Unorthodox

by Deborah Feldman

  I am uncomfortable with the idea of undressing in front of another woman, a strange mikvah attendant. I tell my teacher this. She assures me that during the inspection process I can remain in a bathrobe, and that when you immerse in the bath, the women don’t look at you until you are in the water, and they hold your robe up in front of them like a curtain when you walk up the stairs.

  Still, I’ve lived my life knowing that even the furniture shouldn’t see my naked body. I’ve never bothered to clear the fog on the bathroom mirror. I’ve never even looked down there. This isn’t right.

  The birth control, prescribed by a local midwife, makes me wake up in the middle of the night and clutch my stomach, nausea coming over me in waves. I try crackers and toast and vomit up a neat pile of soggy whole-grain crumbs. The midwife says it will get better with time, and I can go off it as soon as I’m married.

  I spend each morning in the weeks before my wedding struggling to overcome the incessant nausea so I can summon the strength to do all my trousseau shopping.

  Bubby and Zeidy are too old to have the energy to plan my wedding, so Chaya does most of it. We shop for linens at Brach’s Bed and Bath on Division Avenue and buy china and kitchenware at Wilhelm’s housewares nearby. I choose a beautiful Villeroy & Boch tablecloth to go on the miniature Formica table we bought, custom designed to fit into the tiny kitchen of the apartment we’ve rented. I’m going to be living on the fifth floor of a giant apartment building on Wallabout Street, in what used to be the commercial district of Williamsburg. The neighborhood is littered with run-down warehouses and abandoned lofts; double-wide trailers still growl through the streets at all hours.

  The apartment is six hundred square feet, with an alcove kitchen, a living/dining room, and a tiny master bedroom. We buy two forty-four-inch beds because the forty-eight-inch ones won’t fit, and Shaindy still wants me to have wider beds. She says it’s easier for nursing babies. Regal Furniture in Borough Park has the mattresses custom made. There is a little porch off the living room facing Lee Avenue, and if I step out, I can see a long line of porches on either side of me, leading off of identical apartments, all inhabited by newly married couples. On my left a young man smokes a cigarette, his tzitzis fringes dangling over his black pants, his white shirt untucked and stained yellow. Ash dribbles down onto his beard. He sees me looking at him and stamps out his cigarette quickly and goes inside.

  Some days I go to the apartment, supposedly to organize the closets and get it ready, but I just sit in the living room and play Hilary Duff on the stereo, keeping the volume low so the neighbors won’t hear me listening to gentile music. I trace my fingers over the grain in the hardwood floor and think about what it will be like to be able to live here all the time and never have to go back to the house on Penn Street.

  I bring my books here now and hide them in the bathroom cabinet. Bubby wonders what I do for so long in my new apartment, when most of the furniture hasn’t even been delivered yet. I’m curled up on the bare floor reading, and this time it’s a bad book, a book I wouldn’t want to be caught reading at home. Mindy told me about it; she lent it to me after she was finished. The Romance Reader, it’s called. It’s about a religious Jewish girl just like us, who wants to read books and wear bathing suits. But even better, the author was an Orthodox girl too, and she went “off the derech,” as they say, or off the path. She became secular. Mindy knows the author’s mother, she says, who runs a little needlepoint shop in the center of town. She wears a scarf on her head and everything. They say she doesn’t talk to her daughter anymore.

  Even if the book claims it’s a novel, I read it like a breathtaking piece of raw journalism, because the stories detailed within are so current and real, they could be happening to me, and I know that the author must have at least based the book on her intimate life experiences. Like me, the heroine enters an arranged marriage. She is horrified to discover that her new husband is weak-willed and dim-witted. In the end she divorces him but finds herself back at her family’s table. In my world, that is the ultimate defeat. Why would she go back to the world she was trying to escape in the first place? She thought marriage would bring her independence; then she thought divorce would truly set her free. But maybe there was never a path to freedom, not for her, not for anyone like us.

