Authors: Meir Shalev
Two She-Bears (7 page)
So that's it. It took me a while to understand it. It took me a while to see how much alike they were, my grandfather and my man, and the layers they uncovered in each other. But when I understood, I understood it all: that Eitan got down to the soft layers of Grandpa Ze'ev, under his armor and flinty exterior, and Grandpa Ze'ev got down to the hard granite layers of Eitan, under his weightless, radiant wings, and maybe they also discovered a common darkness in each other. Whatever. Even though they were two generations apart, they had a friendship that all men want and few men have. That friendship is what saved Eitan after Neta died.
THE MAGNIFICENT OX, THE WAGON, AND THE MULBERRY
A Story for Neta Tavori by His Mother
Once upon a time, in a little house in a faraway moshava, at the foot of a big mountainâlived a little boy named Grandpa Ze'ev. When he reached the age of four, Grandpa Ze'ev got a very special gift from his parents.
“Happy birthday, Grandpa Ze'ev,” they said. “We brought you a small sapling of a mulberry tree. You will water it and fertilize it, and one day when it will be a big tree, you will sit in its shade and eat its fruit.”
Grandpa Ze'ev loved his little mulberry tree very much. He didn't understand much about its shade and fruit, but he was the son of farmers and he already knew how to water and spread fertilizer.
Two years passed. Grandpa Ze'ev and his mulberry tree grew, and one day his parents sewed him a canvas bag, bought him a notebook and a pencil, and said, “The time has come to go to school, to learn arithmetic and the alphabet.”
The next day Grandpa Ze'ev got up early, took the bag, and went to school.
On the road were many other children.
This is a new student,
And this is an older student.
This one has books tied with rope,
And that one with books in a bag.
This one rode on a donkey and that one on a bicycle.
This one went on foot and that one was carried on someone's shoulders.
Some walked slowly, some walked fast.
Some went in a group, others by themselves.
And Grandpa Ze'ev went with his mother,
And thought about his mulberry tree.
“Hello, first graders,” said the teacher. “I am your teacher, and I will teach you addition and subtraction and reading and writing.”
All the students sat and learned: letters and vowels, numbers, plus signs and minus signs, and Grandpa Ze'ev just sat and thought how much he missed his mulberry tree.
“Maybe it misses me too? Because when it's not with me, then I'm not with it.”
“Maybe it's thirsty and needs to be watered?”
“Maybe it'll think that I went away, and it'll give someone else its shade and fruit?”
And “What luck that it's a tree and can't move from its place.”
The next morning Grandpa Ze'ev said to his parents, “I don't want to go to school.”
“Why, Grandpa Ze'ev?” they asked.
“Because I'm not learning. I'm just sitting in the classroom all day and missing my mulberry tree.”
Mother and Dad said, “This is really not okay, Grandpa Ze'ev. It's really important to learn!”
They sat and sat and thought and thought, and finally they said, “We know what to do!”
They took a big old wagon and built four walls on it.
“What are you doing?” asked Grandpa Ze'ev.
“Soon you'll understand,” they said.
And they spread a layer of good soil on the wagon floor and added some cow manure to it.
“What are you doing?” asked Grandpa Ze'ev.
“Soon you'll understand,” they said.
And they took a hoe and a pitchfork and a pickax and dug a very deep hole around the mulberry tree.
“What are you doing?” asked Grandpa Ze'ev.
“Soon you'll understand,” they said.
They set up a scaffold of long thick wooden beams over the mulberry tree, attached an iron pulley to it, and ran a very strong rope over the pulley.
“And now,” they said, “go bring our big ox, who plows the field.”
Grandpa Ze'ev's mother and dad held on to the rope, tying one end to the horns of the big ox and the other end to the trunk of the mulberry tree.
“Giddyap, big ox,” they said, “slowly and carefully.”
“What's he doing?” asked Grandpa Ze'ev.
“Soon you'll understand,” said Mother and Dad and the ox and the mulberry tree.
