New Life, New Land

by Roberta Kagan

  Dovid looked up from his plate and smiled at her. Then he winked. “We’ll make a day of it. The game starts at one. We’ll leave early and take the bus over to Taylor Street. I know this little Italian restaurant that has the most delicious Italian beef sandwiches. After lunch we can all hop on a bus back to the stadium.”

  She smiled at him. “I think you’re right, Dovid, it’s going to be a great day. I think I’ll love the Italian beef and the hockey.”

  “I know you will,” he said and began eating his meal.

  For a few minutes she watched him. How handsome he was in her eyes, even though he was more than ten years her senior. She was proud that he was her husband. Dovid had adjusted so well to life in America. And now, because of his friends, she was feeling better about being there in the U.S.

  Eidel had something she had to tell him and she was afraid he would be angry or disappointed in her. However, there was no getting around it, she had to tell him. She steeled herself before she spoke.

  “Dovid?” she said, her voice a little above a whisper.

  “Yes, love?” he said, putting down his fork and looking into her eyes.

  She looked away.

  “I have something to tell you. I hope you won’t be mad.”

  Dovid wiped his lips with the napkin. “Mad? Why? What is it Eidel?”

  “Oh Dovid…”

  She was wringing a dishtowel in her hands. He looked at her with genuine concern. Then she continued speaking. “I don’t know how it happened. We were so careful. I know you said you wanted to wait until we had a house. I am sorry; it’s probably all my fault. I am sure that there must have been something I should have done to prevent it better. I didn’t have any prior experience, so I didn’t know what to do. Please, Dovid, don’t be mad….”

  “Eidel? Are you trying to tell me what I think you are trying to tell me?”

  “I’m pregnant. I am sorry, Dovi.”

  “Don’t be sorry,” he said and got up from the table, his napkin falling to the floor. Dovid lifted her in his arms.

  “It’s maybe a little bit sooner than we originally wanted but what a mitzvah. Thanks be to God! I will go to the shul and give a donation tomorrow in thanks for this great blessing. Oh, my darling, how can I be mad? After all, we have been touched by God. You and I are going to have a child.” He kissed her all over her face. She was crying tears of joy.

  “I’m so glad you’re happy about it. I want a child, Dovid. I want one more than I can ever tell you. I was just afraid that you would be upset because it happened before we had a house. But when I look at poor Ida and I know she can never have children my heart breaks. The bond between a mother and child is the deepest bond any woman can ever have. Thank you for being happy about this.”

  “The bond between a father and his children is also a great gift. Thank you for being the mother of my future children. I love you, Eidel.” He whispered into her ear, “Oh, and by the way, since you gave me my Hanukkah gift early, which of course is this wonderful blessing of a precious little life growing inside of you…” He leaned over and gently caressed her belly.

  “Let me give you your gift early, too.”

  Dovid took the box with the hair clip out of the breast pocket of his shirt and laid it on the table.

  “Open it,” he said.

  Eidel opened the box and looked at the beautiful piece of jewelry. Tears filled her eyes.

  “Do you like it?” Dovid asked.

  “I love it,” Eidel said, holding the box to her chest. “Dovid … do you like my gift?”

  “A child, a blessing, nu? What’s not to love? Of course, I am very happy. God bless you, my sweet darling. I am going to be a father!” Then he carried her into the bedroom and made tender love to her.

  CHAPTER NINE

  The winter was cold and unforgiving. Scraping the ice off of the car in the morning and shoveling the walk when he couldn’t find anyone to pay to do it was taking its toll on Arnie Glassman. By the time Arnie arrived at work he was red-faced, out of breath, and exhausted. He began to come in late because he would wait until he could find a boy on his way to school and offer to pay him to shovel the snow. When he tried to do it himself, he got chest pain and was unable to breathe.

  Arnie had no children and his wife had passed away several years ago. His work was all that was left. Arnie’s father had come from Romania, a poor immigrant who raised himself to the status of a five-star vendor in the South Water market, selling fruit and vegetables. Unlike most of Arnie’s peers, Arnie’s family had plenty of money. Because his mother had died in childbirth and his father had never been able to bring himself to remarry, Arnie was an only child.

