“I suppose God pointed that out to you?” I asked, not really expecting an answer.
“Yes, I think he did, actually,” answered Dad, rubbing his chin as if trying to recall something from his memory bank. Again, I shook my head in disbelief.
“Ok, ok, I will go along with your little game for now. If I am the Son of God, why are you telling me now? I am thirty-two, very nearly thirty-three. Surely by now I would have had some inclination as to who I am? Surely I would have performed some sort of miracle or at least some kind of trick?” I gave my parents no chance to reply as I continued to speak. “Why, if what you two say is correct, have I not turned water into wine, risen the dead, stopped war, won the lotto, married a supermodel, all that stuff? Why haven’t I spoken to God? Answer that? If I am the son of God, why has he not spoken to me? Got an answer for that one? But more importantly, why was I circumcised? Why that, why at least didn’t you stop that? It was extremely painful. I don’t recall it, but I guarantee I wasn’t smiling afterward.”
“He said you would react like this,” said Mother. “Didn’t he, Ely?” Dad nodded. I shook my head once again. This was frustrating. Dad rose from the sofa, stretched and yawned. I couldn’t believe it; he was going to bed!
“Well, I’m beat. It’s time for me to go to sleep, and I get the feeling you’re going to take some convincing. I will leave that to your mother.” And with that, he was gone. It was as if the last twenty minutes had never happened. It was typical of my dad. As far as he was concerned, the truth was out, despite the ridiculousness of it all; it was time for bed, and nothing would stop him from sleeping. It was a trait I had never much liked in Dad. He never argued or became embroiled in controversy; once he made his statement, it was finished. It was why Mother found him so easy to manipulate. Unfortunately, this reinforced my theory that they actually believed what they were saying. I looked at Mother in the hope that she would stop my dad from leaving, but she just shrugged. She knew it would be pointless, and I got the feeling that maybe she had even orchestrated my dad’s departure. It dawned on me she probably had more to say and didn’t want Dad to hear it. Either that or she wanted alone time with me. I bet myself she had instructed Dad to make himself scarce at an allotted point in the evening, and that assigned point was now. Dad bid me goodnight, kissed Mother on the forehead, and with that, he was gone.
“Really, there isn’t much he can add anyway. God came to me more, in any case. He chose me, not him. He sort of just went along with it; you know what he’s like. I think God spoke to him once or twice, but it wasn’t anything important. He didn’t much like the ‘virgin all my life’ business, but you know your father— well, that father anyway—he kind of likes an easy life.” Could she hear herself? An easy life? The guy, according to both of them if this whole thing were true, which I assure you I did not believe it was, had never had sexual intercourse! He had brought up another man’s child and got nothing for it. No miracles, nothing. He had spent his whole adult life succumbing to Mother and her overbearing methods.
I was becoming annoyed, and despite my deep-rooted fear of the consequences of confrontation with Mother, enough was enough. “Oh, come on, Mother,” I said, my tone aggressive, which was a first for me when talking with Mother. “This is totally ridiculous. If any of this is true, why didn’t you tell me before? Why wait until now? Why not tell me when I was thirteen? After I left high school, college? Not that for one minute I think any of this ridiculous and tiresome story is true anyway.” I waited for the reaction. The eruption. I had never spoken to my mother like that before.
“To be honest, your father really wanted to tell you. I mean, Ely your father, not God your father, but I felt it would interfere with your schoolwork, and then you headed to college. You were doing so well, and you seemed so happy. It didn’t seem fair to burden you with all this Messiah and second coming business. Then one thing led to another, and it slipped our minds. We brushed it to one side. Kind of hoped it would go away, and that maybe you’re real Father, God, had forgotten about you. You see, he is like that. He is very forgetful.” It was a relief that her reaction was not volcanic; however her answer was beyond ridiculous, as was the whole evening. I could not believe it; she talked about God as if she had actually spoken to him. She was very convincing; she had obviously already convinced herself. What was more bizarre, though, was that she was talking about God, the creator of the Universe, as if he were some sort of forgetful, old uncle who had a reputation for mislaying his spectacles! A different approach was required. I felt if I placated her for a while, she might come to her senses.
