{"id":335,"date":"1989-12-04T08:45:06","date_gmt":"1989-12-04T13:45:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shats.com\/?p=335"},"modified":"2019-09-14T09:09:53","modified_gmt":"2019-09-14T06:09:53","slug":"%d7%aa%d7%90%d7%a0%d7%99%d7%9d-%d7%91%d7%90%d7%a0%d7%92%d7%9c%d7%99%d7%aa-figs-by-avner-shats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shats.com\/?p=335","title":{"rendered":"\u05ea\u05d0\u05e0\u05d9\u05dd \u05d1\u05d0\u05e0\u05d2\u05dc\u05d9\u05ea Figs by Avner Shats"},"content":{"rendered":"

Figs<\/strong><\/p>\n

Avner Shats<\/p>\n

A reddish dawn is breaking upon our\u00a0blessed village, and through my window I can see the lacework of twigs and\u00a0leaves of the fig tree. I like the smell of the fig, but the buzzing of the\u00a0little gnats drawn to its fruits disturbs my sleep. There is nothing bad without\u00a0some good in it, my aunt always says, and no good without bad: no one knows this\u00a0better than the people of our village, a village upon which the best of all\u00a0blessings befell, yet by now no one knows for sure if it is indeed a blessing.<\/p>\n

The impending day raises first sounds\u00a0of morning in our darksome house: the cracking cough of my father, who will soon\u00a0shake my mother's shoulder, so that she will get up, sighing, and go to the\u00a0kitchen to put life into the dying embers of last night. My father says my\u00a0mother is lazy, that a man is not supposed to hurry is wife, and that she should\u00a0get up early on her own and prepare everything. To me my father says I am as\u00a0lazy as my mother, that I am dreamy, and woe to the man who will have me as his\u00a0wife. But I don't mind what he says, because my wise aunt had told me that men\u00a0are the truly idle bunch, sitting in the shade smoking and drinking coffee while\u00a0we fetch the water and feed the chickens and make the dough and cook, and so I\u00a0should not take what he says to heart.<\/p>\n

But his words take on a different\u00a0meaning today, and my heart trembles like a chick, for today is the big day, the\u00a0wedding day, my own wedding, and it is the weirdest and saddest of all the\u00a0weddings our village ever saw, and my aunt has nothing to say about it. And I do\u00a0not know what I should think of, my own miserable happiness or my perplexed\u00a0village, celebrating and not knowing why. Blessing brings with it distress, like the gnats driving us mad day and night, attracted by the fig tree, with her\u00a0pleasant smell and cool shadow and sweet fruits. I am eighteen today, and the\u00a0situation brought upon us by God is the reason I only marry so late. Once the\u00a0girls were married at fifteen or sixteen, but things have changed since the army\u00a0came, and since the women of this village stopped frequenting the grave of our\u00a0holy man, the round, white, egg-like dome of which I can also see from my\u00a0window. He was a very powerful holy man, and practiced many miracles in his\u00a0lifetime, not to mention after his death, a miracle in itself, because he\u00a0decided upon his death by himself, and had he not wanted it, he wouldn't have\u00a0died, for he was divine and immortal. His name was known all through the land,\u00a0and women from all villages of the region made pilgrimage on holydays to ask the\u00a0holy man for a baby boy, but since he is our own holy man, he granted our\u00a0request more than anyone else's, and made this strange permanent arrangement up\u00a0there in heaven, so that no one has to pray for a son any more, a son is sure to\u00a0come, no doubts whatsoever, and maybe its time we prayed for daughters, but who\u00a0is crazy enough to implore heavens for a girl?<\/p>\n