  His father adored his son and wanted a better life for him than getting up early every morning and working at the market. He wanted Arnie to have an education. After all, that was why William Glassman, better known as Willie, had come to America. He yearned to escape the poverty of Europe. He longed for his son to be an educated and important man. This was an opportunity Willie would have relished had it ever been presented to him. However, the only option Willie had was to steal away from Europe on a voyage to the U.S. and when he got the chance to do so, Willie didn’t hesitate.

  He met Arnie’s mother on the ship and fell instantly in love with the beautiful, spirited young girl. She was very young and traveling with her sister. Their parents had spent every penny they had to send their two daughters to America, where the streets were lined with gold. Bessie and her sister, Fannie were both beautiful girls but in Willie’s mind, Bessie was the prettier one. He was smitten as soon as he saw her.

  Willie was bold. He knew that all he had was three dollars in his pocket, but he vowed to her that if she married him he would give her a good life and someday she would be a wealthy woman. He too, was very young but still older than her by five years. Bessie liked his confidence. He was confident almost to the point of arrogance and it amused her. She also liked his handsome strong jawline and deep-set eyes.

  Willie and Bessie were married as soon as they both passed through Ellis Island. Fannie had nowhere to go, so Bessie insisted that her sister live with her and Willie. Willie didn’t mind. He was happy to indulge his beautiful wife. He worked long hours in a physically demanding job, but he was young and he was tireless; perhaps that was where Arnie inherited his own work ethic. With the help a few good business breaks, Willie made good on his promise.

  Bessie was a wealthy woman by the time she got pregnant with Arnie. Willie hired women in the neighborhood to help his wife during her pregnancy. This was a luxury few women of their class could afford. However, women died in childbirth all the time and Willie was worried because Bessie was a tiny, delicate girl. He wanted to make sure she had whatever she needed to make the pregnancy easier on her. Then Fannie met a man, got married, and moved to New York. It devastated Bessie to have her sister so far away during her pregnancy. Willie promised that as soon as the baby was born they would travel to visit her sister. This seemed to pacify Bessie. When Arnie was born with the help of the local midwife, Willie was overcome with joy. His first child…a son! They named the boy for Willie’s grandfather, Arnold Glassman. At first, Bessie was thriving. In fact, her skin was glowing and she was excited to take her son to New York to visit her sister. The woman whom Willie had hired was helping Bessie pack when Bessie suddenly felt feverish and tired. She told the housekeeper that she had to lie down. By the time Arnie’s father got home, she was dead.

  “Childbed fever,” the housekeeper told Willie. Willie was distraught. He couldn’t believe that just that morning, Bessie had been fine and now she was gone from his life forever. He wanted to resent the child who had taken his beloved wife, but he couldn’t. When Willie looked into his son’s tiny face and counted the little boy’s fingers and toes, a wave of love came over him. He would raise this boy and give him a great life filled with opportunities that he never had.

  When Arnie was old enough his father insisted that he get a col
lege education. It didn’t matter to Willie that Arnie had no desire to go on in school. He had the grades and he got accepted, and Willie refused to take no for an answer. His son would be educated!

  Arnie was smart. He was accepted into the University of Chicago where he joined a fraternity. It was easy for Arnie to drink all night and still keep up his grades. It was on just such a morning that Arnie received a phone call. One of his frat brothers came to his room and knocked on the door. Arnie’s head ached from a hangover.

  “You have a phone call, Glassman,” his frat brother said.

  “Yeah, all right. I’ll be right there.” Arnie sat up in bed; his head was pounding. “I gotta stop drinking like this,” he said aloud to himself and walked to the phone in the hall in his underwear.

  “Yeah,” Arnie said.

