holy land

the last time i was in israel was after college and lived there for a while, working a couple of often dull jobs but with kindly folks around who looked after me and tried to convince me to stay.

one of those peoples was a guy my age, a modern orthodox fellow, whom i had first met about 10 years earlier in 8th grade when i lived there in eighth grade. you could say he was my eighth grade boyfriend. say it! feel better now?

anyway, you'd be right. he was funny and cute, very dark eyes, skinny. he didn't mind too much that i wasn't actually orthodox, that my family wasn't/isn't but that i went to his orthodox public school anyway because the local secular school had no room for extra students visiting for the year. i think to him it was exotic to be associated with a not really orthodox eighth grade girl who was nevertheless not so very wild, so still within bounds of possibility while also breaking rules.

when i returned to j'lem after college i didn't know too many people my age and since i was on and off in touch with friends from my earlier life there, i fell in with them all again (they by now were out of the army and working or going to school) and it was comfortable and warm and nobody minded that i was not religious and i didn't flaunt it. if they did mind, they were discrete and diplomatic. some probably thought they'd woo me to their lifestyle. (my roommate was a bit of one of those. she wanted to prove to me that god exists and offered as proof that when soldiers are in foxholes they start to pray. she meant well and sent me linen napkins once as a gift. or was that what i sent her? her father was a stern englishman, her mother was dutch.) anyway, this fellow and i didn't 'go out' whatever that would have meant, though i nursed a crush on him, probably out of loneliness and a desire to have everything taken care of the way i imagine it can be in the orthodox world, limited choices, more prescribed paths. and he looked out for me in an avuncular way, seeing me to the door if we went out, making sure i sat next to him in restaurants, and every now and then i'd go to his house and nothing happened, we'd chat, it was all very above board, and he told me he was dating a very lovely, demure young woman (she struck me as very young which now seems funny because we were all very young. no more than 22). he could only marry an orthodox girl, that made sense, he also told me he was descended from some famous rabbinic line and was a bit astonished i was unfamiliar with that particular line (another time, in a shop that sold nuts and seeds and dried fruits on the way downtown, my roommate asked if i recognized the man in a big photo behind the cashier. i guessed, rabbi soloveichik, a rabbi from the boston area. she laughed. she might have guffawed. it was schneerson. how was i supposed to know. why was i supposed to care?)

but we were sitting on the couch, day light was dimming and it being the sabbath, no lights on, and he had a blanket over his lap and i realized he had an erection there, sitting next to me. but we neither of us acknowledged it. i did, though, feel glad, somehow flattered and a little powerful.

i sometimes wonder about him, about his life, how many kids he has, if he messes around (he had a bit of the cad in him and i'd not be entirely surprised) what his job is, if he knew any of the kids who were killed last week, though that yeshiva seems full of people far more religious than he was then.

another thing that happened in israel back then: one of my jobs was that i worked on a public health study in which i'd go to the beit she'an valley to religious and secular kibbutzes and take blood pressure, ask some questions about diet, sleeping habits, etc. our driver on these excursions was a man, probably around 60, from morocco. he'd chat with me. i think it amused him, this young woman in israel, a bit naive, a bit alone, good hebrew but ignorant of the discotheques. and he told me his wife was a nurse and that they wanted to have me over, fix me a moroccan feast, since i was kind of an orphan for the year. but i didn't have that much to talk to him about and didn't really want to spend the evening with him and the missus. so i kept putting it off.

one night, i was at home, and the phone rang and it was he and he said, 'oh, i'll just swing by' and before i could think up an excuse he swung by. and in the car which was a minivan he said his wife had to work and we'll just go pick up some food (did i want grapeleaves? i did. and hummous too) and bring it home but first to the king david hotel for a drink. all of which happened and we both looked exquisitely out of place there. and then we got to his apartment and i sat on a chair and he on the sofa and he said, 'oh, come sit by me,' and i hemmed and hawed but he insisted and i didn't really know to refuse or assert and so i sat in the corner of the sofa. and he moved over right next to me then, put his arms around me and started to kiss my neck.

i jumped up and said, 'i really have to go.' he asked why and i answered, 'my parents are going to call me from america and they'll be worried if i'm not there.' it was a lie. he offered to drive me home, i said no thanks, i'll take a bus. and my orthodox roommate, when i told her the story, laughed at me and my naivete. and i did feel naive, and didn't tell anyone in my family about it. my parents thought i was too trusting to begin with, this story would have confirmed that hunch. but isn't it good to be trusting?