  I brush away my discontent. My future husband will not turn out to be weak-willed or dim-witted. He will be brave and strong, and we will do everything we were always told not to do, together. We will leave all the craziness behind.

  In addition to my kallah lessons, Chaya has also signed me up for hashkafah classes. Those are also lessons in preparation for marriage, but they don’t really deal with the legal aspects. Rather they are supposed to prepare us emotionally for being in a successful relationship. These are group sessions, attended by over a dozen soon-to-be brides, and before the classes start, the girls pile onto the sofas in giggly heaps, comparing jewelry and relating the details of their shopping excursions.

  The woman who teaches the class is a rebbetzin, a rabbi’s wife. She instructs us all to find a seat around the large oak table in her dining room as she stands before the hastily erected whiteboard in the front of the room. In her lessons she outlines scenarios and has us guess solutions to various challenges presented to marital bliss. The girl who guesses right wins her glance of approval. But as she reiterates different versions of what appear to be the same problem, it becomes clear to me that there is only ever one answer. She calls it compromise, but it feels the same as giving in.

  The characters in her scenarios are unfailingly formal, and I find it hard to believe that there are couples out there who really interact with each other that way, with all the familiarity of strangers. Surely, even for those who have trouble overcoming shyness, the sense of newness can’t last forever? I find it hard to believe that the rebbetzin and her husband still approach each other like appliances that need an instruction manual after all these years. The girls around the table seem to take her instructions for granted. I want to shake them all out of their automaton states. Can’t you see, I want to shout, how blinded you are by the jewelry and the new linens? You are missing the point! In the end all you will be left with are your closets full of new things and a husband that comes with a remote control!

  I feel smug. Certainly I won’t talk to my husband in that way, cold and deferential like the teacher advises. Eli and I will treat each other like human beings. We won’t have to tiptoe on eggshells. They make it out so that the genders are like different species, doomed to forever misunderstand each other. But really, the only differences that exist between men and women in our community are the ones that are imposed on us. Underneath it all, we are the same.

  Chaya asks me about my progress constantly. She is suddenly enthusiastic about the minute events of my life, always calling Bubby’s house and asking to speak with me. She chose these two teachers especially for me, she remarks; she knew they would be the perfect fit. My mouth curls into a sneer when I hear her say that, although I only utter a vague affirmative sound in return. A perfect fit? Why would an old, decrepit lady be a perfect fit, when she could have chosen someone younger, more vibrant, and more realistic instead? It never ceases to amaze me how little Chaya really knows about me, after all this time spent controlling my life.

  For every special occasion, every holiday, a gift arrives for me from my future husband’s family. It is always wrapped in pretty paper and accompanied by bonbons or flowers. First there was a string of fat, shiny pearls resting in a small arrangement of fake fruit for Tu B’Shvat, the new year of the trees. I had already sent my future husband an ornate silver case for the etrog he would take to the synagogue with him on future Sukkot holidays. I placed it in a wooden crate that I spray-painted gold and stuffed with ferns and lemons, as well as with some small gifts for his sisters and brothers. The gift giving is a long-standing tradition, and every engagement is marked by the flurry of the exchange, as brides and mothers-in-law compete with ea
ch other to see who can send the most prestigious gifts, along with the most elaborate presentations.

  On Purim I send my mother-in-law a silver tray with twenty miniature chocolate trifle cups arranged in a row, along with an expensive bottle of wine and two crystal goblets stuffed with layers of milk chocolate and white chocolate mousse. I wrap it in clear cellophane and tie it with a giant silver bow. One of my cousins will drive it up to Kiryas Joel, wedged firmly between the front and backseat so that it doesn’t topple. I also send my future husband his own megillah, the scripture that is read aloud twice on the holiday, the ancient account of the story of Queen Esther. It cost Zeidy sixteen hundred dollars to purchase it from the scribe, and the parchment was rolled up and placed in a luxurious leather case made especially for such a document. I slipped it into a glass ice bucket with a bottle of champagne and some rock candy to look like ice. I’m glad I get to send my fiancé nice gifts; I know the boys compare the megillahs and etrog cases they receive, showing them off in the synagogue, and it’s nice to know that Eli will be able to feel pride in the way he is being showered with such valuable pieces. Zeidy is very generous when it comes to his future grandson-in-law. I have never seen him part with his money so joyfully. It’s like he was saving every penny for this occasion.

