The Moth Presents All These Wonders

by Catherine Burns

  This story was told on April 11, 2014, at the Shubert Theatre in Boston. The theme of the evening was Coming Home. Director: Meg Bowles.

  When I was a child, I was given a blessing to become the greatest rabbi of my time.

  But at fifteen years old, I was struggling in school and I felt like I couldn’t live up to the pressure of my blessing anymore. I’m the fourth of eight children, and I was raised in an ultra-Orthodox Jewish community in Monsey, New York.

  For those of you who haven’t been raised Orthodox Jewish, it’s kind of like growing up Amish, only we had electricity.

  I wasn’t allowed to watch TV, read secular books, eat non-kosher food, or even talk to girls. And I was taught from a young age by my rabbis that if I disobeyed any of God’s commandments, I would receive a punishment.

  By punishment my rabbis meant that God would most likely, you know, kill me.

  And here’s the thing: I believed them.

  I was a good boy. I got straight A’s. I listened to my parents and my rabbis.

  But as I got older, I started to question and wonder, Would God really hurt me if I didn’t obey him?

  So I started to test him. One morning at school, I moved my yarmulke from the back of my head to a few inches closer to the front of my head.

  Now, that was a sign of modernism. That was like upgrading from a prepaid flip phone to an iPhone.

  Then I started secretly listening to Howard Stern on the bus on the way to school. And I was wondering if the other boys were listening to him, too. It was fascinating to me to listen to someone who was discussing something other than the Talmud and the Torah.

  Even more thrilling was the fact that this Howard Stern guy was Jewish. He was using Yiddish words and talking about Shabbos and the Jewish holidays.

  And that got me thinking, Wait a second, if Howard Stern is Jewish and he’s practically sinning every day with the things I’ve heard him talk about, why hasn’t God killed him yet?

  But even though I was starting to push back, I was still afraid of going too far.

  At the same time, I was becoming disillusioned with my upbringing; things were falling apart at home. My parents were going through a pretty bad divorce, and I wanted to get away from them, and my rabbis, and the religious restrictions.

  So for winter break that year, I planned a trip to Florida with my older brother, Israel. Israel had left the fold a year earlier, and moved in with my nonreligious Aunt Linda in Bellmore, Long Island.

  The plan was to meet him at her house, and then we’d leave for the airport on Sunday.

  Now, I had always wanted to go to my aunt’s house. My brother told me she had things I could only dream of having one day: a grand white piano, a spiral staircase, and two fifty-inch-screen TVs.

  So I got to my aunt’s house on Friday afternoon in time for Shabbos, and she was kind enough to buy me kosher food for the duration of Shabbos. But by the time Shabbos was over on Saturday night, there was no kosher food left, and I was hungry.

  So we all get into the car to go graze for kosher food out on the pastures of Long Island.

  Now, I was pretty good at searching for food, because being one of eight kids, I always felt like there wouldn’t be enough of it, and I constantly paced the kitchen, looking in the pantry and the fridge for my next meal.

  Sometimes I’d even go so far as to hide food out of fear that there wouldn’t be any left.

  And I always wished there was some sort of pill that would substitute a meal. Like the manna in the Torah.

  When the Jews were in the desert, they complained to Moses and Aaron that they would rather have died with pots of meat surrounding them in Egypt than die of thirst and hunger in the desert.

  And God, hearing their complaints, quickly answered and told them, “Look, guys, settle down. I’m going to show you how great I am. I’m going to fill the camp with bread and meat.”

  I believe the direct quote was, “Because then you will know I am the Lord, your God.”

  And sure enough, my rabbis taught me that you could ask him for anything and it would literally drop from the sky. Anything you wanted—pizza, ice cream, candy—it would magically appear.

  But nothing was magically appearing in Long Island, so we continued driving around, looking for a kosher restaurant, but none were open. I recommended we go to the local Stop & Shop to look for kosher frozen pizza. (For some reason, in my community, that’s a delicacy.)

  So we scanned all the aisles in Stop & Shop, but I couldn’t find anything that had an OU marked on the package. (The OU symbol means that it has officially been certified kosher.)

  If you were only allowed to eat food with an OU marked on the package, that meant you were most likely ultra-Orthodox, which I was. But if you were only allowed to eat food that was watched over by a specific rabbi, then marked with an official stamp by that rabbi, that meant you were Hasidic.

  But if you were allowed to eat food that had a “kosher but made with dairy” certification, then you were most likely Modern Orthodox, also known in my community as “a borderline Jew.”

  And if you were allowed to eat food that had a K marked on it, or worse than that, a capital K surrounded by a triangle, or even worse than that, the Hebrew National certification, you could forget about a seat next to God in the world to come, because you weren’t even considered Jewish.

  Eating that food was just as bad as throwing your yarmulke to the ground, cursing God, and biting into a bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich.

  So having found no kosher frozen pizza, we all stood outside Stop & Shop contemplating what to do next. Our search for kosher food had been going on close to two hours, and we were all frustrated.