When first the prayers were answered in\u00a0full, the joy was mixed with the confusion and fear brought on by the army that\u00a0came on the very same year. Everything happened at the same time, the blessing\u00a0and the curse came down entwined, and our priest says it was a sign from God,\u00a0and undoubtedly it is a sign, for no one has heard of such a wondrous thing, but\u00a0what kind of sign and what exactly it means no one knows for sure. I was born on\u00a0the same year the army came, and do not remember life without it, but my aunt\u00a0told me a little as we sat sorting the beans or embroidering dresses. Shortly\u00a0after me, my cousin was born, my best playmate, and then other boys were born,\u00a0more and more boys, only boys, and than they started calling our village "the\u00a0blessed," and then the women from neighboring villages started coming to our\u00a0holy man's shrine, to drink water from our spring and pick magical herbs growing\u00a0near it. The years went by, and not a single daughter came to the world. The\u00a0women were getting older, less babies were born, and I was the last girl born\u00a0here, there is no girl younger than me in the village, no sister nor niece, and\u00a0today I shall marry a man, and no one is really sure whether to be happy or sad,\u00a0for no one ever heard of such a thing, not even the army and the other people\u00a0who came with it, those who wear no uniforms and walk around the village asking\u00a0silly questions, those who erected a tent like nomads, with bizarre instruments\u00a0in it, so my aunt says, where they cure people by pricking them or feeding them\u00a0bitter hard beans, and request you to do odd things and movements and to answer\u00a0questions about drawings, and even those knowledgeable people have never heard\u00a0of a wonder such as ours, a place where only males are born.<\/p>\n

If things continue this way there will\u00a0eventually be only men in our village, and they are already frightened: when it\u00a0happens, men will be forced to do women's work, and how can this be possible?\u00a0Our esteemed holy man, while performing his miracles, did he not think of what\u00a0might happen? Does he really want to see men drawing water from the spring and\u00a0carrying jars upon their heads, and men embroider, launder and cook? I can\u00a0barely stop myself from laughing when I imagine such pictures of a topsy-turvy\u00a0world. When I was still a girl the village people convened to discuss matters.\u00a0They were bewildered and knew not what to do – many boys were getting old enough\u00a0to be engaged, but soon there will be no young women, and only a few parents can\u00a0obtain brides from other villages, and it gets worse as even there the number of\u00a0girls is declining, and they went away without a solution, still worried and\u00a0bewildered. Only one person is happy about all this, my cousin, who studied and\u00a0went on to study some more away in the city – I could never understand how much\u00a0can one study – only he is strangely pleased with what goes on, and speaks about\u00a0it a lot, and I listen and sometimes do not understand what he says. And when I\u00a0ask and investigate he may dismiss it with a wave of his hand, and then I think\u00a0he himself does not understand much of the things he says, just repeats what he\u00a0had heard from others, for I know his dismissive gesture since the days we\u00a0played together half-naked and suckled a piece of cloth dipped in sugary water\u00a0and wallowed in the dirt in the yard; and I smile inside at the sight of his new\u00a0raging pride, which I can squelch without difficulty by looking him in the eye\u00a0and smile and hint at the pantry, as I did when we were kids, telling him I know\u00a0where the sweet dried figs, which he madly craves, were laid, and the mere\u00a0movement of my eyes evokes the sweet taste in his mouth, and then I go and bring\u00a0a saucerful and watch him swallow it all avidly, and it swallows up his rage.\u00a0But some of the things he says make me think of things I never thought of\u00a0before. He speaks of the army we must fight against, and for that we need many\u00a0warriors, and this is the reason only boys are being born in our village, but he\u00a0does not say what would happen once the war is over, where will the warriors\u00a0take wives, and when I asked him he answered, laughing, we shall take their\u00a0women; who's, I asked; the army, he said, and then it occurred to me for the\u00a0first time, and I was surprised, that the army people also have wives, and\u00a0children, and families, it is obvious, but I never thought about it. And I could\u00a0not stop thinking about it since – that they too have their own villages and\u00a0houses and holy shrines, and perhaps over there, too, some holy man determined\u00a0that only males will be born, and so they had so many men they were forced to\u00a0establish an army and send it over to us? Of course I immediately realize they\u00a0are infidels and their holy men are unable to make such miracles, and isn't it\u00a0true that the army people and even those without uniforms are amazed by our\u00a0village, and according to my cousin nothing worries them more than that, not\u00a0even his comrades who prepare to fight and gather arms and sometimes strike the\u00a0army from an ambush: they know how to deal with that, my cousin says, but not\u00a0with this mystery of our village, a puzzle to all their wise men who don't know\u00a0what's to be done about it, or if anything should be done at all, for they\u00a0cannot decide whether it's a good thing or bad, but who needs the army's wise\u00a0men, I say, in order not to decide whether its good or bad, even the most\u00a0ignorant people in our village will suffice, they all still wonder about it, and\u00a0only my cousin, and maybe the priest, believe it's a good thing, but they are\u00a0solitary in their confidence. And they do not answer the one question lurking in\u00a0everyone's minds: what to expect of the future when I, the last girl in the
\nvillage, will be married.<\/p>\n

