The Instructions by Adam Levin
Even so, while I do agree without hesitation that the scripture you hold in your hands is definitive, I cannot share—try as I might—in Gurion’s certainty that it is “translingual” (though for reasons I trust by now to be obvious, I did not argue when he first claimed it was). However remarkable, the identicality of my re-translation and Gurion’s original—along with the identicality of the original and re-translation of the latter ten books, which you’re about to read, and to which Emmanuel and I applied the same methodology as we had to the first ten (Hebrew-to-English-to-Hebrew this time)—might be otherwise explained by what’s lately known in social-science communities as “The Gurion Effect,” and “Gurionic Solomony” among non-pseudoscientists. Both Sandra Billings, in her “Assessment of a Client” (p. 291), and Rabbi Avel Salt, in his letter to Leonard Brodsky (p. 217), glancingly refer to certain outcomes of Gurionic Solomony, but neither really describes it, not even briefly. And so, to describe it, however briefly:
Anyone who reads or listens to Gurion ben-Judah without enmity becomes more like him; demonstrably more like him. E.g., before I, at the age of twelve, met Gurion, I was no doubt booksmart, even exceptionally so, but I was not on a path toward finishing college at the age of nineteen. Now, at the age of nineteen, I’m in law school. I will not detail it here for security reasons, but Emmanuel Liebman’s experience has been highly similar to mine. Suffice it to say that among those who have encountered the Rabbi and/or his work, instances of grade-skipping and a generally increased talent for verbal articulation are not only manifold, but well documented. You can even witness these changes happening (to Vincie Portite, for example) over the course of the four days on which the vast majority of The Instructions focuses. And lest I be accused of coyness, let it not go without saying: If you are with us, you will certainly witness such changes in yourself as you proceed through the scripture. I would not be too surprised were I to learn that you have already.
But the point I’m trying to make is this: Given the effect of Gurionic Solomony, Emmanuel and I, two of the five people with whom Gurion has maintained the closest contact over the last few years, might be two of the only five people with the ability to translate/re-translate The Instructions in the way that Gurion himself would have. And so the fact that we have done so does not—not necessarily, at least—indicate that The Instructions is translingual, at least not in the general sense. It only indicates the potential of The Instructions to be translingual. It might, of course, further indicate that if you’re a scholar without enmity toward Gurion, and you were to come to know him as well as we do—it is his hope, and ours, that reading The Instructions will itself engender such knowing, or at least a sufficient approximation thereof—The Instructions would in turn become translingual. For you. The scholar. It might. We hope. And so maybe I’m merely splitting hairs.
Yet maybe, though splitting hairs, I’m not merely splitting hairs. In either case, who am I to split hairs? To you. Who, to you, am I to split hairs? You don’t know me from Adam. Not really. Not yet.
Come heavy next year in Jerusalem.
—Eliyahu of Brooklyn, December 2013
13
THE FIVE
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
4th Period–5th Period
F
ourth period, I had individual therapy. Call-Me-Sandy had a bag of wrapped caramels. She held it out across her desk. A one-pound bag, an inch above the blotter, her elbow at rest between the lips of a tissuebox. “So?” she said. “How are things?” she said.
Her bony wrist, her medium-length nails, raggedy cuticles, the bag slightly trembling, its stiff plastic rattling. The overhead light panel flickered twelve times.
“I’m worried about you.”
Thirty more flickers, and she set the bag of caramels to rest on the blotter, put her hand in her lap, took a sip from her coffee.
Ninety-six flickers. Three sips from her coffee. Uncountable flickers. She chinned the air at the bag of caramels.
Twenty-seven flickers.
She lifted the bag, held it over the blotter. Again the bag rattled.
“I’m worried about you.”
You said that already.
“You didn’t respond.”
You’re not worried about me. You’re worried because you’re nervous.
“I worry that I’m nervous?”
