A Letter to Mama

The older he became, the less able Sam Metzger was to understand why he had never written to his mother after leaving Krasnobrod for America. This “letter to Mama,” which he never wrote, became the bane of his existence. Granted that he disliked writing letters and that the first years in New York he used to work fifteen hours a day in a sweat shop. Still, to leave his widowed mother behind in Krasnobrod and never write her so much as a single word, he had to be out of his mind. Sam could not fathom how this came about, although he had brooded over it many sleepless nights.

At first, it was simply a manner of putting it off. Then he seemed to forget about it altogether. At night, while trying to fall asleep in Moishe Leckechbecker's alcove on Attorney Street, along with three other boarders, he would think of it. In the morning, he would forget again. Later the nagging sense of shame turned into conviction that it was already too late. A devil possessed him who wouldn't let him take a pen in hand. In New York at the time, they were all singing a popular Yiddish song which went: “Why delay? Write your mother today.” From the Yiddish theater stage, from Second Avenue cabarets, in the workshops on Grand Street, from record players blaring in homes, the song followed him everywhere.

Perhaps that was the reason Sam left New York. He got as far as Chicago, where he became a peddler. He knew no fellow countrymen from Krasnobrod there. He married a Lithuanian girl, a plump orphan named Bessie, and his business prospered. Bessie had saved nine hundred dollars with which she opened a women's wear shop. Sam and a partner bought a store which handled the same sort of merchandise.

Miracles didn't happen to Sam. He didn't become a Rockefeller. He and his wife needed little and managed to earn three or four times more than they needed. When they were in their thirties, a daughter was born to them whom Bessie named Sylvia—after her own mother, Sarah. The couple hired a Polish servant, Antosia, who became devoted to the child. Antosia's husband, a coal miner, had died in a pit. They had had no children. Antosia was more trustworthy than a relative of the family could ever be. She ran the household, cared for Sylvia, and was frugal. She invested her savings in Sam's business, eventually accumulating several thousand dollars. Whenever Sam would try to pay her salary, she would argue, “What good is money to me? I have everything.” She drew up a will in which Sylvia became her sole beneficiary.

Later, Sam bought a department store in a city in Illinois where no more than twenty Jewish families lived, mostly business people, a few professionals, a doctor, a dentist, and a veterinarian. During the day, the men were occupied with their work. At night, they played cards. After a while, they hired a rabbi and established a synagogue, but there were never enough men attending to make up a minyan, except for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. The rabbi, a bachelor, was openly living with a Gentile girl. Everyone called him by his first name, Jack. In the late twenties, fundraisers began coming from Chicago, New York, even from Palestine, all demanding large donations. They reprimanded the Jews for not giving their children a proper upbringing. But there were hardly any Jewish children left, only grandchildren of mixed marriages.

Sylvia had grown up and had gone off to college. Sam was approaching sixty. The years had been filled with business, card playing, and an occasional trip to California or Florida. Antosia had died and Sylvia had inherited her money. Sam set an elaborate tombstone over Antosia's grave in the Catholic cemetery.

Over the years, Sam had managed to avoid contact with anyone from Krasnobrod. He had no idea whether his mother had died and whether he should say Kaddish and light an anniversary candle for her. He kept from mentioning the word Krasnobrod among the town Jews, even though they probably wouldn't have known where it was since they all were born either in Lithuania or Rumania.

In his effort to forget, Sam had become a traitor to his people. Several of the Jewish spokesmen who visited the town from time to time would refer to the community as godless, materialistic, money-grubbing. The other men resented these rebukes, but Sam Metzger reluctantly agreed.

During the day, Sam was too busy to think about these things, but at night, after the card playing, lying beside Bessie in the upstairs bedroom, his thoughts would assail him like a swarm of locusts.