it?  Considering that I still have 55/100% leeway, I figured that questioning God re this matter could sway me either way.

If God were so powerful, then I definitely would have been
Bar Mitzvahed. Unless, for some godly reason, He didn’t want me to be Bar Mitzvahed, which was a distinct possibility. Maybe God wanted me to be one of those kids playing stickball while those in Hebrew school, enduring their second schoolday of the day, watched through the window.

I mean
, there is supposed to be only one God so why should He care which team I was on?  Maybe my religious oscillation perturbed him and He thought that I should have made a decision long ago. Maybe he wanted to me to become a Catholic or a Cath-lite just to evenly spread the athletic mediocrity so the softball game at the annual Jew/Cath Picnic wouldn’t be so one-sided.

Which brin
gs up a point. If there was truly one God, servicing all religions, then was He not straddling religions as well? Perhaps oscillating between them as I did.  Much like Superman and Clark Kent, He has never been seen in Church and Temple at the same time, cleverly reserving Saturdays for the Jews and Sundays for Catholics, et al.

Perhaps He thought that my destiny should be setting an example of one who went astray. I would be the poster boy for un-
Bar Mitzvahed quasi-Jew boys — a living example of one who had gone astray. I pictured a black and white photo of me sitting in my empty room, scraped band-aided knee, arm in a cast from swinging and missing a high curve, my TV permanently fixed in horizontal hold, no comic books, no friends, not even God to say hi to. Ominous shadows of vertical bars cast across my sullen face. The caption below read:

Don’t let this happen to you
.

Be
Bar Mitzvahed
.

Your grandmother wouldn’t mind
.

Of course, I would be serving a purpose, sacrificing myself to enable many other young Jewish boys to become men, pad their savings account and acquire IPhones. If that’s what He wanted, I was ok with that. Even if I were a pawn in God’s plan, I felt useful.

If God were so great
Gram wouldn’t have died because she was old.

“
What’s the point of getting old if you have nothing to look forward to?” I queried Hochman who sat on the floor, head on his knees. Perhaps he was beginning to become a tad weary of my single-minded discussions.

He nodded respectfully. Or he may have been falling asleep.

“If I were God,” I continued, as Hochman could be a better audience asleep than awake. “I would redesign life so that when you get old everything reverses and you become younger every day until you are born. Everything would be full cycle and you could have elderly wisdom on your return trip and your youth would be far less reckless.”

He nodded again, this time accompanied by a snore.

“Of course,” I conjectured, “you would have to go back to school and get left back each year to keep up with your age group. Clearly an obstacle. I could never get left back with my solid C+.”

This plan needed some more work.
I am beginning to see why God elected to construct life the way that he did. But it’s still flawed — there should be some incentive for growing old.

“A lottery,”
I declared.

“A lottery for growing old?”
Hochman queried without opening his eyes.

“
Think about it. What if one out of ten old people get to start over or relive some part of their lives.”

“NG.” Hochman answered between snores and drools.

“NG?”

“NG. No
good. No bueno. Because if you were reliving it, you would know what going to happen which would change what would happen so you really wouldn’t know it after all. Or, you could relive it without knowing that you are reliving it, which would defeat the purpose of reliving it.”

“You have a point.” He really did.
Reliving one’s own live could be problematic.

“
How about reincarnation?” I declared just as Hochman’s head fell off of his knees and plummeted straight towards the ground.

“What?”
He snorted and bounced up just inches from impact.

“It’s the perfect incentive for life
. Reincarnation, it’s like a Powerball ticket.”

“No one wins Powerball unless you work in some factory in a town no one has ever heard of.”

“My point exactly
. Powerball is about the promise of something better. It’s only good until it’s announced.”

“And then?”

“And then you buy another ticket. Of course, in my analogy, the afterlife ticket is drawn as you expire so you never know the results. It works for the Hindus.”

“I
don’t think the Jews would like it.”

“
Maybe I’ll become a Hindu.”

“A Hindu Jewolic?
”

Clearly, the incentive plan needs some work.

I wasn’t ready for Gram to leave
and I was a tad pissed at God for willing it. What’s more,
He wanted it that way
was not an answer; it’s more of a way of saying skip this question now and we’ll never come back to it. I didn’t buy it.

