The Moth - The Moth Radio Hour: Red Sox, Jerusalem, and Coming Home

Episode Date: October 19, 2021

A father bonds with his son over baseball, a boy realizes that his single father is not a superhero, a worker gets a knife pulled on her at a homeless shelter, a newly divorced mother is evicted from her home, and a young writer moves to Jerusalem with the hope that peace will break out. Hosted by The Moth's Producing Director, Sarah Austin Jenness. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by The Moth and Jay Allison of Atlantic Public Media. Storytellers: Jimmy Tingle, Jason Schmidt, Launa Lea, Gretchen Waschke, Nathan Englander

Attention Houston! You have listened to our podcast and our radio hour, but did you know the Moth has live storytelling events at Wearhouse Live? The Moth has opened Mike's storytelling competitions called Story Slams that are open to anyone with a five-minute story to share on the night's theme. Upcoming themes include love hurts, stakes, clean, and pride. GoodLamoth.org forward slash Austin-Geness from the Moth Radio Hour. I'm Sarah Austin-Geness from the Moth. I'm glad you're listening. The Moth is a place for two stories told by all kinds of people to audiences all around the world.

This hour explores the idea of home with five stories. We'll hear about a piece trip to Jerusalem, a kid's staff infection in the woods, a knife drawn at a homeless shelter, an evicted mom's lesson, and our first story about a family who feels most at home with the Boston Red Sox. Here's Jimmy Tingle, live with them off in Port Smith, New Hampshire. When my son, Shamus, was five years old, I was so anxious to get him into baseball that

I offered to coach the T-Ball team. And the thing about T-Ball is, when one kid hits the ball, both teams chase it around the field. Which is hilarious unless you're the coach. Sort of organized chaos. And after the second game, my son quit the team. My wife said he had problems with the coach. I said, quit. You can't quit baseball.

Baseball is in our blood. It's in the Tingo family blood. Ever since we were kids watching the Boston Red Sox in the 1967 pennant race, when they won the pennant 1967 with the impossible dream team. When we all had our favorites, Rico Petra Sully, the Italian shortstop for the Red Sox. My mother's favorite. She called him Mike Paisan after her Italian roots. And my father had two cabs in Cambridge. And on several occasions, he actually drove Boston Red Sox players to Fenway Park. Now, to the outside world, they might have just been utility infielders,

but to us they were like gods. And we never won the World Series in 1967, and I think a lot of it had to do with the theme of that 1967. The theme was the impossible dream. It's very difficult to win a world series. When the word impossible is part of your theme. But it just made us more psyched up to win and more into baseball. Opening day, 1972. My brother Barbie and a bunch of kids from the teen center got tickets to go to Fenway Park on opening day and they sat right under the backstop. And a foul ball got stuck up in the backstop.

And my brother Barbie watched that foul ball for three innings. And when the umpire wasn't looking, my brother Barbie ran out on the field, started climbing up the backstop to get the foul ball. My mother and father were home watching the game on television. And the announcer came over the air and said, there's a delay in the game. There's a young blonde-headed boy climbing up the backstop to get a foul ball. And Mama Tingle turned to pop Tingle and said,

that sounds like something Bobby would do. And the umpire tried to grab him and he shoest him away and he scurried up the screen like a squirrel and he got the ball and he sat on that crossbow and he held the ball up and 34,000 Boston Red Sx fans gave my brother Bobby a standing ovation. Open in day, 1972. The next day he was on the front page of the Boston Globe. Other newspapers came to our house. We were celebrities.

We were baseball celebrities. They're taking our picture or in front of the house with bats and gloves and balls. But even though I told my son, shame, is that story many times, he still wasn't into baseball. And one day he comes home from school. And he says, Dad, the red socks are playing the Yankees today in the pen and erase. Can we watch it on television? Can we watch it on television? That was the most beautiful question I ever heard.

Of course, we can watch it on television. And we sat there on the couch. My wife made popcorn, we got all ready to watch the Yankees and the Red Socks duke it out in the 2004 pen and race. We were so pumped up and the whole city was pumped up and they lost the first game, said, ah, that's okay, son, we'll get them the second game.

And the Red Socks lost the second game. That's okay, we'll get them the third game. And then they lost the third game. Now, the theme for the 2004 Boston Red Sox was, you got to believe. But it's very difficult to believe. When your team is losing three games to nothing to the World Champion, New York Yankees.

