The Jew and the Gentile

"Of course..! We have to pick a rabbi who wants to live near God himself," snipped Rhonda’s mother as they all began the climb up the steel and marble staircase.

Her irritated mother went first, then Ida, then Rhonda and Vic who was unable to see passed Ida’s large round torso as he looked ahead up the staircase. "How could someone be so small and so wide at the same time?" he thought.

She took one step up and then brought the other foot to the same step repeating this all the way to the forth floor. It seemed to take hours for them to finally make the climb as Vic was forced to watch Ida’s pleated skirt sway from left to right, like a stage curtain after just being closed.

Once at the top, Rhonda’s mother made a few derogatory comments about the shape and cleanliness of the stairway and the hall, but Ida took control of the situation by bluntly telling her to, "Just stop complaining..!"

Her mother gave her a look back as if to say, "Watch it..! Don’t push it..!" Then Ida, without further ado, knocked on the anticipated door as they all gathered in front of it.

They soon heard latches being undone for what seemed to go on for at least thirty seconds and finally the door was opened. Surprisingly a young woman greeted them with a simple yet bubbly, "Hello."

"Hello," said Ida. "We’re here to see Rabbi Golden."

"Yes.., your expected. Come in, please." Ida pointed through the doorway to direct everyone as if in total control of the group. "By the way," whispered the woman directly to Ida. "His name is Rabbi Goldman."

"Goldman..? Are you sure..? I always called him Rabbi Golden," demanded Ida.

"Yes dear.. I’m positive. His name is Goldman. Now please have a seat, the rabbi will be with you in a few minutes." The woman smiled as she left the room, but looked a bit annoyed that she wasn’t believed about the rabbi’s name.

"Oh my..! I must apologize to the rabbi," sniveled Ida.

"Well.., I can see he’s a really good friend of yours, Ida.!" snipped Rhonda’s mother. "I can’t imagine what you call me?"

"No, no.. you.. can’t..!" responded Ida with a smirk on her face. Without saying anything else she walked into the living room and sat down. Everyone else followed her as Rhonda’s mother continued her onslaught of comments, without batting an eye.

"Who the hell, was that..? Is the rabbi shacking up with somebody?"

"It could be just the cleaning lady," suggested Ida.

"What cleaning lady looks and dresses like that..? I bet my husband would love it if I hired someone who looked like that to clean our house. He’d never go to work..!" Ida giggled, but Vic and Rhonda were to nervous to enjoy the remark.

Silence finally took over the room as the four of them intermittently began to just look at each other. Even Ida had run out of things to say as her verbal well of appeasing remarks ran dry, but within a minute the exotic woman walked back into the room, carrying a tray which held a container of coffee, a container of hot water, tea bags, cookies and utensils.

"The rabbi will be with you shortly..! Please help yourselves." Then she paused for a second with a pasted smile on her face. "I’ll be leaving you now. Enjoy..!" The determined woman then threw on her coat as she walked to the door and nervously began to mumble a barrage of questions to no one in particular. "Is it snowing yet..? It is supposed to snow, right..? Is it still icy out there..? It was this morning..," but before anyone could answer, she was out the door and it slammed behind her.

Vic leaned over to Rhonda and began to whisper. "Well.., at least I don’t think we have to worry about snow, remember what Vinny Bullet said...? On the days you suffer through like this.., it rains, or wit’ our luck.., we’ll get slush."

"Yes, yes.., I know, you’ve told me all that before," said Rhonda . "But let me tell you, it’s pretty cold out there, so you may be wrong."

"I’m tellin’ you," he said confidently. "It ain’t gonna’ snow..! You’ll see..!"

"You know.., did anyone ever tell you, your nuts..?" she whispered jokingly as silence once again took over the room.

He sat back and began to think to himself. "I wonder if the Rabbi will be wearing one of those ridiculous hats. God..! I hope they don’t try to make me wear one."

Then in the lull of the moment he began to day dream and pictured himself standing next to Rhonda in front of all their friends. Everyone seemed to be having a good time as usual but oddly, he and Rhonda for some reason were dressed in Jewish Orthodox attire. He wore the hat, the long sideburns with curls and the long black coat.., and Rhonda of course the long to the floor dress. As he stood there and examined the way they looked, everyone else's clothes instantaneously changed into bathing suits, except of course for Rhonda’s and his.

"Let’s all go swimming," bellowed out of the crowd and they all magically appeared in the Bean’s backyard up to their waists in water, in an in ground swimming pool which Gene didn’t own in reality. That is with the exception Vic, who found himself standing on the edge of a diving board, behind a large old fashioned microphone, still fully dressed and Rhonda who was watching from the nonexistent patio where she sat knitting a sweater with the kosher sign on it. Everyone seemed to be yelling at him, "Jump.. or sing! Jump.. or sing!" and whenever he would look over at Rhonda for help, she’d hold the sweater up in front of her just below her face and say, "I’m making this for you, Vic. Here.., take it..! Here.., take it..!"

He awakened from the day dream being nudged by Rhonda, who was handing him a cup of coffee, "Here.., take it..!"

Still a little dumbfounded from the nonsensical daydream, he took the coffee and began to sip the drink, which was made just the way he liked it hosting plenty of sugar and while doing so he noticed peeking over the rim of the cup, that Rhonda’s mother was acting quite strangely.

She would look at Ida then either nod or shake her head, then look somewhere else in the room and nod or shake her head again. This continued for a few seconds and then it seemed that she was beginning to use her chin to point at certain aspects of the room, so Ida would look at them also. He watched her quietly for a awhile without talking, entranced by her movements since he didn’t know what she was doing.

Soon the gesturing was enhanced with complete body movements. She would lean over to look under the piano which was in the corner, then back to Ida, then under the chair and back to Ida again, who was beginning to follow the same pattern on her own. They even began to move out of their seats. Leaning over to look down the side of the sofa, moving the magazines on the coffee table around and looking under the lamp shades.