The Undying Spark | ||||
PART ONE PART TWO
PART THREE |
By: Jacob Auerbach Copyright @ 1992- Jacob Auerbach, Long Beach, N.Y. CHAPTER TWO STILL WATERS P. 17 - 25 1. G-d's Creatures
Shershev was situated on both banks of
a small river, Lesna, which flowed sluggishly through it before spreading into a swamp
on the outskirts. It was spanned by a wooden bridge, about seventy-five feet long but too
narrow for two-way vehicular traffic. When two horse-drawn wagons approached
simultaneously from opposite sides one had to wait a few minutes for the other one to
cross before crossing in turn. The bridge was the only connection between both parts of
town, unless one was to wade across the swamp--not difficult during the dry summer months.
In winter everything froze solid and it was no problem to get across on foot or by sleigh. During good weather the river's only sandy bank near the bridge was alive with barelegged women, their long skirts tucked in high above their knees, washing their laundry in metal basins, slapping the clothes with wooden paddles over flat stones, or rinsing them in the stream. It was unseemly for grown men to stand about gawking, but we boys had no such inhibitions and hung around ostensibly fishing or looking for frogs, but not missing the intriguing female contours revealed by the clinging wet garments. Our "fishing" was done with a string tied to a stick, the hook made of a rusty pin with a piece of bread crust for bait--at least that was used by me because of an aversion to worms. None of us ever caught anything, and I doubt if any fish were around with all the commotion of the washing. We were more successful with frogs, which were grabbed with bare hands, taken some distance away from the water, then watched as they jumped back to the river, under our prodding. We never harmed them otherwise--we were taught compassion for "G-d's creatures." Pigs, of course, did not come under that category.Of all "G-d's creatures" our tenderest feelings were reserved for the birds. The town was full of sparrows, and we could tell the deep-brown males from the grayish females. They were all over the place, and used to swoop down on the still steaming horses' droppings on the cobblestones, chirping, squabbling and pecking away for all they were worth, and in no time the dropped balls were transformed into a nasty mess spread about the pavement. Crows were the next abundant species, and flew over the houses in swarms, wheeling and turning as if on command, their flapping wings and strident cawing drowning out all other sounds. They nested in the trees around the Russian church and the cemetery behind it, and never alighted on the ground. Then there were the storks, which we saw high in the sky flying in V formation southward in the fall and back again in the spring. They built their nests of dry twigs on the thatched roofs of the peasants' houses, and could be seen standing there on one red leg, their heads and enormous beaks turning in circular motion while producing a series of sharp clacking sounds like that of two boards being struck against each other. I do not recall ever seeing two storks together near their nest, supposedly because one remained to guard the eggs or fledglings while the mate was feeding in the swamp on the plentiful population of frogs, leeches, small water snakes, and fish. After catching the prey they would throw it into the air with an upward jerk of the beak and catch it again on the way down, repeating the performance again and again until the food was in proper condition to be swallowed or taken home to feed the nestlings.
The birds we loved most were the
swallows, black except for a bright red spot
on the throat and red markings
under the wings which could be seen only when they were in flight. They used to appear
every spring and we knew then that the harsh winter is definitely over. Their nests were
built out of mud, usually in clusters, right underneath the eaves, and it was believed
that the same birds came back to their own nests each year. The house of my maternal
grandmother had two such nests, and we kids were delighted to watch the swallows dart
like lightning just past us, disappear from view, dart in from another direction again and
again, and only then, apparently satisfied that no danger lurks, disappear into the nest
opening. We guarded "our" nests with a sense of proprietorship and chased away
other birds and cats if they came too close. Though we heard faint peeps, we never saw the
young come out and learn to fly. They either did this early in the morning when we were
still asleep, or else remained in the nest until ready for flying. One fall day after the
birds were gone both nests fell down
during a strong squall. They were
never rebuilt again.
2. Landmarks
Not far from the bridge, in the center
of town, a sprawling open area constituted the business section, market place, and
fairground. In the middle of this space stood a massive fortresslike rectangular
structure, with thick masonry walls; transversed by a wide arcade for pedestrian passage.
The building was honeycombed with about twenty-five stores, and the arcade contained a
number of closet-like niches used as trading posts or stands. Each store, or krom
in Yiddish, was a cubicle about ten feet wide by eighteen feet deep, without windows, the
walls lined with shelves and the floor encumbered by wooden boxes, barrels and sacks,
perhaps not unlike the old-time American country store. It had one solid door of rough
wood on heavy hand-wrought
iron hinges, and next to it a
similarly constructed Dutch door, the bottom half of which formed a counter when the upper
half was open. The storekeeper (kremer in Yiddish, kremerke for female) sat
on a high stool behind the counter, or often stood just outside the door, calling out his
wares to every passerby. The high stool had a double purpose: first, to afford a view
across the counter; second, and more important, to provide warmth during the frigid
Russian winter. For underneath the stool was placed a cast-iron pot filled with glowing
charcoal, which exuded enough heat for comfort, especially for the women who draped their
long skirts like a tent all around the stool while sitting on it, the heated air thus
being directed upward to keep their bodies warm even on very cold days.
