The Miracle Letters of T. Rimberg (14 page)

Day Nine:
Transcript 2

Yes, my father did hit David. I still wanted to find him. I wasn't angry at him for hitting David.

I don't think Dad hit me, but I do remember him trying that one time.

No way I would've contacted David. He's my brother only by blood.

Right, I felt closer to this Professor Lewis, who taught all of these incredible ethnographies that included magic and a lot of violence and scientific discovery. It made more sense to contact him . . . write to him. You know what I mean.

I don't really know Professor Lewis. I don't even know if he's alive anymore. But I needed to write someone who might understand.

God, yes. I can still see it, Barry, both dream and reality. And I wasn't shocked. It was completely evident that my dreams, since the very beginning in Minneapolis, contained real details of Antwerp . . . that I'd been seeing Antwerp for real. It was also clear at that point that my dreams were happening when I was awake, which was terrifying—not that I was afraid—I was horrified at how brutal, violent things were around me, things that I saw. Lurking soldiers in bars. Flemish kids crouched and eyeballing me with these cold blue eyes. I knew the outcome of Nazi warplanes shooting overhead and the Gestapo at the corner smoking and kids riding their bikes in the park. I knew what was coming. I knew it all. Professor Lewis would not have been afraid. He would've been . . . interested, would've wanted to get to the bottom of this. Cultural anthropologists have a lot of courage.

Yes, Barry, I could see stuff from the early forties and also from the fall of 2004. I could see it all simultaneously.

I didn't see the little dream girl on the street when I was awake. I didn't see my dad. Just 1940s stuff.

I would call these visions . . . Listen, Barry, call them what you want. Those in the medical profession would say I was having a psychotic break.

I didn't feel psycho. But I imagine most crazy people don't think they're crazy.

I don't think I was crazy.

I got locked up. Yup. I did a good job not reacting to things for a few days. But the park. That park. I couldn't stop myself. It was three a.m., and I wasn't asleep because my cough was getting worse. (Probably couldn't have slept even without the cough.) I was awake in my underpants, pacing around, scribbling in my notebook, when it came to me. That park. The one we walked into after the bakery? Stads Park. I understood . . . remembered (though I'd never been there, would have no way of remembering) that my father's childhood apartment was on one corner of that park. I realized I'd been dreaming of that park for six weeks. I knew exactly where the apartment was.

I don't know. I don't know. This stuff, which happens all the time to me, makes me dizzy . . . because it makes no sense and it makes complete sense, which is also why it doesn't make sense.

The doctor in Antwerp thought I was schizophrenic. At first. After we talked for a few days he didn't think so anymore.

It was quite a scene.

Journal Entry,
October 5, 2004, 3:12 a.m.

Dream park is no dream.

Light coming in from the window. You look down at the park in front of the apartment. Dark trees. The path where kids ride bikes during the day. In the corner of the park, an enormous sculpture, maybe of soldiers, bronze shining green in the streetlight. Window open, cold air, springtime, the trees with new leaves, leaves shaking because of oncoming soldiers and trucks and tanks.

The park you see from the apartment window is the park you sat in yesterday, eating a knish on a bench. It's that park.

Troops march past the park, down the street, past your apartment, and Belgians are with them, and it's not Dad, not Dad, the little girl in her broken English says it's not Dad, but someone is there in the apartment window when you recede into shadows, spotlights training the windows from the street below.

That's not Dad in the window. 1940s. He's in the apartment, with you, with the girl, cowering in the corner, shaking, crying. He's just a kid. Who is it in the window?

It's that park in your dreams. It's that street in your dreams. It's that apartment. The map says the street is Rubens Lei.

Go see it now.

Day Nine:
Transcript 3

Cranberry heard me run out of my room. I wasn't quiet about it. Yanked the door, slammed it, and took off running. Cranberry left his room across the hall from mine and tailed me onto the street. Out on the street he shouted at me. He caught up, but I wouldn't talk to him. Just ran toward the park. Cranberry chased behind, chattering God knows what.

