Stanley Elkin - The Rabbi of Lud

“And I didn’t get out of the water right away.”

“No.”

“I went for my swim.”

“Your swim.”

“Fortunately, I’d been able to look around from the trestle just before I dived.”

“I see.”

“I’d spotted some wild strawberry bushes not far from where I’d left my shoes and socks. Though the bush in which I’d actually hidden my stuff was a lingonberry. I’m not partial to lingonberries. Too acidic.

“But even if there hadn’t been those strawberries there’d have been plenty of other good things to eat. There were crab apples and plums and, near the poison ivy, a strain of breadfruit I’m rather fond of. There was iceberg, romaine, and good Bibb lettuce.

“So it wasn’t any hardship for me to live off the land. What with the strawberries and the breadfruit and the fish I fried up, it was quite a grand lunch.”

“You caught a fish?”

“Well,” he said, “while I was on the trestle I happened to notice a kind of soil particularly hospitable to bait. I just dug down into it, carefully chose a worm—”

“Carefully chose?”

“—for texture, for color, I’d seen these perch—”

“Go on.”

“—and fitted it to its hook like a stitch in crochet.”

“Then what happened?”

He shrugged. “Nothing much,” he said. “That’s about it. I finished my lunch and dreamt I took a nap beside this weeping willow.”

“Well, well,” I told him, “that was quite a dream. You went for a walk, figured out clouds, had an adventure on a railroad trestle, observed nature, took a swim, went berry picking, fishing, prepared a first-rate lunch for yourself, and caught forty winks in the shade of the old weeping willow.”

“Yes,” he said.

“You did all that.”

“That’s right,” he said. “Yes.”

“What’s wrong? Is anything wrong? Why are you crying?”

“In my dream,” he said, “in my dream I was napping. Not dreaming a dream, only dreaming my nap.”

“Yes?”

“Dreaming sleep.”

“Yes? Dreaming sleep? Yes?”

“Dreaming the darkness. Dreaming the dark.”

“Oh,” I said, “oh.”

“So I didn’t know when I woke up.”

“Oh,” I said, “oh,”

“Because I’m without sight,” he said. “Because I’m without sight and couldn’t tell if it was the satisfied comfort of fulfilled coze and snug or only the dark, ordinary blackness of the blind.”

“Oh, Edward,” I said.

“So I had to try to turn my head.”

“Oh, Edward. Oh, Eddy,” I said, and didn’t bother to echo his words this time or ask him questions. Because I was no longer interested — this is my rabbi mode now — in playing straight man, in feeding him lines, my faked incredulity and poised astonishment. It was too awful. He was making me uncomfortable. Because this is just ballast I do, only the dappered-up charm of my phony accommodation, ingenuous as a host on a talk show egging on a naive guest. Maybe, awash in my agog wonder, by playing to reason, I could make out I was playing to God.

“Or grab the safety rails of my raised hospital sides. I had to. To see if I’d throw up. To see if those liquids in my inner ear would move. And start the long rinse-and-tumble cycles of my spinning day. Help my father,” he growled suddenly, his sightless, bobbing, handsome head loose on his neck as he sought a kind of random, flailing contact with me. “Work for Charney,” he urged, “work for Klein. Help my father, help my brother. Help my mother and sisters put together an estate that will help me keep body and soul together after they’re gone. Please, Rabbi,” he pleaded, “provide, provide!”

I got word my friend died and, when Connie came by for Stan Bloom’s Get-Well-Soon prayers, I had to tell her it had been called off.

“He died?” Connie said. “Stan Bloom died?”

“We’ll pray,” I said, “for the repose of his spirit.”

“He died?”

“Hey, Connie,” I said, “it happens. People die. It’s a fact of life.”

I began the El moley rachamim.

“El moley rachamim,” I prayed, “shochen bamromim, hamtzeh, menucho, nechon al kanfey hashchino, bemaalos k’doshim ut’horim kezohar horokeea mazirim, es nishmas Stanley Bloom sheholoch leolomoh, baavur shenodvoo z’dokoh b’ad hazkoras nishmosoh. B’gan eden t’hay M’nochosoh. Locheyn baal horachmim yastireyo beseser k’nofov leolomim—”

“He died?” she said. “Stan Bloom died?”

“—ve’itzror bitzror hachayim es nishmosoh—”

“Stan Bloom,” she said, “Stan Bloom died?”

“Connie,” I said, “hey, I’m praying here.”

“He died?”

“What’s all this about then?” I said, a little angry now, a little steamed. “He was my friend. You never even met him.”

“He’s dead?”

“Hey, kid, I gave it my best shot. You were right there beside me, you heard me. Weren’t you? Didn’t you hear me? The lengths I went to. All wheedle one minute, all smart-ass, up-front I/Thou confrontationals the next. Jesus, kid, I’m a licensed, documented rabbi. I was taking my life in my hands there.”

“He’s dead? Stan Bloom’s dead?”

“Prayer’s like any other treatment, Connie darling. Unless you catch it early enough … Al Harry didn’t even tell us about Stan Bloom until he was already down for the count!”

“You said you could pray him back to health. You said … Oh, Daddy, ‘down for the count’! I get it. Oh, that’s so grisly!”

“Come on, Connie,” I said.

“I hate it here,” she said. “I hate looking out my bedroom window and seeing all those dead people.”

“You don’t see dead people. Why do you say you see dead people? You see markers. You see a few markers. It’s like seeing a sign on the corner with the name of the street written on it. Why do you say you see dead people? If we lived on Jefferson Street and outside your window you saw the sign on the corner, would you say you saw Jefferson? Would you tell me you saw Elm or River or Michigan or Maple? Be a little reasonable, why don’t you? You see a few markers here and there in a field. Don’t say you see dead people.”

“I hate it here, I do, I hate it here, I hate it!” she said over and over with her hands on her ears to drown out my objections.

“Connie,” I said, holding her, stroking her hair. “Connie Connie Connie.”

“I hate it! I hate it! I hate it here, I hate it! I hate it!”

“Connie Connie Connie. Connie Connie Connie. Connie Connie Connie,” I told my child.

“Please,” she sobbed. “Please?”

“What, sweetheart? Please what?”

“Let’s go away. Let’s go away from here.”

“Leave our home?”

“Daddy, our back yard is a cemetery !”

“It’s beautifully landscaped.”

“It’s perpetual care!”

“Kids these days. I tell you, you can’t put a thing past ’em.”

“Stop joking me! I’m not a tough customer!”

“Can’t you tell I’m teasing? Maybe I was giving you a little more credit than you deserve.”

“I’m a little girl. Smoke rises from some of the chimneys here even in summer! You smell flowers all year round. Even out of season you smell flowers, even in winter! Everyone is always all dressed up! The florist and the man in the dry cleaner’s. The barber wears a suit and tie, the man who drives the wrecker! I’m only fourteen years old. I shouldn’t have to live around all this goddamn death!”

“It’s all right to let me know what’s on your mind once in a while,” I said, “even if you talk back, but don’t you ever say ‘goddamn’ to your father. I’m a rabbi, young lady, and don’t you forget it!”