  “Listen, it’s Jake.” Jake was Arnie’s father’s partner and best friend. “I got some bad news. Your father was bringing a truckload of grapefruit from Texas to Chicago. You know how God damn stubborn he is. I told him to stop but he drove through the night, and then went to see the vendor in the morning. He spent all day bargaining then loading the truck so he was dog-tired. He shoulda checked into a hotel, but I know your father, he didn’t want to leave his load of goods on the back of the truck open and unattended. He was afraid his stuff would get stolen. Anyway, he headed back home to Chicago without getting any rest for two days. Sometime during the night, Willie musta fell asleep at the wheel and his truck veered into a tree, killing him instantly. I am sorry, Arnie. I really am.”

  Arnie was shaking. He couldn’t believe his father was gone. The news was painful, very painful. However, in a way, it was also freeing. His father had been such a strong-willed man that Arnie had never dared to say no to him. Now Arnie could make his own decisions. He could quit attending the university. And since Willie had left his son with plenty of money, Arnie was now free to do whatever he wanted. All of his life, Arnie had loved jazz and blues and so, although he knew his father would never have approved, he opened a tavern where colored musicians could play jazz and the blues to their hearts’ content. He met a woman and got married, but his wife never wanted children. She was too busy impressing the other women with her pretty clothes and lovely home. And, quite frankly, she felt that pregnancy would ruin her figure. Arnie could not say he had been happy in his marriage. His wife was impressively beautiful, but she was vain and self-absorbed.

  Over the years, he had a couple of heartbreaking affairs with colored blues singers who’d stolen his heart when they performed at his establishment. He had even considered divorcing his wife and marrying one, but he didn’t have the guts to go against society and that was what he would have had to do if he married a woman of color. He knew that. And so he finally stopped trying to be happy and accepted his life for what it was. By the time his wife passed away, his sexual desires had dwindled considerably. He put all of his energy into his work. However, lately he’d been feeling weak. He decided to ask Dovid if he wanted to take Arnie’s car home with him at night and pick Arnie up at his house the following day He liked Dovid. Dovid was trustworthy and he felt like Dovid was the son he wished he had.

  “You will be my driver, Dovid. Of course, you’ll still be my bartender, and I will pay you a little bit extra for driving me. Then at night and on Sunday, you can use the car to take your wife out, or go wherever you need to go. All you have to do is make sure I have a ride back and forth to the tavern and you’ll have to take care of all of my food shopping and whatever other errands I need you to run for me.”

  “Sure, Arnie,” Dovid said. “But I have to get a driver’s license first.”

  “You don’t have one?”

  “Not yet.”

  “You drove to pick Cool Breeze up at the flophouse a few months ago?”

  “Yes, you asked me to do it so I did.”

  Arnie burst out laughing. “You sure have chutzpah!”

  “I’ll get a license.”

  “Take the afternoon off and go and get it today,” Arnie said.

  “Should I take the car?” Dovid asked.

  Arnie laughed again. “Only if you want to be arrested. You can’t drive to motor vehicles to get a license to drive. You are not supposed to be driving at all until you have the license.”

  Dovid shrugged his shoulders. “It’s like a frozen wasteland out there today. Back in the old country we would have said it’s like Siberia! After the snowstorm last night the temperature warmed up a little and the snow melted. Then this morning when the temperature dropped all the melted snow froze. Now the whole ground is solid ice. Ah…well… what can I do? I’ll go to the bus stop and take the bus to get the license. By the way, do you have any idea where I should be going for this?”

  “Yeah, of course. You gotta go to the department of motor vehicles. But, what the hell, why don’t I just drive you?” Arnie said. “Cool Breeze can watch the place.”

  “That would be a lot better for me than standing at a bus stop in this weather,” Dovid said.

  Arnie called out to the back room where Cool Breeze was gathering cases of whiskey to stack behind the bar. “Hey Breeze, I have to take Dovi to pick something up, can you handle it while we’re gone?”

  “Surem, Mr. Arnie. I’m just stocking the bar for tonight,” Cool Breeze said.