From married father of three with a corporate job and . . . khakis . . . to jumping in the Seine . . . to racing down an Antwerp street at 3:30 in the morning, hacking out my lungs, wearing a T-shirt and underpants. Right?

(Laughs.) I don't remember the last time I really laughed. (Laughs.) Barry, I stormed the . . . I stormed my father's apartment. Poor Cranberry. Poor, poor Cranberry outside . . . hearing me screaming and glass breaking . . . (Laughs.)

You read the letters, Barry. I was sent to a nursing home after that.

Letter 39
October 10, 2004

Dearest Jack Nicholson, who won an Oscar for
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest,

I'm writing to tell you I'm like that little guy, your friend, in the movie. Except he commits suicide and I can't. I'm like him, because I need a brother, like you, to guide me, and I am, I think, really fucking nuts. I am also a magician.

Listen, Jack.

My dad lived here, in Antwerp, Belgium. It's possible I have ESP because I can see the past in the present. Also, I don't drown in rivers. I'm locked up in a damn home for old crows. I can't stop coughing. What do you think?

Dear Jack, what was your name in that movie? Randle? That might be it. I'm not like you. My name is Theodore, and I'm not pretending. I see stuff and maybe there is some genius here in my head.

Jack, I am sitting at a table in a common room in some kind of nursing home or rest home. Institutionalized, my man. And I wish the old ladies would turn down the TV so I can think. They can't understand me. The doctor just gave me a pill, but I'm not sleepy yet. I have ten minutes of consciousness and I'm going to use it.

Listen, Jack. I did something crazy. Rock star–sized crazy, which you might have done yourself, in a movie or in real life, because that's the kind of guy you are. This will sound familiar: broken glass, screaming, rock throwing. This all happened at the apartment building where my father grew up, so it wasn't a random crazy.

You weren't in World War II, were you, Jack? You're too young for that. There's some WWII stuff happening in my head and on the street and in that apartment building, which I've been dreaming for months, although I didn't know it was in Antwerp until I got in front of the apartment building and broke it wide open with a rock. The Belgians can't be pleased with me. The Jews in the building thought I was a North African terrorist, middle of the night, going to burn the place down to announce my hatred of Israel and of Jews in general.

Me? An Arab terrorist? Come on! I'm half-Jewish.

Okay, I'm getting sleepy. Here's what you need to know: I am in a rest home (a nursing home?) and I am resting my aching head and lungs. I am not free to go.

I'm surrounded by ancient crow women in bathrobes with no teeth who scream at me bloody murder in French and Flemish. They howl, Jack. And I tell them, “I can't help you. I'm an American. I have my own problems. Please watch TV.” And the old women howl.

Why am I in a nursing home? I am criminally insane, I think. Like you pretended to be in the movie. You got shock treatment, right? Not me. Not yet. They shouldn't put me with all of these howling old women, though. What if I pick them up from their wheelchairs and throw them out the window? (I wouldn't do such a thing . . . our mother is in a home, Jack, just like this one, except in English—but how would the authorities know that if they think I'm criminally insane?) I should be in jail or in a serious mental institution with my brother (you!) and a tall Indian and we should play some basketball.

Not that I'm complaining. I don't want to be in a serious mental institution.

There was a police station at the beginning and a jail cell for a short time (I slept there for a couple of hours, bled a little on my shirt). But by noon the next day I was brought here, to this gravy-smelling, carpeted place, and was told to sleep, which seems very nice, considering I shattered the glass on that apartment building door, my dad's old apartment building, by throwing a large rock, considering how I wrenched open the door by reaching through broken glass for the handle and then sprinted through the lobby, bleeding, alarms blaring, then took an elevator up to the fifth floor and knew which one was THE apartment, DAD's apartment. I pounded on its door, shouted, “Open up,” then tried to break down the door, while Cranberry screamed on the street for me to stop, cries getting more and more plaintive, and then other people screamed in other apartments and especially in the apartment where I pounded. And while I operated in present time, the 1940s tanks were rolling, the sirens blaring, gunshots up the street ricocheting, echoing, cracking in my ears.