And when your team is winning, very few people criticize the team or second-guest the coach. But when your team starts losing, some people feel compelled to put in their two cents. I fell into that category. I finally self-turned into one of my uncles, trying to give my son a teaching moment. You see, Shamus, the reason the Yankees always win. Look at these people. Clean cut, in shape.

Well-disciplined players. Look at the red socks. Long hair, beards. Johnny Damon, head down with shoulders, a big beard. He looks like the lead singer for ZZ Top. Hey Johnny, ZZ Top never won a World Series. And then the red socks won Game 4. And then they won Game 5.

And then they won Game 6. And in Game 7 seven the Boston Red Sox secured their place in baseball history by becoming the first team to come back from a three game deficit to win four straight games when the American League Yankees Stadium. There's only one word to describe that series with the Yankees. Biblical. And then came the World Series. And the whole town can feel it and everybody can feel it. We have it one in 86 years. And we're getting ready to watch the game.

And my son, Shameless, says, Dad, you think we can win the World Series this year? And on the surface, I'm saying, of course we can win the World Series. We're the Boston Red Sox. But internally, I'm saying, it's highly doubtful. And then we won the first game. He's going, Dad, we got a good chance now. We won the game, they got to win four, we only have to win three. We got a pretty good chance. Don't get ahead of yourself, Samus.

Then we won the second game. Dad, we got a better chance now. One game at a time, son. Then we won the third game. Dad, it looks pretty good now, huh? Don't get your hopes up. Mm-hmm. On paper, it seems logical, yes. And then game four.

The red socks are winning by a few runs in the fifth inning, my son goes to bed, it's a school night. They're still winning by a few runs in the seventh inning, my wife goes to bed, it's a school night. Eighth inning, ninth inning, one out, two outs. Ground bottle of the pitcher, over to first, three outs. The Boston Red Sox just won the World Series for the first time in 86 years.

I'm in my living room. I'm completely alone. I'm completely alone. I'm completely alone. I've got my pajamas on, my bathrobe, my slippers, and my herbal tea. And I realized I'm middle-aged. But the most beautiful thing for me about the Boston Red Sox winning the World Series is that my son and I fell in love with baseball. And we bonded, like we never bonded before. For that Christmas, he got bats and balls and DVDs and batten helmets and shirts and a new glove.

We were immersed in baseball. The entire winter, we played catch every single night after supper in the park across the street from my house. Every single night, even in the snow banks, the great thing about the snow banks, you could dive into the snow banks, to catch the ball, and I throw them long fly balls and do the announcer's voice, you know. There's a long fly ball, a deep center field, Johnny Damon's back, he's way back, he's way way back, he dives and makes a tremendous catch. And that April, we actually got tickets to go to Fenway Park for the very first time in his life. It was so cool.

And he was so pumped up to go to the Red Sox game. He goes, Dad, I'm going to bring my new glove to the game. Maybe catch a ball. Maybe catch a foul ball. I don't know if the heart to tell them 34,000 people, you have virtually no chance of getting a ball. I don't know if they're hot to tell them 34,000 people. You have virtually no chance of getting a ball. But we bring the glove. And when you're a little kid and you walk up that ramp for the first time at the Fenway Park and you see the green left field wall, the left field, the green monster,

so beautiful, so Boston, so majestic, so baseball, so beautiful. And the lights are so bright in the field, so bright, bright, bright, bright, bright, bright, green, so appealing. We had beautiful box seats, about 100, maybe 200 rows back. On the first base side, when we got there early, I'm sitting there and I'm looking up at that backstop, getting a little nostalgia. Thinking about all the people I used to come to games with as a kid who aren't around anymore. My father, a couple of my uncles, a few of my friends.

I'm retelling the story to Shameless about my brother Bobby when he climbed the backstop in 1972. And then about the third inning, the kids behind us actually caught a foul ball. So on my son's seven-year-old mind, it's conceivable that he can get a foul ball. So we sit in there with a glove, and he's twitching on every pitch.

That's what he's saying. Dad, when they're gonna hit it back up here, huh? He's twitching on every pitch. Then we get food, he's a hot dog on a Coke, he gives me the glove, I'm sitting there, I'm twitching on every pitch. And what happened was, it was freezing out. And the red socks were winning by about six or seven runs in the sixth inning.

And people start leaving in droves. And all these much better seats start opening up closer to the field. So I was going, Dad, there's two seats over there. So we get down there, he goes, there's two seats over there. We move down there, goes, there's two seats over there. We move like four or five times in three innings. And by the ninth inning, my friends, we are directly behind the Boston Red Sox dugout.