  I was beginning to feel like the Israelites in the Torah. I would have preferred to die in Monsey with kosher meat surrounding me than die of hunger in the desolate suburb of Bellmore, Long Island.

  My aunt asked me what I wanted to eat, and I didn’t know. She asked me if it had to be kosher, and again, I didn’t know. I was just wishing there was no such thing as kosher or non-kosher.

  So my aunt pressed me again. “Does it have to be kosher or not?”

  I was beginning to realize in the moment that even if I found something relatively kosher, I would have been disappointed. I secretly wanted something non-kosher, but I was too afraid to ask for it or admit it.

  My aunt turned to my brother Israel for some help, and my brother said, “Look, I don’t wanna force him to eat non-kosher if he doesn’t want to.”

  My aunt was getting angry, so she said, “Well, what is with this kosher stuff anyway? It’s just blessed by a rabbi, right? So why don’t I buy some food and bless it. We’ll just get this over with.”

  And I had to tell her, “Well, my rabbis taught me that women aren’t allowed to bless the food.”

  That got her even more angry.

  So she started to walk away, and I said, “Well, maybe I could eat something if I don’t know that it’s not kosher.”

  She quickly turned around and yelled, “How does that work?”

  So I explained what I learned in Talmud class. Follow this, guys:

  If a Jew is in an airport, and he buys a kosher hamburger, and while he’s gone to wash and make a blessing on the bread, someone switches his burger out with a non-kosher one and he eats it, it’s okay.

  Now, that logic my aunt agreed with. She was excited about that. So she had a plan.

  She told me that she’d go into the store and buy the food for me, and I wouldn’t have any idea that it’s not kosher. I agreed.

  So we all got back into the car and drove to Stella’s Pizzeria on Merrick Road. My aunt asked me what I wanted, and I told her a mushroom slice.

  She said, “Just one?”

  And I said, “Yes, just one.”

  (I didn’t want to piss God off more by getting two.)

  So my aunt and my brother went into the store, and I sat in the back of the car, waiting for God to blow up the pizza shop, the car
, or both.

  My fifteen-year-old mind was being filled with every rabbi I ever had in yeshiva yelling at me that I was going to be thrown into a pit of fire for sinning. I was in a goyishe car, in a goyishe parking lot, next to a goyishe store.

  I watched closely as the counter boy put the slices into the oven. I was afraid it might touch pork. What if there’s pork flavor in the oven, or what if he cut my slice with the knife that he cut a slice of pepperoni or bacon?

  My heart raced as Aunt Linda paid the cashier, and I thought God was going to take her right then. He was going to take an arm off or sever her head.

  I thought about that saying “Don’t kill the messenger” to try and comfort myself.

  But God was God. He could do whatever the hell he wanted.

  I was scared for my brother, too, even though he didn’t order or pay for the slices. But the fact that he was in the store, with my aunt, made him an accessory to my downfall as a kosher Jew. I started to get a stomachache, and I couldn’t even tell if I was hungry anymore. The guilt was racking up pretty heavily.

  I realized I wasn’t that good boy that I used to be.

  So my aunt and my brother walked out of the store and got back into the car. My brother held the pizza box with the slices in it. But I couldn’t look at them or the box of pizza. I was too nervous. I just stared out the window as we continued down the street, afraid of the car crashing into a tree or a telephone pole.

  I could already see the breaking-news headline: ORTHODOX JEW BUYS NON-KOSHER SLICE OF PIZZA AND IS IMMEDIATELY KILLED ON THE WAY HOME.

  Then you will know I am the Lord, your God, I thought. Then you will know.

  So when we got home, Israel placed the pizza box on the dining-room table. Aunt Linda went into the kitchen to grab some paper plates.

  I asked Israel if he’d take my slice out, and he said, “No, I don’t wanna get involved.”

  My aunt told us we were both nuts, and she put my slice on a plate. My aunt and my brother had already started eating, so I felt a little encouraged. I figured if I was going be taken out, they’d go with me.

  So I picked up the slice…and took the first bite.

  I chewed it.

  I swallowed it.

  They asked me how it was, and I told them it was pretty good.

  But it was better than pretty good. Better than any kosher pizza I’d ever had—tasty tomato sauce, thin crust, fresh mushrooms, and cheese.

  But I didn’t want to come off as too happy or cocky. I didn’t want to piss off the Man Upstairs even more.

  So I quickly finished the slice, and I checked to make sure I wasn’t dead, and thought, Please God, forgive me, just this once. Please. It’s just a stupid slice of mushroom pizza.

  I enjoyed the slice…but I had just broken a major commandment.

  The next day Israel and I went to Florida, and it was over the course of that week that I traded in my yarmulke for a baseball cap. I was finally free from the pressure of my blessing, my rabbis, and my parents’ chaotic divorce. It was just me and my older brother, free to do as we pleased. We spent full days at Universal Studios, riding the roller coasters and playing arcades. We stayed up late in the hotel watching movies.

  And I couldn’t stop eating pizza that week. I think I had pizza for nearly every meal. Florida was my Sodom and Gomorrah.

