Culture and Ideas

The Day of His Birth — “Necessary Stories” column from The Jerusalem Report

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Haim Watzman

The quarter-moon hovers low on the horizon as Gadi speeds the pickup truck the length of the Jezreel valley. From the passenger seat I gaze up at the stars sparkling above the Hill of Moreh, where Gideon mustered his troops. It’s my second trip down the valley this night to the hospital in Afula. In predawn darkness I think: my third child will be born this morning.

In remembering that night, I recall a poem by Avraham Halfi, versifier of dark nights and the radiance of the soul. For Halfi the moon is an illusion. Those who see it as such are blind—they do not understand that it is God’s lantern.

A sightless God with lantern in hand
Seeks a path in the evening dusk
And everyone says:

Here comes the moon
And like a tree it rises
Pouring light on the road.

Yet God, too, cannot see. He is blind, like justice, like a man groping his way forward on a moonless night.

The road is empty. It’s the ninth day of Shevat, January 24, 1991.

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Driving Louella — “Necessary Stories” column from The Jerusalem Report

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Haim Watzman

Thanks to the editors at the Jerusalem Report for permitting me to post this before the current issue reaches subscribers, so that you can read this story before Pesach.

This is the story I tell my family every Seder night.

When I was about two years old, soon after my little brother Saul was born, my mother fell ill and was hospitalized for a time. My father, then covering City Hall for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, couldn’t handle a toddler and a baby on his own.

illustration by Avi Katz
My memories of that time are fuzzy around the edges, pervaded by a soft light like an ambient dawn. But they are real impressions of a time when I was journeying into consciousness, not long after I learned to talk, to turn feelings into words. In them my gaze is always directed upward, for nearly everything is bigger than me. Our modest suburban ranch house thus remains huge in my minds eye, centered on an endless corridor that had to be crossed to get from my bedroom to Mommy’s and Daddy’s, and to be run down to escape into the light of our living room with its wall-sized picture window. A troop of monsters, led by a sour-smelling pig, lived in a cavity in the corridor’s wall. At night they threatened to devour me.

Daddy needed a live-in nanny for us. In the late 1950s, in Cleveland, this meant a black woman from downtown. A series of matrons in long skirts and aprons made an appearance and then vanished. Sally said we were too noisy, Emma that we lived too far out. Cynthia simply stopped coming, without prior notice. In a dream from that time a dozen of them enter and leave the house in a line, like models on a fashion show runway.

Then Louella came and stayed. Dark, broad, taciturn, and creased, she was stern when that was required but smiled easily. She was very old, older than my grandmothers. She had sons and daughters and grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Sometimes she’d bring one of them, a Joe or a Lloyd, to unplug a pipe or fix a fixture. She told us that her parents had been slaves in the south. She slept in the house’s third bedroom, which served during the day as a playroom for my brother and me.

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Sharing Pain–Sara Avitzour’s “And Twice the Marrow of Her Bones”

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Haim Watzman

The thought of losing a child is so frightening that during the years that Timora, the daughter of my good friend Sara (Susan) Avitzour was fighting leukemia, I tried as best I could not to think about it very much. Perhaps because Sara and I are partners in comedy and chaos in Kehillat Yedidya’s annual Purimspiel, it did just not seem possible that anything so horrible could happen to her.

Sara has now published an earnest and incredibly touching memoir about that worst of all possible nightmares. And Twice The Marrow Of Her Bones is a story told twice. The first half of the book is a narrative of the years between the appearance of Timora’s first symptoms, through diagnosis, chemotherapy, two bone marrow transplants, and the end of hope. The second half is a series of short reflections about remembering Timora, about the role of Jewish faith and community in her family’s tragedy, and about how Sara coped with Timora’s illness and death. These are based on posts from a blog she began to write after Timora’s death, “Five Years Later” (and which she’s recently renewed under the title Loving, Losing, and Living.

The book’s structure is a key part of its impact. It enables the reader first to experience the tragedy, and then to think back on it. It’s not a usual pattern for a book of this type, and frankly, when Sara told me about it, I was doubtful that it would work. But it turns out that the intensity of the story of loss that fills the book’s first half almost requires the retrospection of its second half. Without the latter, the reader would be moved, but without having gone anywhere.

All of us who have children understand that we are at risk. But, as Sara writes:

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Sex in the Diamond City — “Necessary Stories” column from The Jerusalem Report

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Haim Watzman

Leaflet pasted up on a bulletin board at the Tel Aviv Central Bus Station:
“The Carat Hotel in Ramat Gan: small, comfortable, discreet, rooms equipped with DVD and coffee, hourly rates.”

illustration by Avi Katz

To: Adina Hefetz, counsel, The Association for Civil Rights in Israel
From: Gal Dagan, proprietor, the Carat Hotel, Ramat Gan

Dear Ms. Hefetz,

I write in response to your letter, received today, with regard to the large sign that I have placed in the front window of my establishment in Ramat Gan’s Diamond district, which declares in large, bright orange letters “No Jerusalemites Allowed.”

