Hello, America

by Livia Bitton-Jackson

In the evening a surprise awaits me. I find out that Yishai’s present, the sweatshirt emblazoned with the camp’s emblem, was a sort of declaration, a symbol of his claim. At dinner Yishai, wearing the same sweatshirt, approaches my table.

  “Welcome home, Leah. We’re all happy you’re back,” he says, the wide-open smile showing the gap in his front teeth and emphasizing the dimple in his left cheek. Then the smile fades and his face turns serious. “Leah, the sweatshirt I gave you … I thought you’d be wearing it tonight. You see, it’s a special shirt, only for members of the administration. When people will see you wear it … both of us at the same time, everyone will know …” His attention is caught by some activity in the middle of the dining room, and he hurries off without finishing the sentence.

  I am puzzled. What does this all mean? Later in the evening I seek out Miriam, or Miri, as she prefers to be called. She is an “old-timer” here in camp; she’ll perhaps be able to explain.

  Miri laughs. “It’s obvious. When a boy and a girl show up in identical sweatshirts, it’s as good as an official announcement. You’re now expected to wear that sweatshirt every morning to roll call and breakfast, and every evening to dinner to let the whole camp know that Yishai and you are a couple.”

  “Yishai and me—a couple? When did that happen? How?”

  “Don’t you know? When did Yishai give you the sweatshirt?’

  “He brought it to the hospital. He said I should wear it as a hospital gown. I didn’t know it meant more than that!”

  “Well, now you know.…” Miri laughs again.

  “It’s as simple as that? A boy gives you one of his sweatshirts and that sets you up? And what if you don’t feel the same way about it?”

  “Then you don’t accept the shirt. That’s his answer. You accepted his offer when you took his shirt and put it on.”

  So Yishai and I are a couple. I am thrilled and troubled at the same time. I like Yishai, I like him very much. I believe I’m falling in love with him because of his kindness to me in the hospital, his gentle, caring attitude. Am I a fool? Why do I turn into a foolish, defenseless child whenever someone shows tenderness to me?

  Yishai being my boyfriend is a matter of incredible prestige. And yet this public display of a very private feeling is somehow wrong. I feel my personal life has been invaded. Publicly parading my relationship with Yishai somehow cheapens it. The longer I think about it the more I am convinced that I do not want to go along with it.

  Luckily I am still on sick rest, and do not have to confront this issue face-to-face quite yet. I am excused from roll call and early breakfast, Miriam and Hadassah look after my campers for the next few days, and by lunchtime it’s much too hot to wear a sweatshirt. At dinnertime when I appear in my own lavender sweatshirt, I brace myself for a confrontation with Yishai. What kind of confrontation will it be? Will I be able to explain it to him? Or will he be too hurt, too upset to listen?

  Yishai is not in the dining room—must be attending to some administrative affair—and I sigh with relief. The issue is postponed for one more day. The next evening Yishai is much too busy; he barely has time to come over to our table for a quick Shalom-how-are-you. But after dinner he waits for me at the entrance. Here it comes—the confrontation.

  “There’s a hike tomorrow night after curfew, for all the counselors,’ he says in a hurry. “It will be announced tomorrow morning at roll call. I’ll be away all day tomorrow, but wanted to know, can you come on the hike?”

  “I hope so … I will.”

  A dimply smile brightens Yishai’s tan face, and he is gone, leaving me with an exciting, secret anticipation of tomorrow evening. I march my campers to evening activity, and then help them get ready for bed.

  The hike is an annual night activity for the staff, and from the excited preparations that go on all day it seems it is the high point of the summer. The kitchen staff is preparing food for a picnic and all kinds of goodies for roasting at the campfire—frankfurters, potatoes, and other tidbits I am not familiar with, white and pink fluffy balls Miriam calls marshmallows. We are told to prepare drinks in our canteens, wear warm sweaters and slacks, and bring along blankets.

  After curfew the senior staff takes over supervision of the campers and we counselors, boys and girls, about sixty of us, gather near the flagpole and begin the hike by marching out of the camp, through the woods, into the nearby mountains. It is a wonderful night. The mountain breeze seems to carry us up and up on the steep mountain trail toward the starry, moonlit sky. Boys and girls pair up, and I am looking for Yishai. Didn’t he come? Last-minute camp business must have detained him.

