The Reluctant Jesus: A Satirical Dark Comedy (2 page)

CHAPTER

“SETH, I HAVE YOUR MOTHER
on line one,” announced the voice of the firm’s receptionist, Jennifer, who, as my mind was on the subject, would have been an ideal candidate for my next sexual encounter. She was my type, but then again, they were all my type.

“Thank you, please put her through, Jennifer,” I instructed. Usually, I flirted with Jennifer; in fact, I flirted with every unmarried woman in the office, but it did not seem appropriate to flirt while Mother waited on the other end of the line. God forbid she ever heard me flirting!

“Hello, Mother, how are you?” I inquired once I heard the click indicating Jennifer had put Mother’s call through to my phone.

“Hello, dear, is this a good time? I hope I am not disturbing you.” Mother always said that. It did not matter whether she was disturbing me or not; the fact of the matter was that even if she were, she would not have cared. If I was a stereotypical bachelor, then she was the stereotypical Jewish mother, and as an only child to a Jewish mother, living the lifestyle I had, you can imagine I had to make allowances when dealing with her.

“No, Mother, I am not that busy. How’s Dad? How are you? Is everything ok?” Looking back, my reply was entirely false. The call would definitely disturb me, and I was busy. In retrospect, I should not have said that. I should have told Mother I was extremely busy and that she should not call me at the office anymore, but I craved a quiet life, and for a quiet life, I had to sometimes tell a little white lie or three to my mother.

“Yes, dear, everything is fine,” she replied, and that was the second lie of the conversation because everything was not fine. Not by any long stretch of anyone’s overactive imagination was everything fine. Without any exaggeration, this one call from my mother was the catalyst that would change my life forever. Yes, sir. This was
the call,
and everything was certainly not “fine!”

Before
the call,
I have to say I had a strained relationship with my parents, Ely and Irma Miller of Borough Park, Brooklyn, New York. Since the call and as time has passed, we have become closer, but that day, that Wednesday in June now fourteen years ago, it certainly redefined our relationship and how I viewed both of them. My parents have been described by other relatives and friends of the family as, amongst other things, slightly “quirky.” Slightly “quirky” is a good descriptive because they certainly are not your typical parents. “Strange” would be a better analysis of their personalities, but they were my parents, and to me, they were just Mom and Dad. I never referred to Mother as Mom to her face; she was always Mother.

My dad, Ely Miller, was born and raised in Brooklyn, the younger of two sons born to immigrant parents who fled Ireland after Hitler took power in Germany. Why my grandparents fled a neutral country still remains a family mystery. What isn’t a mystery, however, is that my dad was an excellent car mechanic. He ran a neighborhood garage, which became mildly successful, and though he did not have an academic or great business brain, with the help of Mother, they grew the venture into one of the most successful car repair facilities in Borough Park, eventually employing six mechanics and office staff.

My dad was an amiable old guy who people always liked. I remember as a kid he would take me to play softball; it seemed as if he knew everybody on the way to the park and everybody when we arrived. Dad was popular with the other kids’ dads, and he would always be greeted with a warm handshake and a smile. Like me, Dad was a Yankee’s fan, and he and his brother, my uncle Jacob, would take me to games at Yankee Stadium when I was a boy. Those trips to the Bronx are among my favorite memories of my childhood.

Nowadays, Dad was known as “Mr. Pipe and Cardigan” due to the fact that he would tend the front yard dressed in his cardigan, wearing his house slippers, and smoking his pipe. Mother had deemed their home a smoke-free zone, so the only time Dad could enjoy his pipe was in the garden. Dad was a few years older than Mother, and he did look it. Dad did not speak much, which was understandable, living with my Mother for thirty years. He followed her; by that, I mean, he was always a few steps behind her, lagging behind or pulling up the rear, to use a military phrase. It seemed these days Dad no longer walked; instead, he seemed to shuffle. I presumed it was a combination of old age and years of living in the shadow of a strong-willed woman that had reduced my father to a shuffler; it was as if he hadn’t the energy to raise his feet to walk anymore. Either that or he was extremely lazy. It wasn’t that my dad was slow, though he was a little slower than the average person; it was more that my mother was quick, always in a hurry, and that was apparent whenever they went anywhere.