“So let’s just say, for arguments sake, that I actually believe you. Let us assume, for the time being at least, that what you have told me is true. Run it all by me from the beginning and in chronological order. Dates, times, everything.” So she did. My mother proceeded to tell me the whole story from the moment of my alleged ‘Immaculate Conception’ right up to the phone call she made that afternoon to me at my office. I will not bore you by reciting what she said word for word. She was far too dramatic and went into far too much detail. To be honest, it would take much too long to recite word-for-word her version of events. I will give you a condensed and briefer summary of what she said, but in my own words, and with a little added family history so you can keep on track.
CHAPTER
6
IRMA CRYSTAL FIRST MET ELY Miller in 1965, when Ely was thirty-five and Irma, was thirty-two. They met through their parents, with whom they both lived with. Their respective siblings, whom I have already mentioned, my father’s brother Jacob and my mother’s sister Marla, had already flown the family nest. Irma and Ely had never been successful daters. Boys found Irma stunning but far too pushy and overbearing. After one date, it would become apparent that, despite her angelic appearance, the girl was hard work. Any potential suitors could forget carnal relations; Irma was not giving it up for any man unless it was her husband to be. Even if one of her dates was prepared to wait, she would soon extinguish any budding romance with her ability to alienate and upset all who came in contact with her. Basically, she was too much hard work. So as one by one all her peers married, Irma remained single, waiting for Mr. Right to come along. But Mr. Right would come and go, unable to cope with her personality or the lack of physical contact, so to her, all Mr. Rights became Mr. Wrongs.
As for Ely, girls found him too much of a pushover. Inevitably, the girls he dated usually wanted to get to know his much better-looking older brother, Jacob. Some girls even used poor Ely as a route to meet Jacob, which did nothing for his confidence or self-esteem. Yes, there were a few movie dates and some holding hands but nothing serious. Ely was too nice. He never tried to push the issue of sex, and it seemed this put off the girls he dated. They felt he was too lethargic and uninterested. That was, of course, not true. Ely was industrious, and his car repair garage business boomed.
When he met Irma at the bar mitzvah of a friend of both families, Ely had fallen head-over-heels in love. He didn’t seem to notice, or maybe he chose to ignore, her overbearing and persuasive persona. He didn’t mind Irma bossing him around and telling him what to do, and he seemed quite happy to let her take the lead in their relationship.
By the same token, Irma was impressed by Ely’s restraint regarding sexual relations. He didn’t badger her like the other boys for sex or a quick fumble under her skirt. What impressed her most was Ely’s acceptance that she was the boss. He would do anything for her and never answered back. She had found a man she could control, who was relatively wealthy and already successful. They were indeed well suited.
They married the following year after they met, in 1966. It was a traditional Jewish ceremony, and understandably, both sets of parents were relieved that their mature offspring had finally married and would now vacate the family home. It was on their wedding night when Ely was ready to consummate not only his marriage but also his relationship with Mother, that Irma had her first visitation from God. The v
isitation came in the form of a dream, just as God had come to Mary two thousand or so years before. She recalled that the dream was extremely vivid, and it occurred whilst my Father, Ely, showered before bed. The dream involved a lot of harp-like music, references to lambs, strict instructions, and the odd joke.
God, she claimed, had a pompous sounding English accent, which she found initially odd, but he explained that if had he a Yonkers accent, it would be even more preposterous. Mother agreed. He told her she had been chosen to carry the Nazarene, the son of God, the second coming, Jesus Christ part two, into the world. Just as it had occurred two thousand years before, a virgin would carry the child. Only a real virgin could deliver God’s only begotten son; well, second begotten son. As God had been reliably advised, Irma was indeed a virgin, and he was under pressure to get it done. (Apparently, he had gotten his timings wrong, and he had thought it wasn’t until the following year that he should be doing all this virgin hunting stuff.) Luckily, some wise old Saint had pointed out that if all the prophecies of the Bible were to be fulfilled by the end of the millennium, then God needed to act immediately.