Here is the rule for the dugout. Here are our seats. You could not get any closer. You're practically on the field. And Johnny Damon had been taken out of the game because they were winning by so many runs. And Johnny Damon is kneeling on the top stop of the dugout. And he's kneeling there.

He's got the red hooded sweatshirt on. The long hair and the beard coming down. It's a shame. It's Johnny Damon. Johnny! What's up brother? Turns around. It gives us the victory sign

It's a shame as you see that Johnny Damon just waved to us Hey Johnny Johnny You got a ball He goes into the dugout He goes into the dugout, comes out and rolls a ball across the roof of the dugout into my son's glove. Baseball is much bigger than baseball. It's about family, it's about friends, it's about community, it's about the next generation, it's about the right of passage.

My son now has his own baseball story to tell his kids someday. You got to believe. Thank you. APPLAUSE That was Jimmy Tingle. Jimmy is a comedian and commentator from Cambridge, Massachusetts, a graduate of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, and the founder of Humor for Humanity.

To see a photo of Jimmy and his son, Sheamus, in their element at a Red Sox game. And for lots of extras related to the stories you hear on the Moth radio hour, go to our website, themoth.org. [♪ Music playing in background, playing in background, [♪ wasn't the spring, [♪ the spring became a summer, [♪ would have believed that you'd come along. Coming up next, three stories from our Moth Community Program, all from a storytelling workshop that highlighted family homelessness.

The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and presented by PRX. This is the Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Sarah Austin-Geness. The Moth runs a community program where we teach storytelling to at-risk and under-herd populations around the world. The next three stories were discovered and crafted in a personal storytelling workshop called Home Lost and Found. 18 men and women directly affected by homelessness worked on their stories with us over a two week period.

You're about to hear three of the stories that emerged and will include more in another episode. By the way, thanks to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for supporting this program. So here's Jason Schmidt when I was two. My mom went to California by herself. I stayed in Eugene, Oregon with my dad. My mom wanted to be an artist.

My dad wanted to be a parent. But he was a young guy. He was 22 when I was born. And he was a junkie and a dealer. And stuff was just always going wrong. When I was three, he got busted in our living room right in front of me for dealing coke. And then when I was four, our house made accidentally burn our house down. And it was just always one thing or another like that.

But dad had this trick that he could do. You know, the bad thing would happen, and we'd be sitting next to the road with all of our worldly possessions. And he'd say, sit tight kid, I'll be right back. And then he would leave. And come back. And when he came back, he would have a phone number or a used car or some friend who owed us a favor or ten years on probation instead of 20 years in jail. It was like this magic trick he could do and it was amazing, he was like a superhero to me.

There was nothing my dad couldn't do, but it didn't mean that life was easy. You know, the economy in Oregon back then was really, really bad, and he couldn't work straight jobs because he had a felony conviction and he couldn't deal because he was on probation. But then when I was seven, they cut his probation short because of some kind of budget problem and they were letting nonviolent offenders go early. And dad had an idea where we were going to go. We had heard that there were jobs and good schools and cheap housing if you can imagine such a thing in Seattle. It was the 70s. So, we put all our stuff in storage and we got in Dad's crappy yellow Vega and he had just enough cash in his pocket for food, gas, and we were hoping first last and deposit on a place here in Seattle.

So the only thing was we were going to do one thing before we left. We were going to go camping for a little while, because just outside Eugene, there's this little piece of heaven. It's the Fall Creek watershed, and it's just gorgeous. And we'd had a lot of good times out there with our friends. And we wanted to say goodbye to it before we left. So we got in Dad's car with a little bit of cash

and some blankets, and our stuff was in storage. We went to Fall Creek and we got a great camping spot right next to the river. We got out, had a campfire, roasted some marshmallows and told some stories and got in the car and went to sleep. And in the middle of that night, our first night camping, my dad wakes up because he's hot. And he can't figure out why he's hot. That's his first question. And he goes, why am I hot? And he can't figure out why. And then he realizes it's me. I'm generating a tremendous amount of heat. I was hot to the touch. He actually like couldn't leave his hand on my forehead. So he wakes me up and I'm kind of lucid. And

I seem functioning and it's dark. It's the middle of the night, he doesn't know what to do. But I seemed okay, so we went back to sleep. And in the morning, every little nick and cut on my body, you know, like the little kids get was red and swollen. And there was one on my arm, and he just touched it, and it just burst open. And blood and pus started running down my arm. And he said later that the thing that was most terrifying about that moment was that I didn't react to it.