The big ox tugged hard, the heavy rope stretched tight, the iron pulley groaned, and the mulberry tree went up in the air with a huge hunk of earth stuck to its roots.
Grandpa Ze'ev was frightened. “Go slow! Be careful! So it won't get hurt!”
“Not slow! Faster, faster!” the mulberry tree cried out. “You think this is fun for me? Hanging in the air with my roots showing?”
Mother and Dad told the big ox to move back a little, guided the mulberry tree down into the wagon, added dirt until its roots were all covered, and watered it until the water dripped all around the wagon, and the mulberry tree said, “Stop, enough. It's good.”
“Now do you understand, Grandpa Ze'ev?” asked his mother and dad. “Tomorrow you won't have to say goodbye to your mulberry tree. You'll ride to school together in the wagon.”
The next morning Grandpa Ze'ev hitched the big ox to the wagon, climbed up and sat inside next to the mulberry tree, took hold of the reins, said “Goodbye” to his father and mother and “Giddyap” to the big ox.
The big ox pulled out of the yard into the road.
In the road were many children, all on their way to school:
This one riding on a donkey, that one on a bicycle.
This one went on foot and that one was carried on someone's shoulders.
Some walked slowly, some walked fast,
Some went in a group, others by themselves,
And Grandpa Ze'ev rode in a wagon hitched to an ox, with a mulberry tree planted inside.
When they arrived at the schoolyard Grandpa Ze'ev parked the big ox outside, went into the classroom, and sat by the window. All day long he learned songs and stories and numbers and letters, vowels and plus and minus signs, and all day long he was a very good student.
But when the teacher wasn't looking, he smiled through the window at the mulberry tree, and when the big ox closed his eyes and yawnedâbecause oxen get bored more than any other animalsâhe reached out the window and petted him on the nose and whispered, “Don't fall asleep, big ox, it's very important to learn.”
During the lunch break Grandpa Ze'ev ate pita with cheese and olives, because that's what he liked to eat.
And he gave hay to the big ox, because that's what big oxen like to eat.
And the manure that the big ox made after the meal he buried in the soil of the mulberry tree, because that's what trees like to eat.
And at the end of the school day he got into his wagon and sat under the mulberry tree and said to the big ox “Giddyap!” and went home.
That's what they did day after day.
Grandpa Ze'ev studied well and got a good grade,
And the mulberry grew and gave fruit and shade.
And from lots of petting and lots of hay,
The big ox grew bigger in a magnificent way.
And he wasn't just any magnificent oxâhe was the most magnificent of them all.
He didn't fall asleep in class and listened to the teachers and learned all the letters and knew all the numbers.
He was Grandpa Ze'ev's ox, and Grandpa Ze'ev loved him more than all the other oxen in the world.
I remember: A summer evening, a messy bed, his left hand under my head, and his right hand embracing me, or the other way around, you decide which way you prefer, and I am reading him Bialik's poem “Take Me Under Your Wing.” You find that funny? That was a routine of ours. Eitan had quite a few holes in his education, and I helped him fill them. I read to him, I showed him works of art, and something funny happened. Eitan, who cut all his literature classes in high school, suddenly took a shine to that Bialik poem, especially the line “And be for me a mother and a sister.” It's interesting, and I tell you this as a teacher, it's interesting what turns on someone like Eitan, who was never interested in art or poetry or literature. For whatever reason it was the simple words “be for me” that he picked up with such enthusiasm.
“You mean,” he said, “that was in there when they taught us Bialik in high school?”
“Yes.”
“Can't be. You added it now.”