Was God responsible for everything that happened and didn’t happen? It seems that He gets undo blame and unfair credit. He can’t influence every happenstance, or can He? Every time we push the unknown or an unanswered question, however trivial or significant, He gets attribution. He covers our failures, our successes, our unplanned events and mostly, our unknown
s.  He is the universal answer; He is
e) all of the above
for everything in life.

If I were God, I would extend this to every quiz and exam I have ever taken.

Standard answers to all quizzes:

a)
    
Bolivia’s primary export is bauxite

b)
    
Iambic pentameter

c)
     
Plutonium’s atomic number is 94

d)
     
Assuming that they left at the same time, the empty train arrived in Cleveland one and one half minutes before the train that carried gold bullion inside little statues of the Statue of Liberty and traveled 11 mph slower, except downhill.

e)
     
All of the above

I would always check off
e) all of the above
and be the only Jewolic, to ever get 100% on every test he had ever taken, even though he missed several days because of his spiritual obligations, like the Yanks opening day. My straight C+ would have skyrocketed to a B- or maybe even a respectable B.

Of course, if I were really God, I would ace History and Geography, having a tad to do with creating them in the first place. I would probably do pretty well in Spanish and Latin and Hebrew and not so sure about Chinese — but I wouldn’t have to worry about that until college.
Also not so sure about math. I can’t recall any mention of God being good at math other than counting by twos. But I would be such a good counter that I wouldn’t need Algebra or Geometry or Calculus, whatever that is. Needless to say, I would ace Gym, especially dodgeball, a favorite pastime of Moses during his forty years in the desert. That said, being God, I would know the answer to everything anyway and probably be excused from tests, at least surprise quizzes.

But what if He wasn’t right all of the time? What if He got most answers but blew a few because He was busy? I would guess that keeping in touch with every nuance of every being in the entire world in every moment, could be quite challenging. Which brings up another thought; exactly what is God’s domain? The Earth?
The Solar System? The entire Universe? Guam? What if something went astray in Bayonne and, at that same moment, another God spy cam event happened in China or the Bronx or Mars. It would be understandable if he missed a few; after all, God’s only not human.

According to
Uncle Irving’s schmear theory, God covered the entire bagel, even the hole. But, as most of us who are bagel-savvy know, even the cream cheese falls through the hole occasionally and may fall silently onto your lap, which is not as bad as a splot of jelly falling onto your lap. As infrequently as it may occur, it occurs. Should that be the case, God is everywhere, except occasionally.

But, if that were true, then how does one know which occurrences were God’s will and which were while God was focused on other matters? What if we attributed the wrong things to God? What if He had nothing to do with Gram’s departure or my severe stomach cramps because I had too much red licorice the night before?

Then, even in those infrequent occasions, He wouldn’t be
e)
all of the above.
Maybe He would be
a, b, c or d
. But, what if He were
f)
none of the above
? As infrequently as it may happen,
f) none of the above
occasionally pops up as a choice much like the wayward cream cheese falls through the hole. What if He didn’t have a plan? What if things just happened? What if He didn’t create the Earth or plankton or mankind?  What if Gram just died and God had nothing to do with it? What if he was getting a bad rap for all those major disasters and the plague? I think that a lot of people would be very unhappy.

Imagine finding out that something that you believed in your entire life, was not true. I guess that’s why people hold on so dearly — it would be very painful to undo that deep a belief. The problem with God, a convenient and easily comprehended concept, was that He wasn’t totally logical. He was a catchall covering everything that had not been covered by mortal knowledge. Of course, I express this in the most academic of ways in case He is reading this at this very time.

Was Hochman right, a rare and incredible occurrence? Do I believe in God because I am afraid that if I didn’t and there was the smallest of possibilities that I am wrong, then He wouldn’t be there when I needed Him?  I shall give this further consideration. I wondered if many others were held back by the fear of being wrong about not believing in Him? What if we were taught nothing when we were young? Unlike Aunt Selma and Gram, whose world had been predefined, what if nothing was predefined and we each had to make a choice on what was and wasn’t?

I figured that, like Gram, most people had their beliefs since the beginning of time and had not wavered, had not even considered wavering, had not even discussed considering wavering, or had not even considered discussing considering wavering. I, considering my Jewolic background, had fewer beliefs than most except in my commitment to ambivalence. Actually, I was, and remain, on the fence of my beliefs. I was so convinced of my uncertainty that I fully understood how others could be so convinced of other things.

It was time to get off of the fence.