I was seven and I was just looking at it like it was happening to somebody else. So he got in the front of the car and we drove to town to our family practitioner, Dr. Barry Hill. And dad and I sat in the exam room and he gave me Tylenol to lower my fever and antibiotics. And he said that what I had was a flesh-eating staff infection or most of my body. And he prescribed us this special soap that was supposed to take care of the staff infection.

And he said that my dad would have to monitor my temperature. If I got above 104, he should take me to the emergency room immediately and that I should get plenty of fluids and a lot of sleep. And it wasn't said, but it was strongly implied that what we shouldn't do was go live in the woods. And bathe in the stream with all the living things that have, you know, their poop in their own bacteria. So we went out in the lobby and dad went to the pharmacy and he used our house money to get the soap and a handful of change and he came back and I sat there next to a phone booth in the lobby and

he made calls. He called everybody we knew. And nobody could take us because they had kids and they couldn't risk them getting infected or they they had roommates, or they were dealing, and they didn't want to kidnap us. And so I was sitting there, and I was watching my dad making phone calls. And he wasn't yelling, and he wasn't begging. But he was getting scared. but he was getting scared.

I had never really seen that before in all of his previous magic tricks. And I started, I had this moment, this seven-year-old epiphany where I was thinking about all the other times that stuff like this had happened. And I was thinking about it sort of from his perspective. And I started to realize that to him, each of these near misses will just points on its trajectory, leading to this moment, where we had been sliding downhill for a couple of years.

That's what it would have looked like to him. And I just hadn't noticed because I was a kid. That's what it would have looked like to him. I just hadn't noticed because I was a kid. So, he runs out of change and we go back out and get in the car. And he sits there with his hands on the steering wheel and I'm still hoping I'm wrong. So I look at him and I go, where are we going, Dad? And he goes, just be quiet for a minute. And then he starts the car and we go back out to the woods.

And it wasn't the end of things like it had looked like the end of things, like it had looked like the soap worked and he checked my temperature and it went down and we spent a while out in the woods and it was kind of fun. It was almost what we'd intended to do except that we weren't camping anymore. We were homeless and we stayed there longer than we needed to. And at some point, I did that thing again where I tried to imagine it from his perspective. And I started to understand that he was avoiding the reality that we didn't have any money

for a house when we got to Seattle. But eventually, we just had to go. So we got to Seattle and dad's crappy yellow vego with $20 and no place to stay. And that worked out eventually. That worked out. We had other houses. And we had other near misses.

But the way that I saw my dad had really changed forever. He wasn't a superhero or a magician to me anymore. He was just a man who did his best. Thank you. Jason Schmidt lives in Seattle with his family and he's the author of the memoir, a list of things that didn't kill me. Proceeds from the book help to cover the costs of higher education for young people living in poverty.

For more information, go to themaw.org. Next up, a story from Lana Leah, another graduate of our home, Lost and Found community workshop. Here's Lana, live at the mall. There's an intersection in Seattle at 90th in Aurora that's known as the Switchblade. For the last five years I've been working with people who are experiencing homelessness and addiction

on North Aurora. And Aurora is an interesting place. It's a kind of place where you can find a lot of beauty and a lot of needles. So I'm working at this community center that's at the switchblade. And the space is set up like a giant loft with a living room, a library, and a kitchen.

And I'm making coffee for people just like every other morning. And I see a woman walk in and like many of the women who visit us at the community center. She makes her living as a sex worker. So I see this lady come wobbling in on these toothpicks to let all thigh high boots. And she tries kicking those things off, and they don't come off, and she's wrestling and cussing and cussing and wrangling. She finally gets out of them.

And she crawls into an armchair, and she falls asleep. And at some point I noticed she's been covered with a blanket. She's asleep, and it's a very peaceful scene. Less than an hour later, the same woman is screaming at the top of her lungs. So I come out from the back to see what's going on. And I didn't hear everything she said. But I heard her say this.

She said, I work hard. I don't steal. And everything I have, I paid for myself. Why would someone take one of the only things I have? How am I supposed to work tonight without my shoes? Now me personally, I've been homeless three times in my life. Once as a child, once as a teenager, and once as an adult. And if I've learned one thing from those experiences, and from kicking it with this population

on Aurora for half a decade, it's this. You cannot be seen as weak when you're on the streets. So when she first started up I figured she was making a statement. She wanted people to know that she wasn't an easy target. But I didn't want things to get out of hand so I pulled her aside and I walked her over to our donation closet, told her I'd find her new pair of shoes. But with each pair of high heels, she got angrier and angrier. And the angrier she got, the more desperate I became. And she finally stopped me and she said, Lana, I don't want your shoes. I want my shoes. The ones I worked for and paid for myself.