Our literature lessons took place in bed, of courseâ“The two of us, you and me,” he would say in English, “the two of us and Bialik, naked in bed.” But I read him other poets too. “I like Alterman,” he said, “because of the
eh
sound he uses so muchâand also Yona Wallach. Her I'd also like to meet,” he said. But we were talking about Bialik and his “be for me” that Eitan fixated on and made his own and would say to me at every opportunity with different meanings; instead of “tell me,” “talk to me,” “hug” or “kiss” or “caress me,” or “touch me”âhe would say “be for me.” I'm not sure that's what Bialik had in mind, but for us “be for me” meant make me feel good, in body and soul and heart. Be for me, wash me, comb my curls or tie me up, do as you wish with me. Show that you love me, that you understand my love, and explain slowly and in detail exactly what you understand, and that we have our “together,”
yahdav,
not just an individual man and woman, but be for me and I will be for you, not just an imperative and in the future, but also now, in the present tense. You are now for me; I am now for you. The word “love” in Hebrew,
ahava,
is very close to Yehovah, the name of God. He said that to me one day, and it surprised me. I see in your eyes, Varda, that something is getting through the gates of gender. I am a veteran teacher, and I know that look of understanding.
I remember: One day I showed him three paintings of women. The
Mona Lisa,
Botticelli's
Venus,
the Maja by Goya. Actually four:
The Naked Maja
and
The
Clothed Maja.
He glanced at them and said, “Art doesn't interest me.”
I said, “Who's talking about art, Eitan? Look at them like a man looks at a woman. Whom would you go to bed with? Whom would you go to a party with?”
About the
Mona Lisa
he said, “This one is surely considered beautiful, but she isn't radiant. She's one of those beauties who leaves you cold.”
About Botticelli's
Venus:
“Her head is beautiful, but her legs are sad.”
On Goya's Maja: “Sexy ugly. Butt-faced but beats the others hands down. She's the sun in sheets, shining in her bed. The naked one and the clothed one too. It's interesting which one he painted first and which next. What did he say after the first painting: âTake your clothes off' or âGet dressed'?”
“But all this art of yours,” he concluded, “can't compare with the beauty of a Wonderful pomegranate, lying open on a white plate in the sunshine.”
“You're right about the type of pomegranate,” I said, “but not cut open on a white plate but pomegranate seeds in a silver cup, and not in the sun but between sun and shadow.”
“Whatever you say,” he said. “You know best. I'll be beautiful and quiet.”
I laughed. “You just don't get whose beauty I'm talking about, ignoramus that you are.”
I already told you: he didn't read much; he wasn't a man to talk to about a good book or take to a play or museum. But he had this aura, and people were drawn to him like moths to a flame, and unlike those unfortunate moths, no one was burned in his good fire. And if you ask me, Eitan's whole story is a story of fire. Light, and heat, and dying down, and cold ashes, and catching fire again. Whatever. Don't get the impression that all day long I tried to teach him poetry and art. Most of the time it was his usual nonsense. His imitations and surprises and performances. Dovik and I also like to do imitations, but we imitate people, and Eitan would also imitate animals, not just the sounds, primarily movements and facial expressions, and also inanimate objects: “I will now impersonate a desk that chicken soup was spilled on.” Or “This is the face of a border collie that failed its truck-driving test.”
Sometimes he would hug me and hold me close and squeeze me and inform me that he was imitating a
Clematis flammula,
a type of climbing vine that I love, with a thousand tiny white fragrant wildflowers. We, by the way, are one of the few plant nurseries in Israel that sells them. Grandpa Ze'ev brought the seeds from the Galilee, from someplace near Hurfeish, and every summer, when all the wildflowers are already dead, in the dry period between the last of the
Agrostemma
and the first squill, it's the only one that blooms. It's a little hot for it here, but somehow it manages. In the days when Neta was still alive and Eitan was still my first husband, we would drive to the Galilee to see and smell it, and I always said to it: “You sweet and beautiful and relaxed thing, you clinging clutching clematis.”
He was that way too, clinging and beautiful and holding tight, telling me over and over “be for me,” and I would have to guess what he wanted me to be or do for him now. And if I would guess right away, he would say, “You don't have to hit the target, Ruta; I also love it when you miss and try again.”
My whole body would melt. All of me would pool to a single place. A small sea under the diaphragm and the rest of the body was dry land. I have a small anatomical anomaly: another brain, which is not inside the head but for some reason under the diaphragm.
