Up From Orchard Street (21 page)

Gabriel Solomon, our sandy-lashed, red-haired, soon-to-be-surgeon waiter, recited the night’s menu: salad, broiled salmon, boiled red potatoes, sliced tomatoes and corn on the cob, all served family style. A vast slab of butter lay on a white plate next to baskets of bread—white Wonder bread and buttermilk biscuits, neither of which had ever touched our lips. There was a bottle of Hershey’s chocolate syrup in the center of the table, a novelty for Jews who didn’t mix dairy foods with meat. “The milk is from the farm’s cows,” Gabe explained. “It’s pasteurized but it doesn’t taste like city milk. If you’d like city milk, it will be delivered to you. But try the farm milk. Some guests love it. The children seem to enjoy it with syrup.” Gabe paused. “I forgot to ask you, do you want your salad dressed or undressed?” Jack immediately replied, “Undressed of course,” and winked.

My mother worried about having fish with rolls and butter. “Fish is dairy,” my father pronounced, immediately an expert on Jewish dietary laws. “With meat it’s no butter and no milk for the children.”

Lil kept fidgeting in her straight-backed chair. “What kind of food is this?” she asked softly. “What do they call it?”

“American,” the two men said in unison.

Within minutes Gabe brought us a bowl filled with iceberg lettuce, butter lettuce, red oak lettuce. “These are grown right here, in our own garden. We pick the greens daily. I brought you some oil and vinegar on the side, and a gravy boat of sour cream for the tomatoes. Take a look at these tomatoes.” Each one was the size of a small melon, blood red, virtually seedless. Our would-be surgeon sliced them, one-two-three. We had not encountered such tomatoes before. “Beauties, aren’t they?” asked Gabe.

Jack held to certain eccentricities in his summer food. Without fail he sprinkled sugar over tomatoes, sugared his melons no matter how ripe and spread his corn with mustard—mustard! A cup filled with lump sugar sat next to the chocolate syrup. He asked for sugar he could pour on his tomatoes. Gabe Solomon replied, “Coming up, sir,” and sped into the kitchen. Lil poked into the lettuce bowl. “What is this with red on the ends?”

“Some kind of American lettuce,” replied Geoff, as if explaining an anthropological excavation. “I think I’ll try my salad with the dressing,” he announced. His decision obligated his entire family to do the same; he allowed his wife and children no individual choice. Our parents permitted Willy and me the same freedom we enjoyed in our restaurant.

Willy and I were accustomed to wasting our food. At home, I often added four teaspoons of raspberry jam and four lumps of sugar to my tea and then did not drink it; or asked for chicken and beef and sampled only a bit of each. Since we rarely ate with our parents or dined with them in restaurants, we had no one to define what was appropriate behavior at the table. At our first dinner in Connecticut, Willy poured a great deal of syrup into his milk, stirred it with his spoon, took one sip and pushed the milk aside. I buttered a roll, found it too dry and discarded it. Neither the tomatoes nor the salad interested us.

A small salmon followed the salad. At other tables people oohed and aahed, but we didn’t because there was no yellow sauce, no thick smooth Hollandaise, to accompany the fish. The lemon wedges, which everyone else seemed to enjoy squeezing over their salmon, would have been sport for Willy and me but we were afraid of antagonizing Uncle Geoff. Boiled red potatoes hadn’t the slightest appeal, but like everyone else, we applauded when the platters of corn appeared—each ear almost a foot long, golden and steamy.

It was impossible for me to finish an entire ear, but I did try and its natural sweetness lingers in memory as one of the best treats I ever had.

The adults at our table ate two each, my father’s lathered with mustard. Not knowing whether or not to be embarrassed, I raised my eyes to Lil. She was still struggling over the issue of butter, but finally she capitulated, making swooning noises as she ate her buttered corn. But the real one to watch was Cousin Alice.

Holding an ear of corn firmly between both hands, she ran her teeth along the entire length and swallowed. For once, absorbed in his own gratification, Uncle Geoff did not admonish her, and to her credit, Aunt Bea leaned over and wiped Alice’s mouth with a paper napkin after she finished gobbling each row.

Our family found paper napkins unacceptable. In our restaurant, we carelessly threw cloth napkins into the laundry bag after a perfunctory wipe. As his mustardy paper napkins piled up on his plate, Jack laughed. “Roughing it in Colchester,” he said.

Ours was the only table with leftover salad, salmon, potatoes. Hal Pankin, who spun as quickly as a top from table to table, landed at ours and asked if we had enjoyed the food.