I couldn't argue with that. But then the knife came out and I realized that I had to make a decision. Now any training manual or guidebook will tell you that this is the point where you run to the office, you lock the door and you dial 911. But as I sat there watching her, remembering when it was like out there, I saw the look in her eyes and I recognized it. eyes and I recognized it. And the knife in her hand I realized wasn't so much of a weapon as it was a prop. She was putting on a show. She said her piece, she got some R E S P E C T

and when she was finished, I said, no, will you please put the knife down? And she did. Now this is the part of the story where people usually tell me that they cannot believe I didn't call the police. And I told them, I wasn't afraid of her. I was afraid for her. You see, if I had called a police officer to the scene, what do you think the odds are that a gun would have been drawn on her?

And if a woman had bled out on the floor that day, because I called an officer to the scene who didn't understand street language, who didn't recognize that they were basically watching theater, then that would have been on my conscience for the rest of my life. So I went off book and I followed the code of the street. She got her shoes back by the way, but the story is not about a woman who got her shoes stolen. It's a story about having a voice.

Now, sometimes it is my responsibility to call the police, but other times it's not. Other times it's my responsibility to simply shut up and listen to someone who has been talked at, talked over, and spoken for. Speak for themselves, even if it's not a language that I don't fully understand. Thank you. That is Lana Lilla. Lana teaches writing classes at the Aurora Commons, or she supports men and women who are in trouble with homelessness, addiction, and prostitution in Seattle. in Seattle. And now, Gretchen Watchki.

The story you're about to hear will sound a little intimate and different. It was recorded during the last session of this Moth community workshop in a quiet meeting room on a Sunday morning before the performance, with only the instructors and the other participants in attendance. It was the first time she told the story in public. So I got home on a a watershed off notice, an electricity shut off notice, and an eviction notice. And it was very cold. I went inside, I took those pieces of paper and I sat in the middle of my very dark living room floor. It was really quiet and I found myself somewhere between relieved because I knew my daughter wasn't there.

She was with her father, she was safe, and she was warm and she was cared for, and she was terrified. We'd recently come to mostly an agreement about how our divorce was going to happen and who was going to have McKenna and what the future would look like for me as a mom. Although my ex-husband, soon to be ex-husband, had made it clear that he didn't think that I could ever be stable enough for her on my own. And I was terrified that he would know that maybe that was actually happening. And I sat there all night and I was like I couldn't figure

out how I'd gone from where I was with a home and husband and three dogs and two acres of property to almost nothing. And I sat there and I knew that I'd grown up being told, it doesn't matter what's going on behind closed doors in your home, you walk out and you put on a good face and you figure it out on your own, but you do what you gotta do in public. You make it look okay. So after not sleeping and being very cold and not having a place to shower or really get ready, I stood in the mirror trying to make some semblance of normal before leaving for

work on Thursday morning. At the time I had an office that was closed and there were no windows. So it was kind of like a refuge in that moment. I was hoping that I wouldn't actually cross paths with anybody that day. And I was not so fortunate. There was a knock on my door. And I almost didn't answer. But I said, come in, and it happened to be a woman who, over time of working together, we'd become friends. And Keisha walked through the door, and she looked me in the eye, and she said, what is going on? And I looked down at my desk. I couldn't look her in the eye. what is going on.

And I looked down at my desk, I couldn't look her in the eye. And before I could stop myself, all of these words started tumbling out of my face. That, you know, he'd been cheating on me, the divorce was almost final. My parents didn't want to talk to me anymore. I had no water, I had no heat. And I was about to lose the only place I had to be with my daughter.

And there it was, it was all there on the only place I had to be with my daughter. And there it was. It was all there on the table in front of me. And I looked up at her thinking that she would either laugh or walk out the door like, okay, don't know what to tell you. And I'm pretty sure I held my breath for a million minutes. In the five seconds it took her to answer and say, we got this. I know somebody who needs a housemate.