I remember: One day he announced he had decided to set up a petting zoo. I thought he intended to bring a few little goats and bunny rabbits to divert the children of customers at the nursery, but that night I found the sign: a little note attached to a matchstick that he stuck in his belly button like a flag, with the words
PETTING CORNER
, 5
SHEKELS
and a drawing of an arrow. Pointing guess where.
That's a very charming story, Ruta, but perhaps we can return to the topic that brought me to you?
The whole moshava heard me laughing because of that petting corner, including my sister-in-law Dalia, who doubtless doubled over with envy, and including Dovik, who pretended to be asleep but couldn't hold back and smiled. How do I know? I know. I have many ways to know. Either I see or I hear or I assume or I imagine or I remember.
That's how it goes. Once in a while voices emanate from our yard that the whole moshava can hear. Sometimes shouts, sometimes roars of rage, and there were also gunshots, sometimes weeping and shrieking, but also wailing and moans of passion and sounds of laughter. From the day Eitan arrived until the disaster, lots of laughter.
He was great not only for the family but for our plant nursery. Dovik is good with numbers and accounting and bargaining with suppliers and dealing with municipalities and regional councils, so Eitan took on the job of rustling up private customers. And an interesting thing happened: you know how a handyman puts a magnet in a drawer, so all the screws and nuts and little nails will stick to it and not get lost? That's how Eitan was with us. No sooner did he arrive than a whole little group formed around him.
You think I mean women? For God's sake, get away from gender already. I already told you: a group of men was drawn to him. Every one of them a male. Customers, neighbors, friends: a whole kindergarten of men. Women, she saysâ¦women are passé, Varda. What men really want are other men. That's what they lack. True friendship, real friends. What most women have a surplus of, they have a deficit, and that deficit is the basis of everything for them.
To cut it short, Eitan set up a pair of
poikehs
under Grandpa Ze'ev's big mulberry tree, and the men began to gather round. You don't need to write down the word
poikeh,
it's a kind of heavy pot with little feet that stand in a fire. He lit a campfire, burned coals, cooked up and dished out his meat stew to customers. A wonderful period began: “The jug of beer shall not run dry nor shall the
poikeh
of beef be empty,” and our customers were spending huge amounts of money just because Eitan handed them a plastic bowl and plastic spoon and let them dig into the
poikeh
for a piece of meat and a potato with gravy and a slice of white bread for dipping, and they could sit together, to eat and drink and talk and look at his eternal flame. A fire was always burning here. Because of the cooking and also because men are attracted not only to one another but to fire. Not necessarily because they're drawn to danger, but simply to fire itself. This is why the woman of the caveman tended the fire in the cave with such devotion, so he would want to return, and when he returned he would sit around it with other men who returned, sniff the embers, add twigs to the flame, keep busy with the fire and with each other, and not go out and pick fights with woolly mammoths and bears and other cavemen and do stupid things.
To make a long story short, soon enough all the supervisors of gardening and landscaping from municipalities and regional councils in the north and center of the country, who constituted most of our business and our profits, stopped inviting Dovik to their offices and started coming to us to sit and eat under the mulberry tree. And when the childrenâDovik and Dalia's twins, Dafna and Dorit, and our son, Netaâgot a bit older, they would come straight from kindergarten or school to the nursery instead of the house, and every school day would end the same way: Dalia would still be at work at the regional council, I would still be at my work at school, Dovik in the office of the nursery, and Eitan in the nursery itself, telling customers to wait a minute, giving each child a big ladleful from the
poikeh,
making sure they ate it all up, and sitting them down to do their homework at one of the garden tables we sell here.
I remember: If they didn't understand something, he would shout out to the whole plant nursery, “Is there someone here who finished high school? You? You have patience for kids? Sit with them a minute, please, and help them with their homework.” And if they brought school friends with them, after one of Eitan's meals they didn't want to eat whatever their mothers had made for them, and soon enough we had a day-care center here. Day care for kids of forty and fifty and kids of five and six. You know what? Maybe on second thought you should write the word
poikeh
in your notebook, because if there were more
poikehs
like this in your history of the Yishuv, all that Zionism would look a lot better.