  “We’ll be back early, way before it gets busy,” Arnie said.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Dovid got his driver’s license and from that day on he was Arnie’s driver. He picked him up in the afternoon and took him back home in the morning. They decided that on Wednesdays, Dovid would pick Arnie up early and they would go to the butcher, the bakery, and the market where Arnie would buy plenty of food to have in the house for the entire week.

  That Sunday, Dovid, Harry, Eidel, and Ida took the car and went to Taylor Street for lunch. Then Dovid drove to the hockey game. It was a frigid day outside and there were still blankets of snow on the ground because it had snowed all day on Saturday. Dovid drove slowly because it was slippery and it was hard to keep control of the vehicle. However, he was glad that the couples didn’t have to stand at a bus stop. Dovid smiled to himself as he thought, We are very fortunate. We are riding in a heated automobile courtesy of Arnie Glassman. God bless you, Glassman.

  Neither of the wives had ever been to Taylor Street, better known as Little Italy. They looked around, eager to see the little neighborhood built by Italian immigrants.

  “You know this Italian neighborhood is not so different from our little Jewish neighborhood? Jews? Italians? I guess in the long run all immigrants to this country are the same. We all come here to America with the same hopes and dreams,” Ida said as she looked out the car window.

  They stopped at a small restaurant where they enjoyed wonderful Italian beef sandwiches on thick rolls with sweet peppers. As they sat in the small neighborhood restaurant they looked out the window.

  “You’re right, Ida, it’s not so different here than where we live,” Dovid said.

  “Except for the big Catholic Church across the street. Would you just look at that? The Catholics spent a fortune to build a fancy church, yet most of the Italian immigrants are struggling to survive. I am not sure how much they give to the church but I know that the church members give a part of their earnings to the church. The church doesn’t care about the people,” Harry said.

  Eidel felt her face grow red. It bothered her to hear Harry speak ill of the Catholic church. Dovid glanced at Eidel quickly. He knew that her feelings had been hurt and he had to speak quickly. He had to put Harry in his place, but gently, before Eidel said something to Harry that would be very offensive.

  “Harry, is it so different with a Jewish synagogue? We joined the temple and I can tell you this, it costs a fortune to be a member. And most of the Jewish immigrants can’t afford it, either. It’s the same thing as the Catholics. There is no difference,” Dovid said. “You know when I got here to America, I was so excited to be able to be a practicing Jew.
And don’t get me wrong, I am proud of my heritage, but I don’t know if I believe in religion.”

  “What does that mean, you don’t believe in religion?”

  “Just what I said. I think religion causes wars and hatred between people. I sometimes feel like I am Jewish by nationality, not because I follow the religion. However, religion isn’t the only thing that causes people to hate each other. Coming to the U.S., I learned that race plays a big part in all of this, too. Just look at how people treat colored folks. The coloreds suffer for no reason other than the color of their skin. You know what I have learned as I have gotten older?”

  “What?” Harry asked.

  “I’ve learned that all people are really the same. We all really want and need the same things. Of course, food and shelter but also love, warmth, safety, and nice things for our families. And …we all bleed red blood,” Dovid said.

  “Well said, Dovi,” Harry said smiling. “I think maybe you’re right. Is that why you stopped wearing your yamulke?”

  “I stopped wearing it because it was tearing my hair out. And I’m losing my hair fast enough as it is,” Dovid laughed. “Listen, Harry, I am a Jew. My parents were Jews, I will always be a Jew. Hitler made sure that we knew that if we had a drop of Jewish blood we would always be Jews. And I want you to know that I am proud of being Jewish. But for me, what I am trying to say is that Judaism is more of a nationality than a religion. I work on Friday night and Saturday because I have to if I want to give my family a good life. I can’t make my hours if I want to keep my job; I work when Arnie needs me. My parents kept kosher, but I don’t keep kosher, as you can see …” Dovid indicated toward the Italian beef and French fries in front of him. “But whenever someone asks me what my background is, I tell them that the blood running through my veins is Jewish blood and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I am proud to be a Jew even if I don’t follow all the religious laws.”