And Sunday night, I laid down next to my daughter and I listened to her sleep and I cried, realizing that my community had become my family. So there it is. That was Gretchen Watchke. She lives with her daughter in Seattle and she says her community is still her family. She now works as a counselor for the formerly homeless. To learn more about our community program which teaches storytelling to underhered communities,

go to themall.org. Coming up, our final story, a young man moves to Jerusalem to make peace when the Mothrad Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and presented by PRX. I'm Sarah Austin-Geness and you're listening to the Moth Radio Hour from PRX. Our last storyteller is the writer Nathan Englander. This story was told in New York at a moth night called, Toil and Trouble, Stories of Experiments

Gone Wrong. Here's Nathan Englander, live them all. I'm going to put this at official Jewish Upper West Side. Hi, it's my neighborhood. I was moving to Jerusalem to make peace. It was 1996 and I was living in Iowa City, Iowa and peace was breaking out. There was going to be a new world order. Basically, I was sure everyone was going to be holding hands from Baghdad to Tel Aviv. And my friends were already there. And honestly, Israel had peace with Egypt. They had peace with Jordan, the Palestinian Authority, had the West

Bank and a casino. And, you know, I just, the state was happening. It was going to be over and I was desperately afraid that year that I was going to miss out. Now, I just, the state was happening, it was going to be over and I was desperately afraid that you're that I was going to miss out. Now, I wasn't just moving, I'm a radically secular now, but I was raised religious. I have this concept of aliyah in my head. I'm making aliyah. The literally the root, la lot is to go up, to go up and holiness. It's a forever thing when you move to Jerusalem. You don't come back from that.

So I am going there forever. You know, I had a friend, Jesus called me, got a job in Denver and he didn't say to me, you know, I'm moving to Denver and I will die in Denver and Denver will drink my blood. But this is the way I'm thinking for Jerusalem. School ends two weeks later, I'm on a plane, I wake up and tell a Viva, I walk into the airport and I look for the first official Jew I can find.

And I say to him, you know, where's the office for new immigrants? And he looks at me and he says, did you come on the plane from Manhattan? You know, not New York, not America, Manhattan. And I tell him, in fact, I have, and he says to me, it's not too late, go back. Two days later, you know, I met this fancy,

I've been there a million times, and I've lived there, I'm at this fancy lefty, you know, in the American neighborhood, this professor's house, the academics, all the brilliant lefties. And I think, because it's times and I've lived there. I'm at this fancy lefty. In the American neighborhood, this professor's house, the academics, all the brilliant lefties. And I think, because it's not just I want to be part of peace needs me. It needs short story writers.

I'm also convinced. And one of the architects of the Oslo Accords is there is this fancy dinner, and I'm just excited. I can see it happening as she raises her glass, and I'm going to get my toast. And she says to me, welcome to the Titanic. But again, there have been setbacks. Busses are blowing up,

the Prime Minister has been assassinated. But all I can tell you, and I so feel this, it felt so good on the street. You know, we'd go to East Jerusalem, on Saturday, the Arab party, and eat lunch, and it was just a beautiful time, and I didn't wanna live with those Americans. I wanted to be, I was becoming Israeli. You know, and there was this neighborhood

in the center of town, you know, all twisty alleyways and houses piled on top of each other. And we're all living in a pile. There's like the artists and the freaks and the stone messianists and, you know, everything's happening. We've got, it is the birth then of Hebrew rap, which I recommend to all of you, you know. So much good stuff is going on,

and we're also poor in living in this crazy place. Literally, my house is patched with tin and chicken wire and when it rains, my room and I would sit there and watch our one light bulb on a wire. Just watch the water pour off, and it would pour in under the doors, and like a horror movie, just water would run black down the walls. It was just downright dangerous to live that way.

And it's my buddy's story that sums it up best. He wakes up, and he's peeing. It's on fire. His body's shaking. His toes are curling. His eyes are bugging out. It's my buddy's story that sums it up best. He wakes up and he's peeing its on fire, his body shaking, his toes are curling, his eyes are bugging out. It's horrible. To give you all the gory details, there's a weird non-complication. When he poops and pees, he feels fine. When he pees, again, the fire that eyes his body shaking, he can't figure out what's happening.

This is for my science friends. When he's sitting, he is peeing against porcelain. When he is standing up, his landlord has not grounded electricity. He is closing the circuit and being electrocuted through his wiener. And this is honestly, this is the least of Jerusalem life. Being in the heart of the city, we also have the open air market. Again, Upper West Side, there are scientists here in Jews. I know Makhine, you know, like it's just this really simple life. You need a cucumber, you go get a cucumber, you need a tomato, you go get a tomato. That's such a nice way to live.

And I'm in the market with my Israeli girlfriend and my buddy, Mike Sin from Khaifa. And we're shopping and it's a Friday and it's always a beautiful day. And we're thinking, should we do a real shopping and we decide, as we always do, let's just be lazy and go home and eat. And we walk the couple of blocks and get to the balcony. And then there is a low boom and another low boom. And we absorb it and the market has just blown up. And I'm thinking, I wanna freak out.