Being under pressure, he had found a virgin who fitted the bill. She met the required profile and, well, apparently that was the way it worked. She was the chosen one. She had pointed out in the dream that she was Jewish and that evidently God had made a mistake. God indeed had made a mistake. Confused by the surname Miller, God, and his team mistakenly assumed Irma and Ely were good Christians. More thorough research wouldn’t have gone amiss. After some deliberation, God decided my parents’ religion was of secondary importance. It was the virgin thing that really mattered. As he pointed out, the last ones were Jewish, and it didn’t seem to affect anything. And that was that.
When she awoke from the dream, which apparently had lasted the time it took for my father to shower and shave, she immediately told her new husband of the visitation from God and the contents therein. After returning to the bathroom for approximately three minutes, for what, my mother did not know, Ely returned, slightly out of breath and a little flushed, and declared it fine with him. If that was what God had said, then that’s what God had said. He would wait to consummate his marriage after the birth of God’s son. He had already waited his whole life, so a little longer wouldn’t matter.
That night turned into a month, and eventually, according to Mother, they never did consummate the marriage, and she remained a virgin, as she felt that it was what God meant by Virgin Mother. So when she went to visit the doctor for a regular health check seven days after her wedding night, it was indeed a miracle when her physician announced she was pregnant.
Luckily, it would seem God had taken the precaution of visiting my father in a separate dream. I reminded myself to verify that with him later. God assured Ely that the child was indeed God’s, and that despite the awkwardness of the situation, he was grateful to Ely for allowing him the use of his wife’s womb, and he apologized for any inconvenience the event may have caused.
Nine months later in January 1967, yours truly, Seth Miller, was born. Not in a stable, but at King’s County Hospital in Brooklyn, New York. Apparently, I weighed in at nine pounds and eight ounces and was nineteen inches long. There were no complications, and no wise men bearing gifts bothered to show up or offer my dad a cigar. It also seemed there was no shining light directing shepherds or other well-wishers to my birth either.
After my birth, my mother and father waited for another sign from God. Since my mom had discovered she was pregnant with God’s son; God had been conspicuous in his absence; no visitations, no dreams, and no signs for either Irma or Ely. They assumed now that his son was born, God would once again enter their lives, but I came with no instructions or directions.
For the first few months of my life, my parents were at a loss. They did not know what to expect. They felt that sooner or later, God would come and claim me. But he never did. They tried praying, they visited churches and temples, and they consulted the yellow pages, but nothing. It was as if God had just forgotten about them and his son. As they watched me grow up into a healthy and well-adjusted child who showed no signs of miracle-doing and who was not overtly kind to others, nor showed any natural inclination to any religion, they soon forgot, or chose to ignore, that I was a miracle birth and the Son of God.
Time passed, and when I reached thirteen, it seemed to Irma and Ely Miller that maybe God had made a mistake. When no disciples came a-knocking, no miracles occurred, nor words of profound wisdom emitted from my lips, they presumed it had all been a misunderstanding, and that maybe God had found a good Christian family to bring up another one of his sons. This other son guessed Irma and Ely, would be the real Messiah, and I must have been a mistake. They put it down to the fact they were Jewish. It was good news, as it coincided with my bar mitzvah.
They read the papers every day, looking for news of miracles or revelations about the second coming, but in time, they stopped even doing that. They both agreed it was probably wise not to mention the circumstances of my birth to anyone, just in case word got out, and I became a religious freak show. So they never told a soul, not even me, and by the time I graduated from Yale, it didn’t seem to matter. Even they began to doubt the whole thing. For thirty-two years they dismissed the whole thing, shut it completely out of their minds and pretended I was a normal child not born from an immaculate conception, and that suited them both.