Maybe that too, I said. What I meant is you’re a nervous person and nervous people worry. The nervousness comes first with nervous people. The vector proceeds from nervousness. Like how you’re worrying that bag of candy. As it were. Your hand’s not shaking because the bag’s rattling—the bag’s rattling because your hand is shaking. And maybe you don’t notice the bag rattling and it stops there, or maybe you do notice the bag rattling and you realize your hand is shaking, and so maybe you stop your hand from shaking, or maybe seeing that your hand shakes makes your hand shake worse, which makes the bag shake worse. Either way, though, your worries are a rattling bag of caramels in the hand of your nervousness. Some people, though: their nervousness is a rattling bag of caramels in the hand of their worries. Those people look calmly on the world until they come across something worrisome, and only then do they worry, and only when they worry do they get nervous. They act upon themselves prior to being acted upon by themselves. They’re the healthier kind of people.
“That’s an almost gestalt kind of observation.”
No it’s not, I said. I said, It’s homuncular. It’s nonsense. Games with prepositions to impress and intimidate.
“Was your mother a gestalt practitioner at any point?”
Mama always said life was like a box of chocolates.
“Are you upset with me, Gurion?”
Why should I be upset?
“I’m asking.”
Why are you asking?
“You don’t usually make fun of me.”
Was I making fun? I said. I knew I was having fun, but—
“It sounded like you were making fun of me,” she said.
How long have you known you were a lesbian? I said.
She choked and coughed—wrongpiped coffeespit—and dropped the caramels. “Excuse me?” she said.
You heard me, I said.
“I don’t…”
How long have you known you wanted sex from women?
“This isn’t appropriate.”
If someone with a vagina likes vaginas but tells herself she doesn’t like vaginas, or tells herself she likes penises but just hasn’t found the right one, or admits to herself that she does like vaginas and doesn’t like penises but consistently refuses to act on her desires for vaginas, is she a lesbian, Sandy? What do you think?
“This is not appropriate.”
How about this one: If someone with a vagina, at age, say, twenty, realizes she likes vaginas and has never liked penises—i.e., realizes she’s a lesbian—has she been a lesbian all along, or has she only been a lesbian since the moment she realized she liked vaginas? And if it turns out to be one of the latter two cases, is ‘realize’ the correct verb? That is: Do lesbians become lesbians, or are they born lesbians?
“I can see that you’re angry, Gurion. That’s why—”
Are you getting any? Sex from women, I mean. Have you gotten any sex from your professor? Did you switch voices over coffee and decide to get beers?
“Please, Gurion. You’re worrying me.”
But did you say it like Obama or Daley, Call-Me? That is, if you said anything, how did you suggest it? ‘Join me for a beer, Professor Lakey?’ Or ‘What say we blow dis popstand and get some beerce?’ Which code did you use? Was the moment all postmodern and meta and intertextual and post-ironic because both of you knew that Professor Lakey had read “Assessment of a Client: Gurion Maccabee”? Or was the moment, after all, just nice and straightforward and full of tension and potential romance because even though she’d read the paper, you couldn’t be sure she’d read it right—you couldn’t tell if your encoded, footnoted professions of
“You were never supposed to have read that paper.”
That’s the response you’re settling on? Blame the victim? That’s the response?
“The victim?” she said.
The victim being me. The victim being sentenced to the Cage indefinitely.
“Gurion, you hurt people.”
I hurt people.
“You hurt people, Gurion. You have a history of hurting people. You cause physical harm to people, and you show no remorse. That’s why you’re in the Cage. I will admit that a lot of what I said about you was inaccurate. This owed partly to my not having known you so well at the time I wrote the paper, but—”
University of Chicago dialect, now. Nearly stentorian. And from such a small head. You are one bold lesbian. You are—
“Make fun of me all you want, Gurion, but I’m coming clean here. I will even admit that many of the inaccuracies in the paper weren’t mistakes, per se, as much as they were—how should I say this? In grad-school—well—”
Sometimes you have to go analytically overboard to prove to your teachers that you’re worth their time.
“Yes. That’s about—”
You constructed me in such a way as to allow yourself room to riff. You needed room to riff on all the valuable knowledge you absorbed in your beloved professor’s writings and lectures. That would get you the A. Or the date.
“Yes.”