I'm a kid from, you know, Strong Island. Like, this is not for me. I just wanna freak and my girlfriend says, you know, it's gonna make a man out of me. You know, this is my girlfriend says, you know, it's going to make a man out of me. You know, this is it. When your numbers up, your numbers up. And I sort of understand it. You know, we don't do chaos theory there.

You did not survive September 11th in Minnesota. You didn't survive it in the Bronx. You know, those are the rules of Jerusalem. If you're close enough to claim it, you're dead. And that's how we're going to do it. Now, I'm a coward. You know, why aren't I afraid? And also, because at this this time I'm an idealist

and I honestly believe you have to be willing to die for something. We're making peace and there is a cost and there are enemies and I was really ready to die for that. I would never say such a thing now but then I really believed, you know. And not long after I'm sitting in my cafe writing

you know downtown and I'm thinking I'm gonna walk home and I decided to just do another few more lines of writing, and I sit for a minute, and then it comes again, the giant, giant boom. And I tell you, I wrote a short story about this, and I deny any link, and I feel like I am raping the memory to share it with you, but it's my memory, and I just don't like to talk about it, but I will here. But this is not the first bombing now. This is the second. So there's a second blast and a third.

And it is the worst thing I have ever heard in my life. The second blast and the third, you are listening to people get dead. It is a horror. And just you turn into an animal. You can't think you just want to run into the fire. But there's nothing to do.

I'm not a paramedic or a policeman. There's a paratrooper. There's my last pee. But there's just nothing to do. So'm not a paramedic or a policeman. There's a paratrooper. There's my last pee, but there's just nothing to do. So I walk up to that corner and I make my first non-Jerusalemite decision. I think I don't need these memories. I don't need to see this. And I take another block and walk home. But the next day I'm back, because that's what we do.

It's not about, I'm a lefty. I want two states. I want, you know, East Jerusalem is Palestinian capital. This is not about Zionism or colonialism or territory. This is about my fucking neighborhood, you know? Like the next day, it's cleaned up. That's the way they do it. No blood, some broken windows, but they're going no glass. No, nothing. I am back there in the middle of the bomb, you know, just right where it happened and I'm eating a slice. I'm gonna have a slice of pizza because it's my town and my block. And if I don't go the next day, I'm not going to go the day after that or the day after that. And that's how we do it. But at this point, again, I'm still not afraid, but I'm thinking in sort of a

check-o-vian word-six idea, like maybe we should all be going crazy. Maybe this not going crazy is the crazy part. I think we should all be curled up in a corner drooling. But again, I just honestly, it just can't be stopped, the piece. I just think this can't be stopped and setbacks and setbacks, but this is how things happen. And the metaphor I use, the thing that can be going all this time, was I just would always think of the moon.

Like, we've looked at the moon since the dawn of time and people wanted to go there. And I thought, that's impossible. It's literally impossible to send a man to the moon, but we sent a man to the moon, and we brought him back. And to me, that's how I feel. The piece is impossible, we'll still do it. You know, and this is also, it's the time,

it's the new millennium, you know, closer rise and think back. We still had Bill Clinton, you know, there's a surplus, but we also had friends in the world. We are one signature away from peace. We need one more Charmel Check and it's over. It's really finally here after all these years, you know. And I remember it's New Year's Interuselum, Jewish New Year's and I throw a big dinner party

and everything feels great. We have a super time and I wake up the next morning and the country is on fire. We are having a war, you know, just mutually assured self-destruction. It is, you know, it is over. The hope is gone. And I call my friend Debbie and she's a war photographer. She answers the phone. And I can hear she's in the middle of a firefight. I hear the bullets flying in the shock grenades and the tear gas. She's really in the middle and I ask her from the, you know, really from the depths of myself. I want to know, at dinner last night, do you think Shelley had a good time?

But this is it, because we're going to be normal. This is the point Debbie still torches me about this. She doesn't hang up the phone. She gets behind one of those big cement things that you see on the news, you know, one of the blockade things. And she just, you know, squads down back there

and we go over dinner like, do you think it's okay that Kathy and Kobe drove from Tel Aviv? Like how is dessert? We go over that dinner, because that's it. We that Kathy and Kobe drove from Tel Aviv, like, how is dessert? We go over that dinner because that's it. We don't give up, you know? And then this is my life now, you know, just if I don't complain about my neighbor's bad piano anymore, you know, like if tank fire is shaking in the window, you put in your ear plugs and you write your novel.