My heart quivers with excitement and\u00a0uncertainty and so my thoughts wander to memories instead of thinking of the day\u00a0ahead, or maybe I fear what's to come, the great celebration where everyone will\u00a0hide their anxiety behind a mask of gaiety and singing and dancing, and the\u00a0festivities will go on till morning, and I am even more afraid to think of what comes next, but I have to think about it, it is a happy, scary thought: I am\u00a0glad to think of my groom's eyes, which have the shade of an olive, and scared\u00a0by his sharpened moustache and the cigarette stuck between his lips as he sits\u00a0among the men and I watch him from a distance. My aunt says he is a good young\u00a0man, hard-working, and I could not hope for a better choice, and she strokes my\u00a0hair, smiles and tell me not to worry, for I shall be happy even if the village\u00a0is suffering, and she keeps on saying that since women became scarce, men\u00a0appreciate them more, and I should count my blessings, for all the young men are\u00a0jealous of my husband to be, in spite of his peculiar older brother, a scrawny\u00a0man with fiery eyes who spends a lot of time alone in silence, but may suddenly\u00a0appear uninvited and make raving speeches and disappear again, I have heard him\u00a0speaking and know not what to think of it, he says not a blessing came upon the\u00a0village but a curse, and not the holy man caused it but the army; is it a\u00a0blessing, he shouts, that only males are born? That only roosters hatch from\u00a0eggs, that goats and sheep give birth to he-goats and rams only? That we cannot\u00a0produce out own milk and eggs and are forced to get them from the army? If this\u00a0is the blessing our holy man has brought about us, he says, there never was a\u00a0holy man stupider than him, and his listeners recoil angrily hearing this, but\u00a0he keeps on claiming it is not the holy man at all, it is the army and his\u00a0doctors and medicines, the army wants us to be dependent and ask for mercy, and\u00a0this is very bad, and they must agree with this. Never before were there so many\u00a0black roosters in the yards, and he-goats and calves that can only be eaten but\u00a0will never give milk. For eighteen years the ewes give birth to male lambs only,\u00a0and cattle brought from other places only give birth to males, and my groom's\u00a0brother screams and says we do not understand, it is nothing but slow death\u00a0spreading, and even if the dying is prolonged it will come sooner or later
\nunless we do something, but even he has no clue about what's to be done, so he\u00a0returns to his silence and disappears for days, and the men continue to sip\u00a0coffee and smoke, but they are weary and more gloomy now, and my groom becomes a\u00a0little embarrassed and looks at the others coyly, but they are all deep in\u00a0thought and pay no attention to him.<\/p>\n

I do not know what the village looked\u00a0liked long ago, when herds galloped in the alleys, and the white hens and\u00a0yellowish chicks were not brought here from afar but born right here, and the\u00a0black roosters weren't so numerous, grouching and boastful and eager to pick a\u00a0fight. I remember how I liked to play with kittens in the spring, and I have not\u00a0seen a kitten in years. All this makes me sad and I'm beginning to think my\u00a0groom's brother is right, it is a curse, but I do not think the army brought it\u00a0about, because my cousin knows they are as puzzled and afraid as us. I don't\u00a0know how things were, but good and pretty things still exist. The spring is\u00a0still cool and its water clear, the sky blue and the fresh wind before evening\u00a0falls brings sweet smells, and the fig tree is as fragrant as in my childhood,\u00a0and her fruits as sweet. But our hearts are full of worries and fears and I\u00a0cannot be sure even the little we still have will go on forever –\u00a0 who can be\u00a0sure things will last with the weird things that already happened. But no one\u00a0prays at the holy man's shrine any more.<\/p>\n

The sky is turning blue and my mother\u00a0gets up, sighing, from her bed; I'll soon get up into this day of turmoil, full\u00a0of preparations and ceremonies, and a decision is formed within me, it is sudden\u00a0and clear, I get excited and my heart beats fast, but I am sure of it, and\u00a0before the coolness of the morning disappears I will do it, I will not tell\u00a0anyone, I will go alone to the shrine of our holy man and pray for something no\u00a0man or woman ever prayed for, I shall lie on his grave holding the magical\u00a0herbs, and ask him to grant me a baby daughter.<\/p>\n