You state in your letter that your organization, for which I have the greatest admiration, “has reluctantly concluded that said sign may, by denying access to a group based solely on city of origin, constitute illegal and unwarranted discrimination. While the sentiments expressed may be understandable, indeed shared by a significant portion of the Israeli population, our mandate requires us to take legal action to end all infringements of the rights of all Israeli citizens, even in those cases, as this one, in which they are richly deserved.”

Believe me, I am happy to see that the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, the watchdog of our freedoms, stands vigilantly on guard. But I am certain that if you knew the facts of the matter, you would agree with me that the sign in my window is not an infringement of human rights but rather a desperate attempt by an embattled Metropolitan Tel Aviv to survive in the face of an onslaught of medieval mores from the primitive Levantine highlands.

The incident occurred on Monday, March 21, a normal work day, although we were all still feeling the effects of our hard Saturday night Purim partying.

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Muscle and Mahler — “Necessary Stories” column from The Jerusalem Report

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Haim Watzman

illustration by Avi Katz
I was not at all surprised when I noticed Gustav Mahler sweating on the elliptic machine next to me at Talpiot’s Body & Soul gym, although I’m not sure whether I should be proud or embarrassed that I’m probably the only patron of that middle-browridge establishment who would have recognized the gentleman with the high forehead, electric hair, and wire-rimmed glasses, especially since he was wearing a track suit rather than the usual three-piecer and bowtie. He strode at quite a brisk pace, his gaze directed intently at the vista of southwest Jerusalem visible through the gym’s large windows.

What I mean to say is not that I’m so familiar with the countenances of the great composers that I could pick any one of them out of a crowd of a thousand (although I could, I certainly could), but that I half-expected to see this particular late-Romantic Austrian-Bohemian-Jewish symphonist and conductor on this particular day, a fact that I remarked to him after removing my Ipod’s left earphone.

He didn’t hear me at first, and then it seemed to take him three or four beats to tear himself away from the view of Bayit VaGan, Malha, and the hazy Vale of the Spirits that winds through the Jerusalem hills down to the House of the Sun.

“Not surprised? Why would that be?” he asked, looking me over with what I could best describe as a sharp critical eye. “I do not normally patronize this place, but the celestial health club is closed for repairs and they have sent us here in the meantime.”

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That Fickle, Freckled Faith — “Necessary Stories” column from The Jerusalem Report

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Haim Watzman

illustration by Avi Katz

Some years ago, when my family was young, I had a neighbor with very strong opinions. Strong and often different from my own. Gavriel was warm, generous, devoted to his family, humble before his God, and dedicated to his country. He died suddenly and far too young.

In the years before his death, Gavriel underwent not a spiritual awakening, for he’d grown up observant and believing, but a spiritual deepening. He spent long nights immersed in Hasidic texts and studied Talmud with a black-coated partner from the Bratislaver community. He grew sidelocks and wore longer fringes under his shirt. But he continued to serve in his IDF reserve unit long after the usual age of retirement.

At the memorial service held on the first anniversary of his death, one speaker praised Gavriel for his temimut, a Hebrew word that that, in the Bible, means “whole” and “unblemished.” In modern religious parlance it usually refers to a simple, pure piety, one that harbors no doubts. It was the right word for the occasion, for Gavriel indeed brooked none. He believed with perfect faith in God, the coming of the Messiah, in the justice of Israel’s rule over the West Bank and Gaza Strip and their Palestinian inhabitants, and in the power of his love to make his wife and children happy despite the adversities they faced. He believed these things with such fervor that, in his presence, I was often left speechless, if not convinced.

Were I myself so whole, so tamim, I would have immediately quoted to myself from Psalms 18, “I will be whole [tamim] before him, and keep myself from iniquity.” Or Deuteronomy 18, “Be whole in your faith with the Lord your God.” Or perhaps the first verse of Job: “There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job, and the man was whole and upright, and one who feared God and turned away from evil.”

But I didn’t. I thought instead of another poem, and not even one by a Jew. “Glory be to God for dappled things,” my heart sang at Gavriel’s memorial service,

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The Big Schlep — “Necessary Stories” column from The Jerusalem Report

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Haim Watzman

illustration by Avi Katz
A shamus knows he’s getting old when people ask him stupid questions. And this shamus has been getting a lot of stupid questions lately — things people ought to know without needing to have an over-the-hill private eye like me to tell them. I realized that early one Friday morning in the damp room in Old Katamon that I call my office. The rain was so heavy that even the Hasidim with the plastic bags over their homburgs didn’t dare go out. And that’s unusual for a tough neighborhood like Katamon, where everyone — and I mean everyone — is holier than thou.

