Potatoes Are Cheaper

by Max Shulman

“Never!” hollered Mr. Zimmerman.

  “He’s not talking to you,” said Albert to Mr. Zimmerman.

  “Well?” I said to Celeste.

  “Give me the poem,” she said.

  I gave her the poem and she looked it over for a while. “Well,” she said finally, “here’s how I figure. No. 1: this was not my idea, going off to Frances Shimer Junior College. My stars, if I can’t find a boy in a huge metropolitan center like the Twin Cities, what can I expect in Mount Carroll, Illinois?… No. 2: I hate you, Morris Katz, you cockaroach, and I will never trust you again. But on the other hand it was you who first awakened me as a woman and that got to count for something … So No. 3: I can’t see any reason not to start up with you again. Naturally I’ll keep my eye out for something better, but meanwhile why not?”

  “I’ll tell you why not,” hollered Mr. Zimmerman. “You’re going to Frances Shimer Junior College, that’s why not.”

  “I’ll run away,” said Celeste.

  “I’ll run away with you,” I said.

  “Armand,” shrieked Mrs. Zimmerman to Mr. Zimmerman, “don’t send her!”

  “You tell him, lady,” said Albert to Mrs. Zimmerman.

  “Shit,” said Mr. Zimmerman to everybody.

  “I love you,” I said to Celeste.

  “In a pig’s valise,” said Celeste. “And let me tell you something else, you cockaroach. There’s gonna be no more On-Again Off-Again Finnegan. From now on it’s me every night and I don’t mean maybe. You got that?”

  “He got it,” said Albert. “Ain’t you, Morris?”

  “I got it,” I said, and Albert put the front seat back in the Olds. “So how’s about it, Celeste?” I said. “Shall we go for a little spin?”

  “I’ll kill the both of you first!” hollered Mr. Zimmerman.

  “Better wait till tomorrow,” said Celeste to me.

  “Maybe you’re right,” I said. “Well, good night, good night, parting is such sweet sorrow.”

  Then Albert and I got in the Maytag and drove away giggling and hugging each other. I wish now I hadn’t been in such a hurry to go. I wish I had stayed another couple seconds and told Celeste not to submit the new poem to the L’Etoile du Nord.

  Chapter Ten

  A week before the wedding Libbie said to me, “Morris, you know what would be charming?”

  “No,” I said.

  “If you gave a bachelor dinner for Jonathan,” she said.

  “Who’s gonna pay for it?” I said.

  “I got ten dollars,” she said. “Don’t tell Ma.”

  Well, I wasn’t exactly in a mood to throw a party. In fact, I was as low as a person gets. Things were worse than ever with Bridget thanks to that meatball Celeste who went and submitted my new poem to the L’Etoile du Nord. “Go,” was all Bridget said to me after she read the poem, just “Go.” I told her it was only a little jape because by now I’d looked up “jape” but that didn’t help. “Go,” was all she said. Even Sister Mary Frances was kinder than that; she offered to pray for me at least.

  So you can see why I was in no mood for a party. But on the other hand a bachelor dinner for Jonathan would give me an excuse to get a night off from Celeste which believe me, I needed badly. Since we got back together again Miss Steamydrawers hadn’t let loose of me for one second. So I told Libbie okay and started organizing the dinner.

  I figured ten bucks would cover eats for ten people with no trouble so that’s how many I invited. Then I went around to a few restaurants to see where I could get the best deal. It narrowed down finally to Amendola’s Little Napoli and the Shanghai Sanitary Pagoda. Little Napoli offered full-course dinners for ten including antipasto, minestrone, spaghetti and meatballs, gnocchi, spumoni, and two gallons of dago red. The Shanghai Sanitary offered egg rolls, fried shrimps, wonton soup, chicken chow mein, pork foo young, kumquats, fortune cookies, and all the tea we could drink. In terms of volume the chinks were better than Little Napoli but of course they didn’t include wine.

  So I asked Albert what he thought and he came up with a new idea altogether: why blow the money on food when for ten bucks we could all go to the whorehouse?

  I hesitated. First off, I was in no desperate need to get my end wet, as you know. Second, I’m frankly not too big a fan of whorehouses; I prefer the thrill of the chase even if it means a bum lay and a steering wheel in the back. And third, I wasn’t quite sure this was the right thing to do, getting my sister’s fiancé laid, especially with her money.