This is not appropriate behavior. I should be jailed.

This behavior, however, seemed completely rational at the time (I needed to see if my dreams were true), and I remember the break-in perfectly. It confounds the doctor who visits me each day that I seem so rational. I remember thinking while trying to get in the apartment, “The people who live here won't open up with me screaming and bleeding like this. Better break down the door to get a look inside.”

A look at what?

Jack Nicholson, get this: This apartment is THE apartment where my dead dad and his brother Solly grew up, at least until the war (WWII). I know this now to be true and fully believed, no, KNEW it to be true when I did my crime . . . though it was unconfirmed by outside sources, only the voices in my head, which are just thoughts, my thoughts. The owners of the apartment confirmed the fact for me when I was arrested, told Cranberry to tell me I got the right apartment—it was owned by a Rimberg—but went about contacting them in the WRONG way. Please tell him not to come back, they said to Cranberry, referring to me. I can't blame them.

And so I'm locked in a nursing home, without other men with whom to organize basketball games and fishing trips. I'm not going anywhere, Jack.

And with sedation there are no dreams, not even when I'm awake. And everything is getting dull and soft now. I like that. And I speak with a doctor who has a soft voice and a Flemish accent, and he scribbles notes and nods at me. He wants to see the notebooks I carry in my backpack. I tell him I will show them to him when I am more comfortable. I tell him that I'm writing a memoir and it's no big thing. He believes me and we are making progress. He, of course, will never see these notebooks. They are incriminating, Jack.

I have to take a nap.

Day Nine:
Transcript 4

Why
wouldn't
I write to Jack Nicholson?

I barely remember writing that letter.

Drugged up.

No, I wasn't scared in the home. Actually felt good there.

The doctor didn't ride me or push me. We had good talks. He asked a lot of the same questions you ask.

Do you have bad dreams? What's in your dreams? Do you have violent dreams? Do you know who you are, where you're from? Do you abuse substances? Do you think about God a lot?

I didn't tell him anything real—nothing about dreams or suicide or Nazis. I told him about my divorce and coming to Antwerp to find my father and how it had been a rough year. But I didn't tell him any of the story as it actually happened.

Well, I wouldn't have given you anything either, but you got to my backpack, Barry, to my notebooks.

You know . . . really that isn't true. I gave up the fight before I got to Green Bay. I probably would've told you.

The accident changed me, yes. But really, by the time I got here I was already changed.

Well, I'm not paranoid like I was in Antwerp, for one thing.

Maybe it wasn't paranoia—could've been rational. When I was in Antwerp, I knew anything I'd say about anything that was happening in my head or in my line of sight would sound delusional. I mean, I didn't even tell Cranberry about the dreams or visions . . . hallucinations is what a doctor would call them. Because I was fully aware I would sound ill . . . and I didn't want anyone telling me this intense stuff was just the product of my . . .

I don't think so, like I said. But I still wonder. We both wonder, don't we?

I don't blame you, Barry. I could have a mental illness. I might be crazy and also incredibly lucky . . . wildly, insanely, incredibly lucky, and I might float really well. That could be my whole deal. This whole deal, including the accident—it could just be a combination of crazy and lucky.

The doctor didn't think I was crazy. We went to work. We talked about my failed marriage, how I failed in it. He told me that love is an action, not a feeling. And if I love someone, I had better act on that or love is meaningless. That's right up my alley, that kind of talk. That sounded smart. If you love, you act on it.

After a week of seeing me, the doctor thought I'd been sleep deprived, that's all. And stressed out, I guess.

You really think so?
Totally
delusional? Why?

Uncle Charley?

I guess it's strange I wrote him. But I watched a lot of
My Three Sons
in the early eighties. Uncle Charley made me feel safe.

Big shocks coming, yes.