I had my feet on my desk, Rabbi Menachem Meiri’s Beit HaBechira open on my lap, a half-filled highball glass in my hand, and a nearly empty bottle of really bad schnapps on the floor. The wind blew the door open and I caught sight of the shingle I’d put up when I was a young dick with an attitude. “Ahrele Andorra—Kushiyot,” it read. Hard questions. That’s what I do, hard questions. Although I’m at an age when nothing that ought to be hard is really hard anymore.

But I guess the all-seeing private investigator up in heaven saw I was getting depressed and, even worse, that if something didn’t happen I’d have to go out in the deluge to get my bottle filled. Providence works in mysterious ways. He didn’t send me something hard. He sent something soft–real soft.

Because after the door opened the next gust of wind blew in this dame. Actually, I couldn’t tell it was a dame at first because she was so wet and bundled up in sweaters, coats and scarves that she looked more like a blowfish after a haircut. But as she started peeling off layers, she revealed a figure that would have inspired Maimonides to compose a 14th article of faith.

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Ancient Teeth–What They Mean and What They Say

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Haim Watzman

Scientific papers are not generally thought of as allusive, but, as the article I wrote for Nature this week shows, intentional ambiguity is not foreign to the scientific world.

So are the eight ancient human teeth, some dated as far back as 300,000-400,000 years ago, that Avi Gopher of Tel Aviv University and his colleagues found in Qesem cave really evidence that Homo sapiens evolved here in Israel, as my friend and colleague Matthew Kalman wrote in the Daily Mail? Kalman based his story on Tel Aviv university’s press release, which Gopher vetted and by which he stands. Going out on a shorter limb, other reports in the mainstream press merely said that the discovery proves that modern humans evolved much earlier than the currently accepted 200,000 years before present.

As my article states, bloggers (such as Carl Zimmer and Brian Switek) who follow human evolution news jumped on the disparities between the press reports and the paper that Gopher et al. published in The American Journal of Physical Anthropology. The latter cautiously offers three alternative interpretations of the teeth.

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Of Feet and the Man — “Necessary Stories” column from The Jerusalem Report

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Haim Watzman

photo by Marc Render

In the valley that runs west of the Omer ridge I wrestle with my angel. Noon is approaching and I’m munching a bagel-and-cheese sandwich under a tamarisk tree with my hiking buddies at our meeting point on the most boring section of the Israel National Trail. It’s a 21-kilometer stretch that is nearly all flat; the sky is cloudless and the sun blazes despite the mid-November date. Halfway through our hike, the five of us stink to high heaven from sweat and grit.

Since we have only one car, we’ve split up. Asher and I were dropped off at the northern end of the route, while Marc drove with Gary and Yitzhak to the southern end and started there. Here under the tamarisk Marc hands Asher the keys. When we get to the end, we’ll drive Marc’s car back to pick up the others. We estimate that we have three to four hours more to walk. It’s time to get up.

I shoulder my pack and rise slowly to my feet. I mutter a curse under my breath and take a step, then another. Each step sends pain shooting through my body. My right ankle is stiff and my foot twisted so that I can only walk on the distal, outward edge. This is no surprise-it happens every time I hike. And now, I spend more time worrying about my pain than I do enjoying my hike, and this is no way to live. I knew I should’ve listened to my friend when he told me about the different CBD oil UK products that he’s been using to help with his own pain. Ever since he’s taken them, he can spend the duration of his hiking trip not worrying about his health, and now I wished I had the same experience. But for some reason, I don’t think it’s going to come anytime soon. At the age of 40, thirteen years ago, I contracted a serious illness that resulted, among other things, in the amputation of all my toes. Toelessness placed unnatural demands and pressures on muscles and joints, causing many a visit to a neck pain chiropractic center as one result was severe arthritis in my right ankle. Because of this, I tend to walk with a limp and it puts pressure on other parts of my body, which then led to back pain. This is opened a whole new can of worms for me and means that I now struggle sleeping due to the pain in my back. If you are unaware, this article on How Back Pain Affects Sleep will explain why this happens. The pain, which is most severe after a rest stop, is the price I know I will pay when I go on a hike. But, to add injury to insult, I’ve also developed a large blister on the ball of my left foot, so I can only walk on its outside edge as well.

I grit my teeth and hobble south like a cowboy with rickets.

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A Short Story Translation: Nurit Kotler’s “Next to the Traffic Signal, Under the Streetlight”

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Haim Watzman My translation of Nurit Kotler’s short story, “Next to the Traffic Signal, Under the Streetlight,” has just been posted on the Zeek website, after appearing in the Summer 2010 issue. Set in Paris, the story tells of an unscheduled and unlooked-for encounter between a nervous Israeli expatriate and an elderly Jewish man. Good … Read more

Finkelstein Contra Aljazeera

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Haim Watzman Worth reading: Israel Finkelstein’s rebuttal to Aljazeera’s propaganda film Looting the Holy Land, which accuses Israel of a systematic policy of stealing artifacts from the West Bank. Finkelstein is the Tel Aviv University archaeologist whose “late chronology” theory claims that most of the finds once attributed to the era of Kings David and … Read more