  “Why don’t you leave it up to Jonathan?” said Albert. “It’s his party.”

  So I did. I went to Jonathan, explained the choices, and asked him to decide.

  “Well, Morris,” said Jonathan, “let me put it this way. I never yet saw gnocchi that compared with nookie and I’d rather screw young than foo young. Does that answer your question?”

  “Yes,” I said and off we went to Cockeye Jennie’s in Minneapolis where for a dollar apiece you could pick from a nice selection of girls, all government inspected, ten minutes per trick, any style you like—regular, continental, or half-and-half.

  It was a good value, no question, but the real attraction at Cockeye Jennie’s wasn’t the girls, it was the atmosphere. It was like a club, kind of. You’d wait downstairs in a big room full of comfortable chairs and the girls would keep walking through in their teddies, but not hustling you, just showing what they had. If you saw something you liked, you’d take her upstairs. If not, you’d just sit and bullshit with the guys as long as you wanted to. Jennie didn’t believe in high pressure, that was the nice part.

  Anyhow, the bunch of us walked in that night and sat down and as usual Jonathan started doing his stuff. First he sang, “Give me ten men who are stout hearted men,” and then he told a couple hundred jokes and then he imitated a screech owl with the piles and then he analyzed everyone’s handwriting including the whores.

  Naturally he was a smash. For over an hour we all sat around plotzing from laughter, even Cockeye Jennie, but finally she got businesslike. “Gents,” said Jennie, “there’s no hurry of course but I’d like you to take a look at the newest member of our team.” She pointed at a banjo-assed blond in green and gold teddies. “This gorgeous young thing just arrived from Chicago,” said Jennie, “and you know what hot stuff they got in Chicago. Gents, say hello to Carla Sandburg.”

  “Hi, honey,” said Jonathan. “Butchered any good hogs lately?”

  “Oh, you!” said Carla.

  “Okay, boys, who’s for Carla?” said Jonathan.

  “Mel” hollered Henry Leibowitz. “For God sakes, me!” Henry had never been to a whorehouse before—how could he with no money?—and he was so excited he’d already come several times. So he rushed upstairs with Carla and pretty soon the other guys started pairing off and disappearing until at last only Jonathan and me were left.

  “You in a hurry to go upstairs?” I said to Jonathan.

  “Not especially,” he said. “Why?”

  “I thought we might talk a little,” I said. “I mean here we are practically brothers and what do I really know about you?”

  “What’s to know?” he said. “I’m a simple, honest businessman, that’s all.”

  “Yeah, and I’m Sister Kenny,” I said. “Come on, Jonathan, anybody can see you’re a thief and a swindler. And that’s what got me so puzzled. What the hell do you expect to get from us?”

  “Affection and friendship, my boy,” he said. “What else is there.”

  “Thank you and up your hoon,” I said. “Listen, I know this is a lot to ask, but couldn’t you tell the truth for just a little while?”

  “How long?” he said.

  “Ten seconds,” I said. “All I want to know is this: what do you do? I mean really. Don’t give me that crap about how you go out on Sunday morning and blow beer coils with your little red hose.”

  Jonathan made a sigh. “Well, Morris,” he said, “I guess I should have known I’d never put one over on a sharp operator like y
ou.”

  “Damn right,” I said.

  “So I’m gonna tell you,” he said. “But first you got to give me your solemn oath it goes no further.”

  “My hand to God,” I said, raising it.

  “Okay, here’s what I do,” he said and made his voice into a whisper. “I got a deal with all the circumcisionists in town. They save the foreskins they slice off during the week and I pick ’em on Sunday. A nickel a skin, I pay.”

  “What the hell do you do with foreskins?” I said.

  “What do you think?” he said. “I ship ’em to Ireland, they plant ’em over there, and they grow up to be policemen.”

  Then he busted out laughing and threw his arms around me, mostly so I wouldn’t be able to belt him, but in a second I was laughing myself and hugging him back. How do you stay sore at a barrel of monkeys like Jonathan?

  “Jonathan, you slippery sonofabitch, I like you,” I said which I did. “You’re cunning as a shithouse rat and I wish to God you had your hooks in somebody else’s sister, not mine, but still and all I never met anyone as peppy as you in my whole life and I got to admit it: I like you.”

  “I’m glad,” he said. “Because I like you back, kid, and that’s a fact.”