“Very much,” my father answered, “but we’re a little tired from the trip. By the way, the corn was sensational.”

“And you ate it with mustard?”

“An old European custom.”

“My younger brother Maurey is in Europe now. Maybe he came across mustard with corn in France.”

“Could be.” My father was being charming, his eyes alight with mischief. “By the way, do you have cloth napkins?”

“Always on weekends. But there was a mix-up at the laundry. It sometimes happens.”

Terrified, I prayed that my father would not forget himself, wise-off and say, “If it doesn’t happen on Orchard Street, why should it happen here?” In full control, he agreed with Hal: “It certainly does.”

Hal called out with enthusiasm, “Fresh peach ice cream, made right here from our own peaches and cream.” The announcement brought on applause. Hal studied Willy for an instant. His head was scraping his chest. He had been sitting too long, with closed eyes. A kindly woman with red hair left her table and came over to ours, saving us from further scrutiny.

“I’m Estelle Solomon,” she said, introducing herself, “Gabe’s mother.” She laughed courteously. “Actually, I’m Estelle Solomon-Sullivan. My late husband, Ed Solomon, was in law practice with Phil Sullivan and after Ed died of heart disease . . . Anyway, I’m Estelle, and I’m fascinated by the stitchery in this dress.”

My mother smiled her appreciation.

“She is your . . .”

“Daughter. She’s my daughter.”

“I do stitchery as a hobby, and I wondered whether the embroidery is the French loop.”

French knots in hair, French labels in coats and dresses, French movie stars Lil comprehended. Not embroidery. She reached for a word that came often from my father’s lips, “Possibly.”

“I would love to know who embroidered that dress. The stitch is unique.”

“It’s my grandmother’s friend,” I offered. “She sews for a living. Not my grandmother, she’s a famous chef, but her friend. She has every colored thread, and she sews so quickly, you can hardly watch her fingers. She’s from Poland, and she keeps letters from Poland in her embroidery box.”

Estelle patted me on the head, “If you find out the name of the stitch will you let me know?” She paused. “I hope your service didn’t disappoint you. Gabe and Hal are very distracted tonight. They’re expecting their girlfriends.”

“Oh?”

“Gabe’s girl is prelaw, but Hal’s is premed. I’m not sure it’s best when both do the same work. I helped in my husband’s office two days a week. Now that I’m Mrs. Sullivan, I’m banned from the office.”

Since Jack and Lil thrived on sharing talk about fashion, my mother opened her mouth and then closed it. At the piano Hal began to play “The Sweetheart of Sigma Chi,” one of my mother’s specialties, and almost in a trance she walked to the piano. She began to sing with such purity that everyone stopped to listen.

The girl of my dreams / Is the sweetest girl
Of all the girls I know / Each fond caress . . .

She hummed when she didn’t know the next phrase, “fades in the afterglow.”

And the gold of her hair / And the blue of her eyes . . .
Are ala la la la lah

Jack saved her. He stood up and in perfect harmony sang:

And the moonlight beams / On the girl of my dreams
She’s the sweetheart of Sigma Chi.

The guests clapped. More than for the New England dinner, more than for the corn or the peach ice cream. Then both did an encore, Jack allowing my mother to sing most of the song and humming in the background. Lil was transformed when she sang. She held her hand to her heart as if fearing that it would stop suddenly if she didn’t. Her toned-down hair color enhanced her appearance, as did the blue polka-dotted dress that she had bought to flirt with Dr. Scott Wolfson. There were calls for still more singing, but she returned to the table—and from that moment on, my mother owned Pankin’s Farm.

After dinner, Aunt Bea and Lil sat on the lawn in rattan chairs and chatted with Estelle Solomon-Sullivan. The young law students returned from their walk and leaped up the stairs to their dormer room in the attic. Bits of grass and hay clung to the girl’s legs, arms and hair and the young man’s hair was disheveled, the fly of his pants squished over to one side. Jack took one look and asked, “What did they do, boff in the road?”

“Yes,” Hal replied matter-of-factly. “After a long day of studying, they eat, take a walk and make love.”

“Why not in bed? Why on the hard ground, with God knows what? They must smell like a stable.”

“Non disputandem est. Who can argue with taste?”

The sight of the two young lovers had a strange effect on Uncle Geoff; nothing would do but a guided tour of the barn and the surrounding land. But each time a car drove by, Hal would stop and run his hand through his copious hair. In the last rays of the sun I could see his fingers trembling. Even as he talked he seemed to be listening for the car that would bring his beloved.