You know, remember watching Die Hard one night, and I just, I pause and open the balcony door to see that the machine gun fires also coming from outside. You know that's my Jerusalem surround sound and it just it just becomes guns on the corner copters it's just never ending violence but that's kind of what I get used to but this is also when I get afraid because this is when I recognize I just thought people were playing I see that's your own sucks and Arif at sucks and they're just nobody is really trying and that's when I see it's for nothing.

You know, that's when I start to see, the tourists are gone, it's Jerusalem. There's no tourists, there's no buses flying back from abroad on empty planes. It's just nobody wants to come to our country and nobody in Israel wants to come to Jerusalem and nobody in Jerusalem wants to come to my neighborhood. You know, I'm sitting there in the shook on the grip of street eating my hummus, you know,

looking at the hummus guy and the other regular customers because we have to be there. This is what we do. If we die from it, we die from hummus, you know. But I just, I feel it's my obligation and I just can't understand how I inherited this block, you know, how did it become mine? And about that time I get a call from a friend in New York and she's weeping. She did not get invited to the Oscar party of her choice.

And this hurts me. It does, and I calm her down, and I hang up the phone, and I have an epiphany, because I want those fucking concerns. You know, I want to worry about the Oscar parties. I want to weep deeply because I miss the Steve Allen sample sale. You know, these are the things I want those fucking concerns. You know, I wanna worry about the Oscar parties. I wanna weep deeply because I missed the Steve Allen sample sale. You know, these are the things I wanna worry about. And I've got this alia head, you know?

This is my head like I think being an individual is weak or wanting to drink your coffee and not get blown up is weak. I just think any concerns that are basically what you would call a happy normal life or somehow wrong, but I'm starting to think otherwise. I'm starting to think I missed that. So I'm in New York, given a reading, and I'm walking around, and I'm thinking, you know,

what? I really like it here. It's such, you know, another betrayal. It's so hard to admit once you've become a Jerusalemite, I'm thriving. I am thriving in New York. I like it. I like my New York friends. I like it here.

And that's when I bump into an X-Pat, you know, a New Yorker to Jerusalem and back, you know, York friends, I like it here. And that's when I bump into an ex-pat, a New Yorker to Jerusalem and back. Oh, everyone's already here. I see more people from Jerusalem in this neighborhood than if I'd go back there. And she's left a year before me. And there's this halfway house that they have, this apartment, you take a Jerusalemite,

and it's coming up so you don't get the bends. It's this place where they can acclimate before you re-release them into the wild. You know, that's what we've got. And there's a room empty. You know, I know the girl who's left it. She left two years before. And she offers me the room. And I look at it and I think it's, I know this thing because Aliyah it is forever.

I'm supposed to die there and I know how everyone does it. It's extended vacation. You know, my parents came for two weeks from Israel to New York in 1964 and they're still headed back. That's how we all do it. So I'm like, I could just use a little more time here. It's peaceful, it's quiet, I'll do my writing. I deserve this life, it's okay. Look at the room, I like it, I look at the lease,

and I sign it. I put down my name, Nathan Englander, and I put down the date September 1st, 2001. Thanks. Applause That was Nathan Englander. Nathan lived in Israel for five years. He now splits his time between Brooklyn, New York,

and Madison, Wisconsin. His short story collections include, for the relief of unbearable urges, and what we talk about when we talk about Anne Frank. So that's it for this episode of the Moth Radio Hour. Thanks for listening. We hope you'll join us next time. You host this hour with Sarah Austin Genes. Sarah also directed the stories in the show, along with Catherine Burns and Larry Rosen. The rest of the most directorial staff includes Sarah Haberman, Jennifer Hixon, and MacBulles, production support from Whitney Jones. Parts of this episode were made possible thanks to the generosity and support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The Moth would also like to thank Catherine Hinnrickson and Colin Minne, also Tracy Day, Brian Green, and our friends at the World

Science Festival. Moth stories are true, is remembered and affirmed by the storytellers, Moth Events are recorded by Argos Studios in New York City, supervised by Paul Rewest. Our theme is by The Drift, other music in this hour from Neil Diamond, Regina Carter, and American Football. You can find links to all the music we use at our website. The Moth is produced for radio by me, Jay Allison, with Ficky Merrick at Atlantic Public Media and Woods Hole Massachusetts. This hour is produced with funds from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting,

the National Endowment for the Arts and the John D. and Catherine T. McCarthy Foundation, committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. The Mock Radio Hour is presented by PRX. For more about our podcast, for information on pitching your own story and everything else, go to our website, TheMoth.org. you