  Zeidy says he will let me call my chassan on Purim to wish him a happy holiday. He lets me use the telephone in the kitchen with the short wire, and I know I only have a few minutes to exchange pleasantries, but I’m excited to hear Eli’s voice nonetheless. His sister sent me a photo of him a few weeks ago where he is perched next to the gift I sent him, smiling sweetly, and I have not been able to stop looking at the length of tanned arm and his collarbone in the photo. I have tried to imagine what he could look like under that loose white shirt, but to no avail. I can’t even remember the sound of his voice, so I’m excited to hear it again. I will try to record it so I can hear his voice replay in my mind over and over after the holiday.

  Zeidy calls my in-laws first to relay his greetings, then hands me the phone to speak to my mother-in-law. “We received your lovely gift,” she says formally. “It was beautifully arranged.” Mine is on the way, but I won’t ask about it. Will I get a watch or a brooch? I wonder.

  She asks me to hold on while she calls Eli to the phone.

  “A guten Purim,” he says cheerfully, and I can hear his impish smile through the receiver.

  Purim is his favorite holiday, he tells me. The costumes, the music, the drinking—what’s not to love about it? It’s the one day when everyone gets to let loose.

  “Did you get my gift to you?” I ask. “Did you like the wine I sent? I picked it especially for you.”

  “Yes, I got it, thank you, it’s beautiful. My father took the wine though; he won’t let me drink it. He says it’s not kosher enough for him. You know my father, he only buys wine with the Satmar rabbinical seal. Nothing else is good enough for him.”

  I’m horrified. My grandfather was with me when we purchased that wine. Zeidy is a holy man, much holier than Eli’s father. How dare my future father-in-law imply that Zeidy is less vigilant than he is! I’m ticked off.

  Eli breaks the awkward silence. “I sent you something too,” he says. “It will get there soon. I helped put it together, but mostly my sisters did everything. Still, I hope you like it.”

  I feign cool indifference. It is unseemly to express too much excitement over gifts. At Zeidy’s impatient signal I say my good-byes, suddenly aware that everyone in the room is listening.

  “Happy Purim, Eli,” I say, rolling the smooth syllables of his name carelessly before I realize that it’s the first time I’ve said his name out loud to him. It feels suddenly, strangely intimate, but before I can say anything else, the clicking sound at the other end of the line abruptly dispels the sensation.

  My Purim gift arrives late in the afternoon, delivered by special courier all the way from Kiryas Joel. It must have been the traffic that kept him so long. Everyone knows it’s impossible to drive into Williamsburg on Purim. The streets are choked with party trucks and drunk revelers. The messenger can barely make his way up the stairs with his oversized package, wrapped and tied flamboyantly in trailing purple raffia. It’s a giant cake shaped like a fiddle, with individual fondant strings and even a bow leaning on the side, with chocolates shaped like musical notes all around. “May your future be as sweet as the fiddler’s tune,” says the card at the top. I want to see what’s in the black velvet box sitting innocently in the belly of the instrument. I slip it out carefully from under the edible strings and open it to see a heavy gold watch, its thick links shimmering in the light, the diamonds clustered around its face like a halo. Everyone crowds around me to get a glimpse. I put it on and it clanks heavily down to the bottom of my slim wrist.

  “You’ll have to get it resized,” Bubby says. It is several links too large. I look down at the foreign piece of jewelry on my arm. I have never owned a watch that cost more than ten dollars. This one is an ostentatious display; the face is at least half an inch thick and sparkles with gems inlaid in various patterns, while the chain is formed in an intricate pattern of gold links that shift awkwardly with every movement of my wrist. In my opinion, jewelry should be dainty and feminine; it should bring attention to the wearer, not to itself. This watch is like a separate being, not an adornment.

