Monday October 6

by

Am so worried, Philip is
unable to work, and Josale
is sick. Oh God speed their
recovery

————-

I know I must help Nettie and Philip but where will I find the means? So many want so much from me. My father olam haba faced these burdens each day. Oh God give me his strength so I may help others, it should never upset me so.

Let those who come after me never know such thoughts.

————–

I can only speculate on what Papa decided not to write down at this time. We know he helped his sister Nettie and her husband Philip negotiate life in America, and this included financial support. We know he felt bursts of resentment when his family in the old country unceremoniously demanded money of him, but he went into debt to accommodate them. We know he admired his father and hoped to live by his example, but he also feared he inherited his father’s life of unyielding poverty and endless worry over how to provide for his family.

Did Papa ever wish for everything to stop, for all his troubles and all the people around him and all their demands to disappear? He never said it, yet in this, his most difficult year of change and self-reflection, he surely felt his generous character tested. And so I ask again: how did he cast such thoughts aside and finally become the effortlessly selfless person we all knew? What would I be if I knew the answer?

Wednesday Oct 8

by


Right after the prayers this
evening, I called the Dr. to
examine Yosale, and according
to him he is seriously ill,

—————

Matt’s Notes

As my mother noted a while back, Papa’s whole family depended on him for support even though he was the second-youngest of seven children. This entry gives us a small but matter-of-fact demonstration of his caretaker’s role: though he has been fasting and attending services all day for Yom Kippur, it still falls to him to call a doctor for Yosale, his sister Nettie’s infant son. It’s certainly understandable because Nettie’s husband, Philip, spoke little English and had recently suffered a debilitating injury to his hands, Nettie probably didn’t want to leave her son’s side for a moment, and Papa likely had the best line in to a decent doctor. (I would guess the doctor he called was associated with one of the landsmanshaftn, or mutual support societies, that immigrant Jews like Papa depended on for various essential services.)

I wonder, too, if Nettie asked Papa to call the doctor of if he acted on his own in this instance. Yosele was, after all, named for Papa’s father Joseph, who had died just a few months before. Since much of Yom Kippur involves intensive mourning for the dead (fasting and non-stop prayer ratchets up the emotion) Papa may well have emerged from services feeling especially compelled to protect his father’s namesake.

Thursday Oct 9

by


Yosale is a little better today
and gradually improving
Received 2 letters from home

———–

Matt’s Notes

Back in May, in one of the more dramatic episodes in Papa’s year thus far, Papa received notice of his beloved father’s death just hours after his nephew Yosele was born. I’ve always wondered if this confluence of events, along with the fact that Yosele was named a variation of “Joseph” after Papa’s father, made Papa especially attached to Yosele.

For example, the first thing Papa did yesterday after Yom Kippur services ended was call a doctor for Yosele, who’d been sick for a while. Is it possible, as we discussed yesterday, that having spent the day fasting, praying and mourning his father, Papa felt overly concerned for Yosele and called a doctor when it might not have been entirely necessary? Could it be that Yosele’s not really any better today at all, but, with Yom Kippur over, Papa’s perspective on Yosele’s condition is a little less exaggerated?

In that vein, I imagine Papa’s Yom Kippur prayers, so focused on his father, also made him think at length about his childhood, and the childhood home he missed so much. If that was the case, the two letters he received from the old country on this day must have felt especially welcome, as if, perhaps, a higher authority than the U.S. Postal Service had a hand in their arrival.

Friday Oct 10

by


Spend the evening with friends
at Nathan Zichlinsky’s house
until after 2 a.m.

————–

Papa’s diary features supporting appearances from three men named Zichlinsky: Jack, one of Papa’s closest, lifelong friends; Julius, whose full name appears only once but may be the same Julius with whom Papa enjoyed many an outing but only referred to by first name; and Nathan, whose home on Brooklyn’s Willoughby Avenue was previously host to a meeting of B’nai Zion, Papa’s fraternal order.

Your Papa’s Diary Project scorecard is surely too covered in scribbles and arrows by now to be of much use, but yes, I’ll confirm that you did, in fact, make a little notation about yet another Zichlinsky, this one named Jacob, and you made it in reference to my September 19th post in which I questioned whether Jacob, who is listed in the 1925 New York City directory as a leatherworker residing at 24 Hart Street in Brooklyn, was actually Papa’s friend Jack. At the time I assumed he wasn’t.

Ah, but how different I am from the headstrong, impetuous incarnation of myself who occupied this chair three weeks ago! Younger, yes, unbowed by experience, to be sure, but so presumptuous, so careless! Since then, I’ve done a bit of research on ancestry.com and learned that: three men named Nathan, Julius and Jacob Zichlinsky all hailed from the same town in Russia; they were all around Papa’s age; they all lived together for a time on Broome Street; Julius and Jacob worked in the same leather goods store together when they were younger; and, finally, Jacob eventually resided in the very Sheepshead Bay neighborhood where my grandmother could be relied upon to shout “Jack Zichlinsky lived there” when passing through. The evidence isn’t bullet-proof, but it certainly implies that these Zichlinskys were the brothers Papa palled around with and that Jacob of Hart Street was Papa’s friend and went by the nickname “Jack.”

Long live the Internets.

Saturday Oct 11

by

[no entry]

Note: Papa didn’t write anything in his diary from October 11 through October 15, but he accidentally wrote the following week’s entries on those pages instead of leaving them blank. So, his entry for October 18th appears on the October 11th page, his entry for the 19th appears on the October 12th page, etc., and he crossed out and changed the dates on the pages accordingly:

After a long series of contentious meetings with the Papa’s Diary Project Committee on Presentation and Editorial Integrity, I’ve decided to accept their recommendation and approach October 11-15 as if Papa left his pages blank, post what he wrote on the days he actually wrote them, and post the thumbnail images for all pages as they actually appear. That’s why there’s text on the thumbnail image for this page even though Papa didn’t write anything on this day. I hope this explanation will satisfy my legions of readers and stanch the flood of impassioned e-mail to which controversial choices like this inevitably lead.

Sunday October 12

by


[no entry]

————-

In my dream I am in Prospect Park and I sit on the ground beneath a tree. In front of me I see an electric fan much like the one I own. It has no plug or wire yet still it turns, the grass in front of it blows and bends. To my delight a rabbit turns up and stands in front of the fan. It is a curious creature, it does not look like a real rabbit it is more like something from the humorous cartoons I see at the movies. It hops up and down in front of the fan and smiles. It makes no sound and I am so happy just to watch. “This is what it’s like to have a rabbit of your own,” I tell it. I have a book in my hand and I open it and point to a page, I hold it out to the rabbit but of course it is too young to read.

————

—————-

Note: Papa accidentally wrote his entry for October 19 on the October 12 page of his diary; this is why the thumbnail image for this post shows handwriting even though there is no entry from Papa.

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