Did I mention that I think professor Lakey is imaginary? I think she’s your imaginary friend.
Sandy pushed me the tissuebox. I pushed it back. I wasn’t crying. Not even close.
“You were never supposed to have read the paper. I don’t know why Bonnie filed it with your records. I didn’t know she would when I wrote it. She’s—”
It’s your supervisor’s fault.
“Yes.”
The buck stops there.
“Stop it now. Please. If you know half as much as you seem to, you know that despite my mistakes, I care about you, Gurion. I am fond of you. I worry about you. You should not have read that paper. You should never have seen it. I am very worried about you right now.”
You’re nervous.
“That too.”
And I’m in the Cage because I’m remorselessly violent.
“Yes.”
If you had the chance to do it all over again, you’d still have me placed in the Cage indefinitely.
“When you put it like that—”
From the CYA POV—
“It’s not just to cover my ass, Gurion, no. It’s because you hurt people. You cause disruptions and you hurt people. You cannot be in regular classrooms. You are Cage-appropriate.”
No one is Cage-appropriate.
“That’s a separate issue. You hurt people, Gurion. That’s what we’re talking about.”
I hurt people.
“Yes. You commit acts of violence. You endanger other students. You’re someone from whom other students need protection.”
She pushed me the tissuebox. She wanted me to cry. To share a tender moment. She was trying to create one. I was not feeling tender. I pushed the box back.
Funny sentence, I said.
“Excuse me?”
‘You’re someone from whom other students need protection.’
“I don’t see how it’s funny.”
It’s all stress and context. Repeat it three times. ‘You’re someone from whom other students need protection.’ It’ll sound like the opposite of what you meant.
“You’re someone from whom other students need protection. You’re someone from whom other students need protection. You’re someone from whom other students need protection… Okay. I see. More wordgames with prepositions. So what?”
Try to kiss her.
“What?”
You’re too passive.
“What?”
Touch her hair first. If she lets you, lean in. If she leans in too, then kiss her. That’s the right order.
“We’re done talking about this. This isn’t appropriate.”
Don’t say ‘I love her’ in Klingon, I said, then pretend it means ‘Have a good weekend.’
Sandy’s eyes welled. She blew her nose. Through her tissue, she said, “‘With all of my heart.’”
Pardon?
“jIH muSHa’ Daj tlhej Hoch wIj tIq means ‘I love her with all of my heart.’”
In Klingon.
“Yes.”
In a footnote.
“Yes.” She tossed her crumpled tissue.
You proclaim your love in Klingon in a footnote addressed to your supervisor. A footnote you claim—within the footnote—that you will not include in the copy that goes to your professor.
“I did include it.”
You included the footnote in the copy to your professor, hoping she’d get the message. You hoped she’d read the footnote and conclude that you had forgotten to remove it, or that you were ‘unconsciously motivated’ to ‘forget’ to remove it. You hoped that your declaration of love for ‘her’ would come across, in Klingon, and would—because it was buried in a footnote that she wasn’t supposed to see and was thereby a ‘secret’—not only enhance the thrill of her discovery that you love her, but put the ball in her court, yeah? Because you figured: ‘She’ll see the footnote, and she’ll realize that I, Call-Me-Sandy, can’t bring myself to approach her romantically, and so she’ll have to approach me if she’s interested.’
“Yes.”
Does your professor speak Klingon?
“I don’t know.”
You don’t know?
“She used to want to be a linguist. She majored in linguistics. Even if she doesn’t know Klingon, you’d think she’d look it up.”
No. I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t think she’d look it up. You wrote that the phrase meant ‘Have a good weekend.’
“You looked it up.”
I didn’t look it up.
“You know Klingon?”
I knew a kid who used to say ‘jIH DIchDaq chargh Canaanite’ all the time.
“‘I will conquer the Cannanite?’”
Yeah. So jIH, I knew, meant ‘I.’ There’s no ‘I’ in ‘Have a good weekend.’
“But how did you know it meant ‘I love her’?”
Context, I said. I guessed. It was either that or ‘I hate you,’ as in ‘I hate you, Bonnie Wilkes, PsyD for making me hand in a copy of this paper.’