Letter 40
October 11, 2004

Dear Uncle Charley,

You know what, old man? I haven't seen my uncle Solly in so long, I realize I've begun to think Solly looks like you (whoever you are who played Uncle Charley on
My Three Sons,
which I watched on WGN). My uncle Solly is a jackass, I believe. You, Uncle Charley, were kind of a jackass on that show, gruff, grunty old man. But at least you had a tender heart, a heart of gold, and you wore an apron and cooked food for poor vulnerable Ernie, who was an orphan or something and who wore big nerd glasses and was sad, and who I totally identified with.

I have family news, Uncle. You should make some brisket. We should sit down at the kitchen table and talk.

It is Monday. The Yiddish weekly came out today. And I made the papers! You must be very proud. Kaatje and Cranberry hurried over here to the home to show me this paper, which I appreciate. Those two are good kids, though they don't know the value of money.

They were on their way to lunch, to a Vietnamese restaurant they've grown to love (oh do they talk about this restaurant), minding their own business, when they saw the Yiddish newspaper on a stand outside a Jewish paper shop. Big headline!RIMBERG in big big letters on the front page of a paper filled almost entirely with Hebrew characters! So instead of eating at the Vietnamese restaurant (on my dime for the third time in three days), they bought the paper (with my money) and ran over here to the rest home to show me. It really is impressive, too, this headline. It ends in an exclamation, Uncle Charley. It says something like:

RIMBERG GSCHFINCTER!

Problem: none of us can read Yiddish. Certainly I can't and Kaatje—who left her job to help me and Cranberry negotiate this foreign place, which is very sweet of her (although a little pricey for me)—can't read Yiddish, although she was perfectly sure she could read Yiddish the other day, before she was asked to read it. The article is certainly about me, though. It refers to me, Theodore Rimberg, by name. And more interestingly, it lists four other Rimberg names in roman characters: Sol Rimberg, Josef Rimberg, Aida Rimberg, Laurence Rimberg. Uncle, Father, Grandmother, Grandfather, I think, though I don't know the last two names. We know Solly and Josef, don't we?

The only Rimberg not mentioned is dear brother David, who broke his contract and was asked to leave the show. So sorry, David! Persona non grata. Bet he wishes he hadn't been such a pain to work with! Hindsight.

Because we could not read the Yiddish newspaper, Kaatje and Cranberry ran off with the copy they brought to me, and they're going to go to the train station where they are hoping to find some English-speaking Hasid to translate the article for them. I don't think they'll have any problem doing so. There are English-speaking Hasids on every corner in that neighborhood. I thought they should contact the newspaper and ask for an English translation. (This is the advice you would've given too, Uncle Charley, while you listened to our problems and served us dinner in your apron.) Kaatje thought that would take too long. Why go make phone calls when the streets are filled with English-speaking Hasids? That's fair. She's a smart girl. Let her take care of this business.

In other news, Dear Uncle: I'm not exactly a prisoner.

When Cranberry was leaving a couple of moments ago he whispered, “You look better. You feeling better?”

I said, “I've never felt better. Sleep is important.”

He said, then, “You can come with us . . . I mean you have to come back here in a couple of hours . . . but we could take you with us right now if you want.”

Kaatje heard him say this to me, though she was away at the front desk, speaking to the fat cow that sits there, asking for the quickest route to get to the train station. Kaatje has good ears. She shot Cranberry angry eyes. She shook her head, no.

“No thank you,” I said. “I'm not going anyplace but back to bed.”

I'm not stupid, Uncle Charley. I don't want to go out on those streets. I appreciate the little white pills that keep me sleeping through the night. I like my bed and the couches. Truth is, I'm scared shitless to leave this place. I'm certainly not ready for the mean streets of the Shtetl, and I don't want to see any more Nazis. I am not interested in that.

I am, however, interested to find out what's so big about me that I should make the newspaper! I suppose it's an account of my criminal behavior. But why the fat headline?

I am also interested in taking a nap. When I wake up, we might know more.

Will report, good Uncle. You can count on that. I'll come downstairs and you'll have baked some cookies and we'll have a chat.

T.