  The climb gradually slows to a halt, we reach a plateau, and all at once I sense a light touch on my shoulder. It’s Yishai.

  Now Yishai is in full charge, giving instructions to the boys on preparing the campfire, and to the girls on readying the picnic on the blankets. Soon the sound of singing rises from around the campfire. The roasted potatoes are delicious, the franks are better than anything I have ever tasted, and the toasted marshmallows are gone before I have a chance to taste one.

  Yishai reappears, and in his palm are three browned marshmallows. “I saved some marshmallows for you. I saw you didn’t get any.”

  “Thank you. Let me taste just one… .”

  I do not really care for the consistency but swallow it anyway out of gratitude for Yishai’s kindness.

  “You don’t like it, I can tell,” Yishai laughs.

  Oded plays his guitar, and we sing popular Hebrew songs to the accompaniment of crackling fire, and the breeze carries the melody on the wings of fiery sparks. We are a swaying circle, all sixty-odd of us, fluid, harmonious … one. How I wish this night would never end, the magic would last forever.

  Slowly the cinders die out and we all rise to tidy up the grounds, still singing, the music from Oded’s guitar still reverberating as, arms locked, we make our way down the hill in the direction of the camp. It is an exhilaratingly fast downhill walk under the fabulous night sky. Yishai is at my side now and we march together, our breathing in rhythmic spurts in time to the beating of my heart. At the bottom of the hill the trail leads to a clearing in the woods. As if on cue, one couple after another strays across the clearing and disappears among the bushes.

  “Where is everyone going?” I ask Yishai in astonishment.

  “To the bushes,” he replies, his voice matter-of-fact. “Do you want to come?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, do you want to come with me to the bushes? Don’t worry, no one will see us. There’s plenty of bushes for everyone… .”

  I struggle to produce a sound.

  “Yishai …” I gulp. “I am going back to camp, to the bunk. It’s been a long night. Are you coming along?”

  “I’ll stay around here a for a while. Shalom, Leah. Layla tov.”

  “Layla tov.” I wave, and join a few stragglers on the trail back to camp.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  CULTURE SHOCK

  At breakfast Yishai approaches my table, and the inscrutable smile on his face makes my heart sink. Is he coming to explain last night, his abrupt goodbye, his not even walking me to the gate of the camp?

  “Leah, I have a favor to ask you.” He leans over so the others won’t hear. “Would you mind returning my sweatshirt?”

  “Your sweatshirt? But I thought it was a present.”

  “You aren’t wearing it anyway.”

  I feel the blood rush to my face. “I have been wearing it… .” My stomach feels as if someone has wrung it like a wet rag. Not a word of explanation about last night, and now this? “But if you want it back, I’ll bring it at lunchtime.”

  At lunchtime I do not spot Yishai at first, but later on he passes my table, barely glancing in my direction.

  “Thank you,” he says simply when I hand him the paper bag containing the sweatshirt. He hangs back for a moment. “Leah, I forgot to ask, how do you feel? Are you fully recovered?”
>
  “Yes, I’m fully recovered. Thank you. I feel perfectly fine.”

  “I am glad, truly glad.”

  “And I am truly glad to know that you are truly glad.” I laugh.

  Yishai laughs too.

  “Leah, you’re always so much fun to be with!” he says as he walks away, carrying the sweatshirt in the bag.

  This cannot be the last chapter in the sweatshirt saga. I must have it out with Yishai. We must have a frank talk and find out what has gone wrong between us. After all, it was Yishai who singled me out and made all the overtures from the very beginning. It was he who chose to accompany me to the hospital and behave like a big brother, making me feel so cherished. I came to believe that he cared for me and felt so proud when he spread the news about our relationship and wanted me to wear his sweatshirt, for all to see. I was thrilled seeing his eagerness when he invited me to come along on the hike. I felt our relationship was reaching a high point. What happened? Why did it all change?

  Perhaps it is not too late. I’m not giving up. I’m willing to swallow my pride and confront him directly. Tonight right after putting my campers to bed I will search him out and explain how bad and confused I feel about our misunderstanding, and demand answers. I must have answers. This not knowing I find unbearable.

