They Don't Play Stickball in Milwaukee Read Free

seemed shaken down to their shoes. My brothers, on the other hand, appeared nearly catatonic. It was as if both their faces had been coated in a quick-setting mortar, color-matached perfectly to their skins. But when you gazed closely enough, cracks showed in the plaster and there was an unmistakable redness in the folds of their eyes. Sometimes, tears themselves are unnecessary. My nieces and nephews were appropriately confused.
    Zak, my brother Jeffrey’s oldest son, was AWOL. Commitment to family was not high on my nephew’s list of priorities. And as he seemed destined and determined to take up my mantle as the family fuck-up, his absence had not exactly set the world ablaze. No one was calling in the troops or printing Zak’s likeness on milk cartons. I think he would have caused more of a ripple if he had just shown his face.
    The rabbi began his routine. He was a man clearly inspired by the Minute Waltz. It had taken Harry Klein seventy-four years to live out his time, but the rabbi was intent upon summarizing them in as many seconds. I might not have minded the pace so much had he been able to muster some semblance of genuine feeling. He didn’t have it in him. And when, twenty seconds into his tribute, the rabbi began buzz sawing through the third and fourth decades of my dad’s life, I stopped listening and checked out the decor.
    The chapel hadn’t changed much since the service for my mother seven years earlier. It was only slightly more awful. There were faux bricks and faux beams and faded decals on the windows meant to give the appearance of stained glass. There was mylar wallpaper depicting scenes from the Old Testament and avocado cushions on the pews. With a splash of bad taxidermy you might mistake the place for a Hadassah hunting lodge.
    Josh, the Klein brother with the misfortune of being born between Jeffrey and me, was up to do the eulogy. He said that he had found himself strangely ill-prepared for my father’s passing. Me too, Josh. Me too. It was strange because we had been in dress rehearsal for his death since we could cross the street by ourselves. My dad had been stricken with a particularly insidious form of cancer. Excruciatingly painful and snail-like in growth, it killed him in pieces. Tenderness being one of the earliest casaulties. Harry Klein had collected scar tissue like some men collected baseball memorabilia. He had averaged one surgical procedure for every year of my life. I would be glad to see that streak come to an end. Josh said just that. We would all be glad the pain was finally over.
    I forced myself to look at the cherry-wood coffin that held those few pieces of my father that had not been divvied up between the surgeons and the sarcomas. For me, the doctors and the disease were two sides of the same coin: two gangs of clumsy thieves who had taken forever to make off with the goods. I remembered lying awake as a boy, praying for my father just to die. Some kids might have prayed for miracle cures, but even then I had dreadfully low expectations of the Almighty. But rather than killing off one embittered grocery clerk, God took the path of least resistance and murdered my faith instead. If my dad had died when I was young, I might’ve been able to imagine him as a man composed of something more than hard edges. In my fantasy, he might even have been capable of loving me back. As it was, I saw him much like I saw the dented and discounted cans he brought home from work. I saw him as he saw himself, as damaged goods.
    At the cemetary, only the noise and backwash of passing jets prevented the rabbi from setting another speed record. I wondered if he kept a stopwatch in his pocket. When we finished taking turns at throwing our spadefuls of dirt on the coffin, people fractured into cliques. Talk turned to food. It’s traditional for Jews; suffering and food. Aunt Lindy and Uncle Saul visited other graves. Their world had just gotten much smaller.