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “And listen,” he said. “Don’t worry about your sister.”

  “I won’t,” I said. “With Libbie what’s the use worrying? You always know how it’s gonna come out: bad. At least from you she’ll get a few laughs along the way.”

  “I don’t suppose I can convince you you’re wrong,” he said.

  “No,” I said.

  “Then there’s only one thing left to say,” he said.

  “What?” I said.

  “Let’s go upstairs and get banged,” he said.

  So we did and that was Jonathan’s bachelor party.

  Continuing the roundup of pre-wedding activities, I’ll tell you now about the pink taffeta formal for Celeste.

  It took a little doing to get Celeste over so Ma could fit her for that dress. The first time I asked her she said, “Go lay an egg. I don’t even know your sister. What do I want to be her maid of honor for? And besides I think your mother is icky.”

  But gradually Celeste turned more agreeable. Here’s why: her sex life was back to normal. That is, she was getting laid every night. True, there were still times when I couldn’t get it up, but Jonathan, the old pussy-maven, taught me a trick which fixed that. He told me when your cock wouldn’t cooperate, close your eyes and imagine the broad you’re with is some glamorous movie queen you’ve always had the hots for.

  Well, it worked but not quite the way Jonathan described. For instance, the first time I was in trouble I closed my eyes and tried to imagine Celeste was Ginger Rogers. But nothing happened except I felt like tap dancing. Next I ran through Dorothy Lamour, Madeleine Carroll, and Marlene Dietrich which you’ll agree you can’t do better, but still it just drooped. Then by luck I thought of a new twist. Instead of imagining that only Celeste was a movie star, I imagined the both of us were. Like if she was Jeanette MacDonald, I was Nelson Eddy. If she was Ruby Keeler, I was Dick Powell. And that did it—or at least most of the time. Occasionally I found I needed still more help, so I’d expand a little—like I was John Garfield and Celeste was all four Lane sisters. That never failed.

  Anyhow Celeste’s disposition was a lot better lately—hers, not mine—so finally she broke down and came home with me to get fitted. Libbie and Ma and Pa were there and also Aunt Lena, Albert’s mother, who was the best seamstress of all the aunts so she was going to help Ma with the sewing, seeing as how there wasn’t a lot of time left before the wedding.

  “Hello, dearie,” Ma said to Celeste when I brought her in. Pa just nodded. He was sulking a little. It was Sunday but on account of Celeste’s fitting, Pa’s regular reading of Itzik Fishel’s poem had been canceled. So he just nodded.

  Then Libbie stepped forward with a big smile and a pair of white gloves so long she must have started putting them on the night before. “Ah,” said Libbie, “this must be the famed Celeste about who I’ve heard such wonderful things.”

  “How do you do?” said Celeste.

  “May I kiss you?” said Libbie. “I feel we’re almost family in a matter of speaking.”

  “Well, okay,” said Celeste, and Libbie kissed her.

  “And this is my dear Aunt Lena,” said Libbie.

  “You don’t want to kiss me, do you?” said Celeste to Lena.

  “Feh,” said Aunt Lena.

  “How do you do?” said Celeste.

  “How do you do?” said Aunt Lena.

  “Would you care for some refreshments, my dear?” said Libbie to Celeste. “You’ll find these biscuits rather delightful.”

  “No thanks,” said Celeste. “I’m not too crazy about Oreos.”

  “Maybe she’d like a wiener,” said Pa.

  “Actually what I’d like is to get this over with,” said Celeste.

  “Who wouldn’t?” said Ma. “Turn around a couple times, dearie.”

  So Celeste turned around a couple times while Ma and Aunt Lena looked her over.

  “You sure you got enough material, Pearl?” said Aunt Lena.

  “Six yards is not enough?” said Ma.

  “I don’t know,” said Aunt Lena. “The tochess alone got to be four yards.”

  “But you’ll save on top,” said Ma. “There she got nothing.”

  “All right, but the skirt got to go all the way to the floor,” said Aunt Lena. “Look at them legs, God forbid.”

  “Why, I think Celeste has a darling figure,” said Libbie.

  “Is there nothing but liars in this family?” said Celeste.

  “Enough talking,” said Ma. “Libbie, get the pins. Celeste, take off the clothes. Morris, Nathan, get out of the room.”