  But of course, it isn’t that easy. It’s not like I just ate that one slice and everything’s all good.

  It’s been ten years since I ate that mushroom slice, and I’ve since made a full break from the religious fold. And yet I’m still scared that something horrible is going to happen to me for breaking the rules.

  I imagine ordering a bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich one day, and I can already see the breaking-news headline: FORMER ORTHODOX JEW ORDERS A BACON, EGG, AND CHEESE SANDWICH AND IS INSTANTLY STRUCK DOWN BY LIGHTNING IN LOCAL DINER.

  Then you will know I am the Lord, your God. Then you will know.

  MOSHE SCHULMAN has written for the Rumpus, Orange Quarterly, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, the Jewish Daily Forward, Tablet magazine, and elsewhere. The recipient of a scholarship to the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, he lives in New York City, where he recently completed a memoir about leaving the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community of Monsey, New York.

  This story was told on February 6, 2015, in the Great Hall at Cooper Union in New York City. The theme of the evening was Secret Heart: Stories of Cloaks and Daggers. Director: Meg Bowles.

  During World War II, I was a pupil at the French Lycée in London. But on reaching the ripe old age of eighteen, I was obliged to abandon my studies and either join the armed forces or work in a munitions factory.

  Well, that option did not thrill me. So I decided to become a member of the Women’s Royal Naval Service. Because I liked the hat. I thought it was most seductive.

  But when I went to sign on, I was taken aside and closeted in a kind of windowless broom cupboard with a high-ranking army officer, who began asking me an awful lot of questions which had nothing to do with the navy.

  He was leaping like a demented kangaroo in and out of four languages. And he seemed very surprised that I could keep up.

  He sent me to a large building in central London. Oh, I knew it well. But like the hordes of people who passed by every day, never had I imagined or even suspected that this was the headquarters of Churchill’s secret army. And that behind those walls, members of every occupied country were organizing acts of sabotage, and the infiltration of secret agents into enemy territory at night, by parachute, fishing boat, felucca, and submarine.

  Without realizing what had happened, I had been recruited into the hidden world of secret agents on special missions. (But I never got my seductive hat.)

  I was assigned to “F” for France section. It was an exhausting but exciting, thrilling, exhilarating life, full of action and emotion. We lived some very intense moments.

  I got to know an awful lot of agents. And I shared many confidences with those who were about to leave. They told me of their concerns for their families—many of them were married with young children—and of their own apprehension of torture and of death.

  They knew they only had a 50-percent chance of coming back. And they were afraid.

  Brave men are always afraid. Courage isn’t the absence of fear. It’s the willingness—the guts, if you like—to face the fear.

  They faced their fears. And they left.

  I remember one. He was a Jew. A radio operator. And he was going in on a second mission. Well, for a Jew to go in at all was extremely dangerous. But many did—we had quite a few Jewish agents. But a radio operator? A second mission?

  A radio operator was the most stressful, hazardous, dangerous mission of all. He lived on his nerves. He could never relax. He was always on the run, always with the Gestapo just a couple of steps behind him. He needed nerves of steel, because once infiltrated, his life expectancy was six weeks.

  I was with this agent on the night before he left. Oh, there was no romantic association; I was just keeping him company. After all, he was an old man—he was almost thirty-five.

  During the evening he drew out of his pocket a small velvet box. And inside there was a gold chain with a Star of David and a dove of peace hanging on it.

  He said simply, “I’d like you to have this.”

  “Thank you so much,” I stammered. “I’m terribly touched, but I couldn’t possibly accept it.”

  He looked so sad. So disappointed.

  He said, “Please do, oh, please do. All my family in France has perished in a German concentration camp. I’ve nobody left in the world. And I’d like to think that somebody remembers me. Somebody perhaps even thinks of me when I’m over there.”

  So I took his little box, promising to look after it and give it back to him when he returned.

  But he didn’t return.

  Those who did return were taken immediately for a debriefing, and I often accompanied the two debriefing officers.

 
; For me it was a revelation to see their different reactions. Some returned with their nerves absolutely shattered, in shreds. Their hands were shaking uncontrollably as they lit cigarette after cigarette.

  Others were as cool as cucumbers. And I realized then that we all have a breaking point. And we can never know until we’re faced with the situation what that breaking point actually is. Perhaps that is why departing agents were strongly urged if arrested by the Gestapo to take the cyanide pill, which was always hidden somewhere around their person, before they left. It would kill them within two minutes.

  I grew up attending those debriefing sessions.

  Many of those agents weren’t very much older than I. Hearing their incredible stories, witnessing their courage, their total dedication, I changed almost overnight from a teenager to a woman.

  One snowy Saturday evening in early February, I was told that I was to leave and go down to Beaulieu. Now, Beaulieu was the last of the many secret training schools. These training schools were dotted all over England. And the future agents attended each one in turn during their long, tough, six-month training. Beaulieu, or Group B as it was called, was in Hampshire, deep in the New Forest. Only six women worked there during the war, and I am the last survivor.