“When we first moved here,” he began, “the place was rustic, circa 1910. My father, Hank, in deep mourning for my mother, couldn’t operate the farm. After a while he pulled himself together. There was actually an outhouse here, the first thing to go. Then came central plumbing and heating.

“The land here is very rocky, hard to cultivate. We brought in tons and tons of topsoil and planted corn, which Maurey and I sold in the village to tourists on a day’s outing. Every now and again people would drive up and ask if we knew of a room to rent for a night. That’s all my father needed to hear. He called his old buddies, builders and contractors, and began remodeling. He loved the idea of summer guests, because during the winter it’s pretty quiet, not much to do.”

We had a glimpse of the barn. “This is my father’s most recent project. He added a whole dormitory upstairs, facing the road.” Two tall skinny ladders were propped up against the east wall. “My friends and I like this arrangement because none of the guests or their kids climb up. We study every day from two to four, quiz each other on anatomy or diseases. And we take in some underprivileged children, four at a time from Front Street—you know, it’s a bad slum.”

Jack nodded. He of the beautiful songbird wife, whose address was theoretically in Yonkers, could nod sagaciously about Front Street as if it didn’t exist in the market area close to Fulton Street in downtown Manhattan.

“The Front Street kids have separate quarters below us,” Hal continued, “but not this weekend. We tucked them in next to the kitchen because our girls are coming, Gabe’s and mine for sure and maybe Ronny’s. They’re driving from Cambridge.”

My father and my uncle exchanged glances.

“I’d like to take a nap in the hayloft sometimes,” said Geoff.

Hal raced out because he heard a car, but the vehicle drove on without stopping.

It had grown dark. We were exhausted from the long day. Having dined on a slice of tomato and peach ice cream, I dreamed of my grandmother’s Friday night kitchen with its chicken soup, roast chicken with roasted potatoes, the summer fragrance of fresh fruit simmering in cauldrons. I loved this farm: the barn, our sleeping room. But I feared the things I could not mention, our real address, our true lives in New York. The tissue of half-truths or outright lies encircled me. Like a claustrophobic, I had to be on guard every minute. None of these things bothered my parents. They could spin any sort of fiction as easily as breathing.

We went upstairs early, my mother taking each step slowly. Willy fell asleep immediately, as did my mother. I was counting on my insomniac father to stay awake and possibly whisper to me, but he, too, was sleeping soundly. I stared out the window at the yellow light that illuminated the barn. The hotel grew silent. Doors didn’t open or close, bathrooms didn’t flush. I wondered if this would be one of those nights when I couldn’t close my eyes until dawn.

Then a crunch on gravel, and the slamming of a car door. I saw Hal race across the lawn. Two young women literally spilled out of the car. They stumbled to the grass, righted themselves. Gabe and his friend vanished from view, but I could see Hal with his arms around his girl. He lifted her skirt; her underpants were white and clingy. He placed his hand on her behind in a gesture as natural as the ardent kisses they exchanged. Obviously he couldn’t wait to get her up the crazy ladder that led to his dorm. He carried her to the barn, leaned her against a wall. She lifted her legs and clasped them around his waist. Like a puppet on a string her head lolled back and forth, forth and back, and Hal, his shorts around his ankles, raised on his toes and lowered as if they were dancing.

I had not seen anyone make love before, let alone in dim light, in the open air, against a barn wall. I could scarcely breathe for the sight of it, the naturalness of it. They seemed to continue forever until her head flopped over Hal’s shoulder, and slowly her leg dangled to the ground. Hal lifted her and carried her away.

I fell back on my pillow. How could I write all of this to Bubby? Our home address presented problems for me: 12 Orchard Street. Everyone at the hotel could read it. What if they did?

Experiencing a moment of complete rebellion, in my fantasy I went from table to table in the dining room and declared, “We’re from 12 Orchard Street. We have rats in our building and millions of roaches, icicles in the winter and the toilet is in the hall and we bathe in a tin bathtub, and every one of us has an illness, and my Bubby’s business is falling apart, and my mother hasn’t worked a single day at Saks Fifth even though she wants to, and Mister Elkin left my grandmother, and we had to hock everything we owned in order to come here and we’re as poor as the children you take in for charity on Front Street. Only different. Because my mother sings, my father wears hand-tailored jackets, my grandmother’s cooking is better than anything here, we flushed the pregnancy down the toilet, and Clayton hasn’t come back.”