Miriam on the beach in Tel Aviv. 1st person.
I did my time. Thirty eight years of marriage to Saul. Raising the children and keeping a kosher home despite his scientific atheism.
I think the ritual was always his way of staying connected to his roots despite the fact that we weren't observant and our children found
it ridiculous to the point of always tricking me by constantly moving the meat and milk plates so that I would have to wash dishes all the time.
I saw me as a complicit slave.
Now, its step by step on the hot golden sand, a dip into the sweet salted Mediterranean water and then quiet time with my favorite books.
Over and over, day after day, the sea air washes me clean. I wish Saul were with me. But what I really mean is that I wish we were together and sharing a life. I'm not sure we ever really did except the early months of our marriage, but then came the graduate residencies, the children and then the rest of our lives.
I'm finally free and where should I go today? Visit the mission for Jewish widows, go gambling? I'm not Israeli, I'm a New Yorker and I haven't really found my neighborhood.
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I love the notion of the children moving the milk and meat plates - that one detail makes this entire world real, gives it dimension. I love also Miriam's realization, I'm not Israeli, I'm a New Yorker and I haven't really found my neighborhood. This is like the beginning of a novel, I want to know what she's going to do next.
ReplyDeletethis is brilliant. It captures the relief of liberation combined with the loss of a family unit. said in few words, but enough--all that is needed.
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