  At dinnertime something happens that stuns me into canceling my plans. As the group of young CITs, counselors in training, files out of the dining room, I spot one of them wearing Yishai’s sweatshirt. It is unmistakably his white sweatshirt emblazoned with the camp’s name and emblem, and buxom Beth is wearing it!

  Beth! How did she get it? There must be some mistake. Did Yishai give the sweatshirt to Beth right after I returned it to him? How can I find out? And yet I dare not ask either Beth or Yishai. What if the answer is yes?

  I must talk to someone or I’ll go mad. Miriam is the one. I feel I can confide in her. She seems mature and sensitive; she’ll understand my predicament.

  I can barely wait for my campers to fall asleep. Finally their rhythmic breathing provides the signal that I can go over to the next bunk.

  I find Miriam sitting at the narrow wooden desk, writing.

  “I am sorry to interrupt you, Miri. But I must talk to you.”

  “No problem. It’s only a letter.” Miriam nods, and with characteristic calm pushes her chair back and rises. “Let’s sit on the stoop. We can talk out there.”

  The heavy silence of the dark woods stills my anguish, helps to unburden my soul and to divulge my dismal failures—the fiasco with Oded and the devastating finale of my involvement with Yishai.

  Miriam listens quietly, and when I am finished she puts her arm about me.

  “Leah, don’t you know what’s going on around you? If you don’t you know what going to the bushes means, I’ll spell it out for you. Going to the bushes means having sex. By refusing to go to the bushes with Yishai, you rejected him. So naturally he wanted his sweatshirt back. He wanted to give it to the girl who did go to the bushes with him.”

  “Beth? To the bushes? But she is no more than fifteen! And Yishai is twenty-four, a grown man; he would never do a thing like that with a fifteen-year-old girl! Miri, it is not possible.”

  “In America fifteen is not a child when it comes to sex. And everyone knows that Beth has had a crush on him ever since she was a camper. So when you rejected him, when you offended his manhood by not wearing the sweatshirt and then by not going to the bushes with him, he took her, the infatuated girl, to the bushes. So he wanted his sweatshirt back, to give it to her. It is as simple as that.”

  “Simple? How can you say that?”

  “Leah, where have you been all these years? Haven’t you learned about the birds and the bees? You should feel flattered that Yishai gave you the sweatshirt before you went to the bushes with him. It’s usually done the other way around.”

  “It’s not that I don’t know about sex. I have known about sex ever since I was ten, or younger. But I grew up believing sex was—don’t laugh at me, but I believe sex is sacred and should be saved for marriage. In my hometown girls were ostracized if they slept around. Even boys were held to task if they did not act responsibly, if they did not treat a girl with proper respect.”

  “Leah, I want you to come back here in an hour after the curfew, when all the lights are out. We will stay by the window and watch. Then maybe you’ll understand.”

  Just as Miriam instructed, I wait till lights out, and then I make my way in the darkness to her bunk. Miriam draws two chairs to her window and we take up our positions. We sit still, peering into the night, waiting.

  I begin to discern one shadowy figure after another emerging from the bunks and moving across the square toward the bushes at the far end. I recognize them, the nicest girls, and there in the distance, near the bushes, I can make out silhouettes of boys, waiting… .One by one they pair up and disappear among the dark foliage of the woods.

  “Now that you have seen it with your own eyes … now you believe me?” Miriam asks, not in triumph but with profound sympathy. “The sooner you accept the world as it is the sooner you’ll learn to be part of it, and to stop castigating yourself.”

  “How about you, Miri? Why aren’t you out there in the bushes like all the others?”

  “Not all the others. There are quite a few who are not out there. It’s a matter of choice. I choose not to. But I’m not devastated by the fact that others do.”

  It’s past midnight. I am ready to return to my bunk.

  “Are you leaving already? If you wait a bit longer you’ll see your friend Oded with Karen … and even Yishai with Beth.”

  “Thank you, I’ve seen enough.”