On the odd occasion they went out for dinner, she was usually seated and ordering her entree before my father had taken off his jacket. His slowness and her quickness defined their whole relationship, such as a few years ago when Dad traded in his old station wagon for a Lexus.

He had driven them to the dealership in Bensonhurst. It was a Sunday, and the dealership’s customer parking lot was full. Poor Dad could not find anywhere to park, not even on any of the adjacent side streets, so he dropped Mother off at the entrance to the dealership and asked her to wait a few minutes while he scooted around searching for a parking space. It must have taken him not longer than ten minutes to find a suitable spot, but by the time he had locked up the car and shuffled the short distance to the dealership, Mother had not only picked out a vehicle for him, but she had also negotiated a deal, organized the finance, arranged delivery, and was waiting on Dad to sign the papers. Thus was the basis of Dad’s role in the relationship. He certainly could not be described as the mouthpiece or spokesperson of the operation. She spoke, and he did.

I have to say, though, I never once heard my father complain. He seemed to accept that Mother was Mother, and she was the boss. I guess he put up with her dominance because he loved her, though as time passed, and especially after I had left home, I could see that maybe he wasn’t as happy as he could be. I felt sorry for him, and maybe seeing the state of my father was the reason I did not want a committed relationship. Maybe Mother had put me off marriage. Of course, I dared not ever say that to her. Just as my dad, where Mother was concerned, I felt it best to toe the party line and accept how she was. I kept my mouth shut.

My mother, Irma Miller (née Crystal), was a dynamic woman whom I adored and respected as much as I did my father though she infuriated me more than anyone else on this planet. She was a larger-than-life woman. I don’t mean she was a big woman, though as the years progressed she lost her swimsuit figure and had put on a few pounds, which meant she was like me: “slightly” overweight. But neither I nor anyone with any sense, would ever tell her that to her face. That face was still attractive despite the fact that she was well into her sixties. She had always been a beautiful woman with a pretty smile and big brown eyes. It was very rare as a child that I would ever see Mother not in full makeup, and even today, she will not leave the house without lipstick, blush, her hair perfectly arranged and set, and all ten fingernails manicured and polished. Even at sixty, despite her slightly expanded waistline, she could still turn heads. Mother always seemed to dress impeccably and with a hint of sexiness about her. Please don’t get the wrong idea: I do not have any thought of motherly infatuation. I am merely being honest in my description of her. She was classy, and at family gatherings she would be the center of attention, women complimenting her hair, makeup, and clothes, whilst men would congratulate Dad on snaring such a fox.

Unfortunately, they did not know that beneath the surface, my mother was a strong-willed control freak who ran my father’s life for him and attempted to control mine as much as she could. Behind the glitzy frontage of a beautiful face, elegant clothes, and an abundance of jewelry, she was a no-nonsense woman who knew what she wanted and knew what she wanted for her family, even if we didn’t know what we wanted ourselves.

When dad’s business began to take off, and he grew successful, Mother stepped in and took over. Even though she had no experience, she initially took over his bookkeeping to allow him to concentrate on the mechanical side of things. Then as business grew and more staff was hired, she appointed herself managing director and ran the office—taking bookings, ordering the spare parts, and putting herself in charge, reducing my dad to nothing more than an extra mechanic.

It became so you would have never known it was Dad’s business. She hijacked it from under him. The only relief for Dad came after I was born, and she acquired a new focus for her controlling persona. She hired her older sister, Marla, to run things whilst she stayed at home and raised me. Mother would still issue orders, using Marla as her mouthpiece, and though she was equally as unqualified as my mom, Father accepted Marla as his new boss with carte blanche responsibility, as he was directed by Mother to deal with the hiring and firing and general running of the business. Mother didn’t care what she did or said as long as it suited her and her plans. She was the boss, there was no doubt about that, and she ruled all the roosts.