Mother told me she had remained a virgin, as she felt it was the right thing to do, and she convinced Dad that God, despite his total absence from the scene, might become enraged if she gave up her virginity. Dad, she claims, apparently agreed with her. I found that hard to believe, as I did the whole story, but I decided would go along with it until I had spoken to the man himself. Ely that was, not God.
All was well. Their secret, my secret, our secret, God’s secret, was safe. My parents carried on with life and presumed that everything was fine, and even though he was the creator of the Universe, God was probably as susceptible to the odd mistake as we all were. All this changed, though, that morning.
God had apparently called. But this time, he hadn’t appeared in a dream or a vision. No, this time God had called. On the telephone. Mother said he still had the English accent, and his voice was as deep and as pompous as she remembered. He made his apologies about not being in touch sooner. He explained he had been away, and he could see that he had let things slide. He had taken a longer than planned vacation and foray into the Universe to develop other planets (he didn’t go into details,) and was extremely apologetic that he hadn’t been around. He could see things on Earth had gotten into a bit of a mess since they had last spoken.
Apparently, he asked after me, and though he hadn’t followed my progress on Earth, he was delighted to hear I had graduated top of my class at Yale. He was also extremely pleased I had secured such a highly paid and lucrative position with Henry, who he didn’t know but was sure there would be a file on him somewhere. He inquired if I was married and if he had any grandchildren and was, Mother claimed, relieved that I had never married and had no children. Also, he was concerned that during his hiatus of “thirty something” years that his credibility had waned. Before he contacted me directly with instructions on how to proceed, he said it might be better if Irma and Ely broke the news to me gently to warm things up for his grand entrance.
He felt arriving unannounced and barging into my life would not be the best ploy to adopt. He had seen a recent episode of Oprah about absentee fathers trying to establish relationships with their estranged children. Oprah had been harsh on the fathers and had given good advice on the right way to go about reestablishing broken relationships. Therefore, heeding the advice he had seen, he felt it better that Irma smooth the way for him. He felt it was time we “got this thing back on track” (God’s words, not Mother’s,) and that my parents should get me over that night and break the news to me gently, so that his call to me, when it came, would not come as too much of a shock.
He would have one of his assistants pencil in a call for the next day, and he would be in touch with me, disasters and other unscheduled events, such as unplanned acts of God or the sudden death of a Pope, permitting. Now, just in case you have missed anything here, let us not forget whom we are talking about. We are talking about God, the creator of the Universe, the creator of Man, and not, as it sounded to me, Donald Trump.
Before he hung up, God once again apologized for his tardiness. He told Mother she had done a great job and to pass on his regards to Ely. Apparently, he also told her she needn’t have remained a virgin after I was born. The virgin thing only applied to my initial conception. It seemed quite a few people had made that same assumption before, and it was one of the things he needed to rectify. Anyway, no harm done, and like he said, he would call the next day.
Mother made me promise not to tell Dad that his years of abstinence had not been required. I did make her promise, though, to right that wrong as soon as she could. I wasn’t sure if I was doing my father a favor or not, but I took the chance.
I looked at my watch and realized Mother’s story had taken her over three hours to relay to me. It was tomorrow. The late evening had turned into early morning. Mother knew how to talk, hence my condensed version of the events leading up to her phone call. There was no way I would get a cab this time at night out in Borough Park. It wasn’t like Manhattan. Unlike the city that never slept, Borough Park turned out the lights and put the cat out at ten thirty every night. In any case, I was exhausted. I was also concerned that both my parents could be lunatics, and I felt I should stay the night, or what remained of it. They were my parents after all, and if they were mad, they needed watching. Who knew what other craziness could happen? I felt it wise to remain in Borough Park whilst I planned my course of action.
The Reluctant Jesus: A Satirical Dark Comedy Page 4