These "firepots" provided an
obvious and inexhaustible source of wisecracks at the expense of the "hot women"
and their husbands who knew of no better way of keeping them warm. Occasionally the women
indeed got more heat than bargained for, when a flaring ember would shoot out of the pot
and singe their underclothes down to the skin. But that was only one of the minor hazards
of being a kremerke. The houses surrounding the market place and in the
adjoining streets were occupied by Jews. Most were one-story wooden structures with
shingled roofs, standing close to each other, with usually a small yard and vegetable
garden in the back. There were a few brick houses belonging to the well-to-do. Every back
yard had an outhouse, since indoor facilities consisted only of chamber pots for use at
night and in winter. These outhouses were about the size of a telephone booth, erected over a pit, and deliberately left open on the bottom of the back to allow access to the roaming pigs which used to feed on the excrement. Pigs were not supposed to be in our area of town, but they got there anyway and presumably found their way home again, although occasionally a peasant woman would walk about in search of a lost one, calling out loudly: "Vas, vas, vas ! Vas, vas, vas ! " The Jewish boys made a sport of chasing these pigs with sticks and stones, especially when they got near or into the vegetable garden. In such events the women would raise a cry: "Children, children, quick! A pig is in the gardens" and the hunt was on, the trampling kids adding to the damage caused by the animal. Though we knew that the pigs were given to rooting in the excrement, and looked about for the presence of one in the vicinity before going into the outhouse, it was startling just the same to suddenly hear a grunt under one's bare buttocks while squatting there. Many a time was I scared out of my wits by such an unexpected visitor.
The gentile population lived on the
outskirts, nearer to their fields and pastures. Their houses were even smaller and poorer
than those of the Jews, generally with thatch roofs, but they were spaced much farther
from each other, had large fenced-in yards for their cattle, and tremendous barns for
storage of hay and grain and for housing the cattle in winter. What 1 admired about them
was the profusion of fruit trees and garden flowers which the Jewish houses were generally
devoid of. Many gentiles also had their own wells since they needed a lot of water for
their cattle, whereas the Jews had to use public wells often situated a considerable
distance away from their houses.
There
were two churches in Shershev. The Russian Orthodox church, with one
One such conflagration remains
vividly in my memory. My grandmother Freide Leie and her daughter Esther Beile, each
holding one of my hands, half dragged me while running through the flames on both sides of
the street, heading for refuge in the nearest swamp. Many other people were running hither
and yon, some carrying bundles or a single household article, crying, yelling, all half
crazed with fear. Wind-driven embers and flaming roof shingles were flying over and around
us, and the crackling, hissing flames were shooting up to the sky. I kept on closing my
eyes against the heat and glare, and suddenly began shivering from the abrupt change in
temperature when we came into a side street and dropped on the ground under some trees to
catch our breath. That was during the groisse sreife (big fire) of 1908 which
devastated the center of town and was talked about for years thereafter. Our houses--each
grandmother had her own house--escaped the fire due to their location away from the
center, nearer to the gentile houses on the outskirts.
Charity, under the
Hebrew name Tsedaka , has been rooted in the Jewish ethos since ancient
times, and was practiced almost as an eleventh Commandment. There was no Jewish home, no
matter how poor, which did not have a little blue and white box (the national Jewish
colors), known as pushke, into which a copper was dropped whenever possible
for charity. Usually the money was donated for such local needs as paying cheder tuition
for a poor boy; aiding a widow with small children; providing a dowry for an orphan girl;
and for supporting a yeshiva or home for the aged. But it would take the contents of
thousands of pushkes to help a man rebuild his house, and in the case of such a
calamity as the "big fire" local means were totally inadequate. Only an appeal
to all the Jews of the province, and beyond, would avail in such a situation.
An
appeal of such magnitude was made through the dispatch of an emissary, known as shaliakh,
or several of them, to travel from town to town and plead for donations for the
homeless victims. The emissaries carried letters from the town rabbi, usually in Hebrew,
detailing the extent of the disaster, expounding the virtues of Tsedaka with
citations from the Talmud, and appealing for help. Upon arrival in each town the letter
was presented to the local rabbi, who would read it from the pulpit to his congregation in
the synagogue, adding his own appeal for generosity as a great mitzva. The Shaliakh too
would make a statement and answer questions from the audience, and often go from house to
house to make the collection.
Making life miserable for public
figures was a sport zestfully engaged in by the Each shtetl typically had only one rabbi--there was neither the
need for, nor the means to support, more than one. His most vexing task was to resolve
personal disputes in a Din Torah, or judgment according to the Torah, still occasionally
resorted to today by Orthodox Jews. Although both sides voluntarily agreed to put their
case before the rabbi and abide by his decision, the losers sometimes accused him of
unfairness or partiality, and did not hesitate to air their grievances in public, or
worse.
One such incident, still
talked about during my childhood, had occurred about twenty years earlier. It involved a
decision that one of the two ritual slaughterers did not fully observe the prescribed
rules in butchering an ox, and that the meat was therefore unusable by Jews. This was a
severe blow to several butchers, who protested that the ruling was based on a technicality
and that the rabbi favored the other slaughterer. They were supported by a number of
households who were faced with a meatless Sabbath.
The following morning, a Friday, a
pig's ear was found nailed to the rabbi's door. In consternation the venerable old man
refused to pass through the door, the only entrance to the house, and did not allow anyone
else to do so or to pass food through it for fear of contamination. He declared a fast
until the door is removed and replaced by a new one, and also proclaimed an anathema
against the perpetrators. Legend had it that several of the suspects had met with untimely
deaths, and that the rabbi himself died within a few days from the shock of the
desecration.
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