  “Don’t go far, Morris,” said Celeste.

  “He won’t,” said Pa. “He’ll be in the kitchen listening to Itzik Fishel.”

  So with Celeste’s dress out of the way, we started looking for a tux for me. Naturally we weren’t going to rent one if we could borrow one for free, so we called everybody we knew who owned a tux—two people altogether. Unfortunately they were the wrong size—too small, not too big. If they’d been too big the aunts would have cut the suits down in a minute. In fact, Aunt Esther suggested borrowing the two tuxes that were too small and stitching them together, but Ma suddenly came up with a better idea.

  “You know who got a tux,” she said.

  “Who?” we said.

  “I just told you,” said Ma. “You-Know-Who.”

  “Ah,” we said because now we understood. You-Know-Who was my officially dead cousin Seymour whose name you dassn’t mention since he married the shicksa.

  And it was true about Seymour having a tux. He bought one a few years back when he was working as a waiter in the Ryan Hotel dining room. In fact, that’s where he met the famous shicksa. It was during State Fair week, I remember, and she had come down from Bemidji with her 4-H club. Hulda Asleksen, her name was, a blond girl with thighs like trees. Anyhow, Seymour was the waiter at her table and they got to kidding back and forth and he kept trying to make a date, which she was willing enough, but she had to be in bed by nine every night and he didn’t finish work till ten. So finally they made a date for Seymour’s night off.

  The trouble was that on the afternoon of Seymour’s night off, Hulda’s calf, which had been a heavy favorite in the Guernsey judging at the State Fair, came in ninth in a field of nine. Who knows why? It’s part of the game, that’s all.

  Hulda took it real hard. She managed to keep the date with Seymour all right, but the whole night long all she did was sit there and cry with those big round thighs. And there was Seymour, basically a soft-hearted person but also dying from a hard on. You know the rest: in order to stop the bawling and start the humping, he finally had to propose.

  Well, it’s happened to better guys than Seymour. Anyhow, he w
as living up in Bemidji now with Hulda where naturally who needs a tux? So it was still hanging in his former closet at home, and that’s where Ma and I went to see if it would fit me. It was kind of a delicate subject because you could never mention Seymour’s name, so Ma approached it very carefully.

  Seymour’s mother and father were my Aunt Bryna and Uncle Herschel (the spats-maker; you remember Herschel) so first Ma exchanged a little bullshit about this and that and then she finally popped the question. “Listen,” she said, “you yourself don’t have a son, everybody knows that. But if you did, what size would he be?”

  “Thirty-six short,” said Aunt Bryna.

  “That’s it,” I said and we checked off the tux situation.

  Next Ma went to hire a rabbi for the wedding. There were three synagogues in St. Paul but one was Reform so naturally to this one we didn’t belong. The other two were Orthodox and at one time or another we’d been members of both.

  First we belonged to the Sons of David but that ended when Ma got into a fight with the rabbi—Rabbi Greenberg, his name was. What happened was Ma was cleaning a chicken one day and she found a little piece of something hard in the gizzard. According to the rules, if there’s anything in the gizzard that’s made out of metal, the chicken is not kosher. But if it’s made out of sand or gravel, the chicken is kosher. But you’re not allowed to decide by yourself; you got to take the chicken to a rabbi.

  So off Ma went to Rabbi Greenberg and he took a look at the gizzard and he said, “Too bad, missus. That’s a cuff link.”

  “What are you talking?” Ma said. “That’s a piece gravel.”

  “With initials?” said the rabbi.

  So of course Ma did what everybody does in those cases: you eat the chicken and join a different shul.

  So we joined the Sons of Zion, and in fact we were still members but Ma decided not to have the rabbi marry Libbie—Rabbi Sopkin, his name was. It wasn’t that Ma didn’t like Rabbi Sopkin; she did; everybody did. He was a nice easy-going old guy who was always willing to turn a blind eye when you showed up with a chicken who had metal in the gizzard, but the point was he did have a blind eye. He wore a black patch over it when he remembered but generally he forgot. Also he had this bad stammer and there was a hunch on his back, not too big, but you could notice it all right, don’t worry. And another thing: I don’t mean any disrespect, but facts are facts. Rabbi Sopkin was a terrible farter. And not little sneaky ones either; great big rolling ones, and steady. My Uncle Shimen, a veteran, said it reminded him of Château-Thierry.