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Overview
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9789655243109 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Urim Publications |
| Publication date: | 05/15/2018 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 447 |
| File size: | 2 MB |
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CHAPTER 1
With four little ones running around, and less than a year between each of them, living a mile away from the road and three miles from the nearest shop, my mother inwardly vowed she did not want any more children. My father, then a farm hand and a preacher in his spare time, brought in barely enough money to feed his growing family. Both of my parents worked very hard. Many times my mother would go out into the fields when the potato pickers had long since wended their way home, trying to find a few orphaned potatoes to feed her family. The farmer kindly gave them milk free of charge, and somehow they managed to raise strong, healthy children, but those years took their toll on my mother.
My father eventually got a bookkeeping job in an engineering firm in the small town of Greenborough, continuing to preach on the side. The family moved into low-income housing which cost my father two hundred and fifty pounds sterling with a mortgage repayment of one pound per week with a thirty pound deposit. We had one room downstairs and a tiny kitchen with no hot water. A creaking, wooden spiral staircase led up to two tiny bedrooms. Baths had to be taken in the public town bathhouses and toilets were shared across a large, muddy yard by all the residents. This slum neighborhood was no friend to a Jewish lady or her family. No matter that she was fully baptized into the Christian faith — or that her husband was a pure Anglo-Saxon "man of the cloth" — or that her children were born and raised in England. She was a wog, a dirty Jew, and the family bore the brunt of medieval anti-Semitism. England was still in ruins from the war with Germany, but the British masses continued to applaud Hitler for his fine work with the Jews.
When my mother realized five years later that she was going to have another child, she wept bitterly, protesting that she did not want to start all over again, and moreover, the neighbors were already complaining about the oversized brood. My father continually teased her and reassured her at the same time that everything was going to be wonderful. "Just one thing, Sally," he insisted, "make sure it's a boy. We will call him Andrew, and he will be the evangelist this generation is looking for."
As the months ticked by, my father's teasing increased until my mother could stand it no longer. Desperately she ran to her friend Jane Webster for advice. Jane was married to my father's preaching partner and was the only person my mother could trust with such a confidential matter.
"Jane, Jane! I don't know what to do. Jeem want a boy, but I don't know what is inside. Only God know. What weel I do?" she exclaimed anxiously in her heavy Italian accent.
Jane tried numerous times to console her friend, assuring her that "Jeem" was only teasing, but nevertheless my mother's tension mounted steadily, until the morning when she staggered to a nearby telephone to call my father at work.
"Jeem, come queekly — the baby is coming!"
Without delay, my father rushed home to take her to the hospital, and shortly afterward his dreams were shattered. The evangelist named Andrew that he had prayed for was not a boy after all, but a squawking, chubby little girl for whom no one had a name. All his hopes were dashed.
Five years earlier, when my sister had been born, my mother very much wanted to name her Tonica after her own mother, who had passed away not long before. However, my father had insisted on the name Margaret, and after a lengthy squabble, he had gotten his way.
With hopes of Andrew now gone, my mother was very firm. "This one will be Tonica," she declared, and would not move from her decision.
And so I became Tonica Marlow, a tiny bundle of Jewish life in a pastor's home; but the irony was that my father's hopes were not totally disappointed, for his Jewish daughter would one day head down the very path he had laid out for the son he could not have.
* * *
It was just two months later that tragedy struck.
My mother was busy seeing to dinner and numerous other jobs around the house while my six-year-old brother David pestered her. Obviously he had been deep in thought.
"Mummy, how do you go to heaven?" he questioned. "Do you go up in an aeroplane?"
"No, my love," my mother replied. "When you are bigger, you will understand."
"But Mummy, I want to know now — please tell me," he insisted.
My mother tried as best she could to explain that when you die, only your body stays in the ground, but the "real" you — the part that makes you think, laugh and speak — goes to heaven. "Now go out and play while I feed the baby," she said mechanically, "but don't go far. Deener is almost ready."
Obediently, David sat on the front doorstep singing his favorite hymn, "Abiding in Thee" until some boys from down the street came by and invited him to go fishing with them in the canal. Forgetting my mother's warning, he accompanied them to the canal, a favorite haunt which was about a ten-minute walk from the house. The boys had no nets. Their method of fishing was to kneel down on the canal bank and try to catch fish with their hands.
About fifteen minutes later, there was a loud knocking on the door of our home.
"Missus, missus, your David's fallen into the canal," chorused a group of frightened, anxious children.
"Don't be stupid," replied my mother angrily. "He was here just a minute ago. Go away and stop your silly lies." She was well used to their cruel pranks.
"No, no, missus! It's really true — go quickly!"
Seeing their grief-stricken faces, my mother became almost hysterical. She sent my brother Philip immediately to see what had happened and confirm if it were really true, and then called to my father, who was upstairs resting on his lunch break.
"Jeem, Jeem, queekly!" she screamed. "Take the bike and go to the canal. See about David — they say he fall into the water!"
Things happened speedily. My brother arrived first at the canal and found the place deserted except for a man passing by with his dog.
"Mister, my brother has fallen into the water," Philip cried.