Where I was concerned, though, I was the golden child, and I could do no wrong. I was her pride and joy, her little miracle, as she would call me, which thankfully subsided when I got to high school. I admit quite freely that not just Mother spoiled me as a child though she was the main culprit and chief spoiler, but my dad, my uncle Jacob, and my aunt Marla spoiled me. Only the best was good enough for me: private tutors, trips to baseball games, toys; you name it, I got it, and I readily admit I enjoyed being number one. My bar mitzvah, as my father likes to remind me, cost him well over five thousand dollars, which, in 1980, was a lot of money. It was quite a party, though.

Mother saw to that. Like everything else, she hijacked it, and to her circle of friends and cronies, Seth’s bar mitzvah was remembered and referred to as “Irma’s most fabulous party ever; wasn’t the boy there too?” I suppose it is understandable that my parents spoiled me. All Jewish mothers love to spoil their kids, and when you are the only child and a son, well, it was inevitable. A direct result of my mother’s affection for me was that I didn’t have many friends growing up. Mother would vet any potential playmates, and it seemed no one was good enough. I did have my buddies from little league though I was never allowed to bring them home. School was the same. I was a bright kid and not unpopular, but after school, friends were not permitted, so I spent my summers and weekends with Mother and Dad and on the odd occasion, my uncle Jacob.

It was always a treat to spend time with my uncle Jacob because he doted on me. He was in the Navy, some sort of officer who dealt with the ship’s radars, and I would anticipate his visits with excitement when he had shore leave. I spent a lot of time with Uncle Jacob. He looked like a movie star, and we would always get free Cokes from waitresses who would often flirt with him. I was devastated when he died a few weeks after my bar mitzvah, as were my mother and my dad. I remember hearing Mother cry for the first time at his funeral, and I still remember her sobbing for days after his funeral. When Dad was busy with the repair shop, Uncle Jacob would sometimes take me to my little league games. I recall it was a great feeling, having him and Mother cheer me from the bleachers and hugging every time I hit or caught the ball.

Another relative who spent a lot of time with me when I was a kid was Aunt Marla. She was the total opposite of her sister. Though she was blessed with the same pretty features, she did not possess the hard-nosed attitude of her younger sibling. In the same way my mother bullied my father, I suspected that my mother bullied Aunt Marla. I always got the feeling that she felt uncomfortable around Mother, and there always seemed to be an underlying tension. When I would spend time in the garage with Dad, I would inevitably end up playing with Aunt Marla. All three of us would sometimes go for Coca-Cola or even to a diner for secret lunches and ice cream sundaes. It was strange, and maybe even a little sad, that my best and fun childhood memories of my parents, when I was growing up, were not of them together.

When I graduated from high school with excellent grades, it was time for me to escape from Mother’s smothering and flee the nest, or so I thought.

Leaving home turned out to be extremely difficult and traumatic—not for me, but for her. I was offered places at several colleges. My preference was Yale and their School of Architecture, and it was their scholarship I took.

Of course, I realize it was my private tutoring, which Mother had insisted on, that enabled me to graduate from high school top of every class and with across the board straight As, and I am grateful that, thanks to her and the extra education she pushed me to take, I was able to follow my chosen career.

To my surprise, Mother offered no resistance to me finding a college two hours and ninety miles away. I felt it was a good compromise. I could travel home on weekends, and in an emergency, Yale was in easy reach of Borough Park. I had a plan, and that plan was to return home every weekend I was able for the first month I was at college, and then gradually reduce my returning to every two weeks, until eventually, I would only return home once or twice every semester. It, therefore, came as a horrendous surprise—no, scratch that, a horrific and abominable shock— when Mother announced she had rented us, meaning her and me, an apartment in downtown New Haven.

I had hoped Dad would talk her out of this ridiculous idea, but my pleading to him was to no avail, and looking back, I realized why. As long as she was with me at Yale, then she was not with him in Borough Park. It gave him peace and a break from her. In a way, he sacrificed me and my fun-filled college years so he could smoke his pipe in peace, watch sports on TV, and enjoy life without Mother, and though initially I resented Dad for it, I understood why he allowed it. I would have done exactly the same if I had been married to Irma Miller.