  Still, I hold my wrist out proudly to all my cousins and aunts, who ooh and aah and try to guess how much it cost. It suddenly occurs to me to check the back for an inscription, but when I do, there’s nothing there. When I bought Eli his watch, I had it engraved with his name. No one else would ever be able to wear it. But it is appropriate that this watch should not have my name on it. It wasn’t made for me, not in the way Eli’s watch was, handpicked for his personality, the way I like it. This watch is for a girl that doesn’t exist, a girl that my mother-in-law thinks she’s getting. The girl that everyone wants, who is as bland as oatmeal under her heavy jewelry, who piles on the pearls and the bracelets to give herself some allure because underneath them she is as commonplace as a pebble.

  I don’t need this watch, or those pearls. For now, it feels nice to have them, but I know they will not be hard to let go of someday. Perhaps if they had been picked for me, it would have been different later. It would have been harder to part with something that had been carefully chosen to complement my style. But these gifts were purchased with no thought to who I was or what I might like. And when I would eventually part with them years later, I would feel relieved. My life would feel lighter as I removed each link to my past.

  At the worst possible moment, a new scandal breaks. The rabbis put a temporary ban on the wig trade, because it has been discovered that most of the hair that wigmakers use to make the sheitels for married Hasidic women comes from India, from the temples where the women go to shave their heads and offer up their hair as sacrifices. For the women of the Hasidic community to gain in any way from the worship of idols is an unimaginable horror. It’s the work of the devil, the rabbis claim, a punishment for the promiscuity of our women. Married women pranced around in gorgeous human-hair wigs and it angered God, they say, and so through the vanity of women we are all deceived and seduced by Satan. The Yiddish newspapers that arrive on our doorstep every morning contain the same angry headlines, with photos of rabbis pumping their fists righteously in synagogues throughout Brooklyn.

  No more human hair, the rabbinical court announces. From now on, only synthetic wigs can be bought or sold. Until the community can determine an authentic source for human hair that’s not a result of idol worship, that’s all that will be available.

  I curse the arrival of this new complication right before my wedding. Why couldn’t it have waited until after? Now, instead of buying me luxurious, silky wigs like every other young girl gets before she marries, Zeidy will purchase only cheap synthetic ones, and I know that those look ugly, with a plastic sheen that can never be mistaken for real hair and a shelf life of no more tha
n six months. Even when wigs do become kosher again, there’s no way I will have the money to purchase them on my own. One human-hair wig can cost upward of three thousand dollars.

  When Chaya takes me to the wigmaker to get my measurements, I sit sullenly in the rotating hairdresser chair, glaring resentfully at the options laid out in front of me.

  “The only thing I miss,” says the sheitelmacher, holding the wigs out on little foam heads, “is the feeling of the wind in my hair. Otherwise it’s so much more convenient. I never have to wait for my hair to dry or to spend hours styling it. It’s such a relief.”

  My hair has never been much of a difficulty, drying into smooth, lanky strands straight out of the shower. Still, I’m nervous to see how I will look in my new wigs, which can be ordered in whatever vibrant color I choose, and cut according to my preference.

  I choose three wigs, one for Shabbos, a little longer so it can fit under my white tichel, the traditional scarf worn on Friday nights that’s draped over the wig and tied at the nape of the neck. The other two are short and smart like the women in my family wear them; Zeidy doesn’t allow wigs that are longer than shoulder-length.

  That night there is a big bonfire in front of the Satmar shul, and all the men bring their wives’ wigs and throw them in the fire, while the crowds stand around cheering emphatically. Policemen set up barriers to keep people from spilling into the roads and to prevent riots. The shouting goes on till dawn anyway, and journalists snap countless photos, much to everyone’s rage.

  When Zeidy brings home The Wall Street Journal the next morning, the bonfire is on the front cover. “Wig-burning is the new bra-burning,” reads the tagline, and I don’t quite understand what it means, but I know it’s mocking. Zeidy shakes his head in disappointment as he reads the article.