“But—”
Touch her hair and lean in. If she leans in, kiss her.
“This is so inappropriate!” Sandy said.
No, I said. This is termination. This is Good Will Huntingstein and Thursdays with Gurion. The saccharine and cinematic moment when the tables turn. The helper getting helped by the one she came to help. I’m done with you now. You aren’t my therapist.
“That’s not up to you.”
If you want me to come on Thursdays still, fine. And you can write whatever you want to write about me for whatever papers you need to turn in, and I won’t even call you out, because I like you. I think you’re a kind person. But I’m not saying anything to you anymore. I’ll sit here writing scripture or reading Philip Roth. And don’t look so down. Just don’t. Just don’t. This could’ve been worse. I could’ve been worse. I hurt people, right? That’s what you said. I could’ve thrown a stapler, but I didn’t, did I? I could’ve been worse but I wasn’t. Remember that.
She pushed me the tissuebox.
It’s not gonna happen, Call-Me, I said.
Sandy said, “Tch.” Then she said it twice more. “Tch,” she said. “Tch.”
I plucked
The argument started five minutes after the beginning-of-lunch tone. Half the Side of Damage had left the Cage to get to-go beef stroganov in the cafeteria. Benji, Jelly, Mookus, Vincie, Leevon, Mangey, and Eliyahu sat with me at the teacher cluster. The other twelve or so brownbaggers and lunchboxers formed a circle on the floor surrounding us. To speak to us from the circle, you had to make your voice louder than conversational. You had to make it public. Ben-Wa Wolf was the first to do it. He said to us, “What do we call that action we did with our chairs?”
And Benji said, “Riotscoot.”
And I said, Hyperscoot.
“Hyperscoot already means something else,” said Benji. “A couple or three spazzes groan their chairs at the same time by accident—that’s hyperscoot.”
I said, Any time two or more people groan their chairs at once, it’s hyperscoot. It doesn’t matter if they do it by accident or on purpose. Intention’s invisible.
“Lots of things are invisible,” Benji said, “but they still count. They still get their own names. Spare a cheesepuff?”
I pushed my baggie into the lunchless space before him.
“This point of Benji’s is not a weak one,” said Eliyahu. “I ask you: What is the meaning of this face?”
He let all the muscles in his face rest.
It’s a blank face, I said.
“A scared face,” said Benji.
“It’s a fucken bored face,” said Vincie.
“A sad face,” announced Cody von Braker, from the circle. “It’s a doubtful face,” said Miles Minton to Cody. “A face like it’s very hard to push the poop out the ane,” Jesse Ritter said to everyone. “We’re eating here,” said Exar Tea. “We’re not eating chocolate brownies or brown gravy or anything,” retorted Jesse. “It’s a face like your brother’s dog died but she bit you once and you were always scared of her,” said Jerry Throop. “It’s not always brown,” claimed Exar. “Exar shits snot-colored.” “You feel sorry for your brother because he’s your brother, but also happy the scary dog’s dead, and maybe even a little sick of your brother because of how he keeps whining to your mom. You want to punch him a little.” “Not snot-colored. Maybe sometimes beige like peanut butter.” “Half the room’s eating peanut butter, Exar. That’s banced of you.” “Jesse started it.” “I’m not the one who said beige.” “It used to be that whenever you wanted to punch him a little, you didn’t do it, except for that first time, when the dog bit you. Which is why you didn’t do it after that. But now the dog can’t bite you because that dog is dead, you’re thinking.” “I think it’s a face of Protestant determination,” said Forrest Kenilworth. “That fucken dog is fucken dead, you’re thinking. And now? Now you’re gonna punch your brother a lot, even though you only want to punch him a little. You’re gonna punch him for all those other times you wanted to punch him a little and couldn’t because of the dog. And when he says, ‘What are you doing, Jerry? What’re you doing?’ You’ll be like: ‘It adds up.’ Just that. ‘It adds up.’ All cold and minimal and shit. Maybe you even drop the ‘It.’ You just say, ‘Adds up.’ All dirty and real.”