  Thoroughly shaken, I make my way back to my bunk, thinking of all the other bunks left unsupervised. What if, feeling ill or frightened, one of the little campers calls for help and the counselor is not there? The thought fills me with dismay.

  Thank God tomorrow is visiting day. I was able to arrange a ride for Mommy and Aunt Celia with one of my camper’s parents who live in our neighborhood. I can’t wait to see Mommy and Aunt Celia, to hug them, talk to them, and regain my perspective.

  All morning my campers and I are excited with the anticipation of our guests’ arrival. Soon the grounds ring with the cheerful cries of reunion between the campers and their parents. My camper’s parents arrive, and Mommy is with them. She is approaching, her face radiant with joy, her arms open for an embrace.

  “Mommy! How great to see you,” I shout as I run to meet her. “Did you have a good journey? Where’s Aunt Celia?”

  “She couldn’t come,” Mother says guardedly as we chat within earshot of my campers’ parents. “Mr. Brand had no room in the car… . Mrs. Brand’s parents decided to come along.”

  I am ready to cry out with disappointment but must hide it so as not to offend the Brands. After all, they did give a lift to Mom.

  “Celia was very disappointed, but it couldn’t be helped. With God’s help you’ll be home in less than three weeks, and you’ll see each other then. Celia sends her love.” Mother adds with a wink, “And a loaf of chocolate cake.”

  Mother is delighted with the camp: She loves the crisp, clean mountain air, the woods, the rolling hills. As soon as all my campers are reunited with their parents, I feel free to take Mother for a walk. We go down to the lake, spread a blanket in the shade of the reeds, and reminisce about our summer in the Carpathians.

  By the time Mother and I return to camp, walking arm in arm, and Mother joins the Brands on the return trip to New York, a sense of contentment has replaced yesterday’s heavy gloom.

  Three weeks pass quickly, and soon camp is over. The farewell party, picture taking, hugs and kisses, and the promises of get-togethers, turn the last day of camp into a virtual moment of love. Even Oded makes a half-hearted apology.

  Yishai hands me an envelope. It contains a poem. It is a love poem in Hebrew, a lighthearted, somewhat humorous poem and yet it manages to convey intense feeling, dee
p regret.

  When we meet a little later, Yishai’s face is grave and his eyes are wistful. “Will I see you in the city?”

  “I don’t know, Yishai.”

  “Will you come to the reunion?”

  Two hands clasp my shoulders from behind and I turn to face Sarah, the head counselor, who locks me in a tight embrace. “Leah, I am so sorry that we didn’t spend more time together,” she says warmly. “That we didn’t get to know each other better. I am sure we would’ve found so much to talk about. Perhaps we’ll meet in the city? What do you say?”

  “Perhaps,” I say, slightly overwhelmed. She is the third person to say the very same words to me today.

  Shoshanah, the camp mother, approaches and plants a warm kiss on my forehead. Hillel, the poet, throws his arms about me from behind. Zeev, the camp doctor, and Eliezer, the camp rabbi, come to shake hands.

  By the time I am free to turn back to him, Yishai is gone.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  A CHANCE MEETING

  It’s late Friday afternoon, barely enough time to reach home before the Sabbath. Leslie and I race down the ramp at Times Square Station in a dead heat to catch the Brighton train bound for Brooklyn. We lingered too long at Professor Kutscher’s talk on the Dead Sea Scrolls, waiting for a chance to talk to the prominent scholar from Jerusalem after the lecture.

  The train is packed as usual, but the two of us manage to squeeze into seats next to each other and launch into our discussion of the lecture. Leslie shares my fascination with the ancient scrolls discovered rather recently in a cave near Khirbat Qumran by a shepherd chasing after a stray lamb.

  Oded and Yishai and Camp Massad are a distant memory.

  A new teacher at the Yeshiva of Central Queens, Leslie Beck also lives in Brooklyn, and it was he who suggested we attend the Friday-afternoon lecture series at the Hebrew Teachers’ Association together. And so from the beginning of the school year the two of us have greatly enjoyed the talks and our discussions on the homebound train.

  “I find The Manual of Discipline the most fun among the scrolls,” Leslie begins. “And I think so does Professor Kutscher. It is more interesting than The Isaiah Scroll. Do you agree?”