"Oh, don't be silly, son," the irritated man replied and turned to go on his way.
However, he noticed that his dog was eager to go into the water, and so he finally gave Philip the benefit of the doubt and went down to investigate. Taking a stick, he dunked it into the canal and hooked my brother out on his first attempt. Evidently, David's galoshes had filled with water and weighted him to the bottom. His friends had panicked, and instead of trying to pull him out there and then, they ran home to my mother. By the time my father arrived, his little six-year-old boy was lying on the bank of the canal, his mission in life already over.
The headmistress of David's school later told my parents that they had always called my brother "David the Comforter," for whenever any of the children cried, no matter who it was, and no matter how old, he would run and put his arms around them in consolation. Years later, whenever my parents spoke of David, they confessed that they knew they shouldn't have favored any one of their children above the others, but there had been something special about him.
My mother in particular suffered such shock over David's death that she lost her memory to a great extent, sometimes even forgetting that she had a baby. Many times, she would take me shopping in the morning, and it wasn't until my elder brother returned home from school at four-thirty in the afternoon that my presence was missed.
"Mummy, where is the baby?" Philip would inquire.
"Eeee! I forgot! Philip, my love, go around the town and look for her. Queekly, my love, before Daddy come home."
And so my brother, only eight years old himself, would trek around the neighborhood looking for the baby carriage and bring it home. On more than one occasion, the entire family would be halfway down the road in the car before anyone realized that I was not there, and sometimes my mother would even forget to feed me.
I have one distinct memory of being left in a store when I was three. It was a huge store that sold knick-knacks, and there was a big old-fashioned rocking horse near the front counter for children to play on while their mothers shopped. Nearby was a mirror which reflected the counter, and I remember looking in the mirror while I was sitting on the horse and seeing my mother talking to the cashier; but the next time I looked, she wasn't there. I climbed down and searched all around but couldn't find her, so I went back to the rocking horse and waited. Even though I was so tiny, I did not cry; I think I had just become accustomed to being left. Eventually my two older sisters came to get me, their faces announcing their annoyance at having to round me up once again.
This went on for several years until my mother gradually came back to herself, but even then the pressures of home and family were sometimes too great for her. We were often so naughty that my mother would tease us and say she was going to run away. She would put on her coat, go down to the shop at the end of the road, and stay there for a long time while we would cry for her to come home again.
By then we had moved to a better neighborhood, and were living in a nicer house, with gardens at the front and back; but it was not long before my parents faced another trial. I was four years old when my father contracted tuberculosis, and he was away in hospital and convalescent homes for the next year and a half.
My mother worked two jobs during that time to keep the family going. She was an expert dressmaker, having been trained as a teenager at a French designing school in Alexandria, which would provide all the dresses and gowns for the Queen and the ladies of the court. Now in England, she was employed by the most exclusive dress company in Greenborough. When she was not at the shop, she did handwork for a tent manufacturing company and often brought work home at night. She was very skilled, but because of her poor English was never able to progress beyond factory-level employment.
Because of my parents' strenuous schedules, I was a latchkey child from the time I was six years old. I was always the first one home in the afternoon, and used to ride my bike to the bus stop every evening to meet my mother after her work, and help her carry home her packages and shopping. Even after my father recovered and went back to his job in the engineering firm, he was rarely at home. He was always running to church or preparing his sermons, and in his spare time, he kept a garden, from which came all of our fruits and vegetables. My parents arose at five-thirty each morning and never wasted a minute. Leisure was unknown to them, nevertheless hours and hours of community service managed to fit into their schedules each week.
The truth is that I did not have much time to think about whether I was lonely or not, because there was always church.
My earliest memories are of Sunday school. Even from the time I was three, I was always fighting for a front-row seat, always trying to sing the very loudest, and constantly full — to overflowing — with boisterous zeal for Jesus, my "savior and friend." The stories, the singing, the pictures to color — I loved them all.
But who was this person who was my savior? As I sat back in my seat and dangled my legs contentedly beneath me, I would listen to my father telling over and over again of how this "special person" wanted to come into my heart and take away all the bad things inside and make me good, and that one day very soon he would come back to earth and take all the good boys and girls with him. The naughty, wicked people would be left behind to a horrible, lonely life, full of terror and pain. But if I accepted Jesus, he would "clean my heart from sin" and give me peace and happiness within. My father always explained that I would know Jesus had entered my heart because I would have a "warm feeling" inside.
I always wanted to be a good girl, and I would watch my father with pride. This was my Daddy telling all these boys and girls such wonderful things. How nice and clever he was! I wanted the whole world to know he was mine and that I belonged to him.
I knew what always came after that speech. I had heard him talk this way many times before. He was building up to an altar call.
"Now I want everyone to bow their heads," he would say.
"Everyone. Forget about the person sitting next to you and think about what I have just said. Remember it is Jesus' blood that can make your heart clean, and that he died to shed that blood for you, because he loves you and wants to come close to you and be your friend."
Some of the older children at the back would giggle in embarrassment. The little ones shuffled around on their seats, confused at what was happening.
My father would start to sing quietly and encourage us all to join him.
Into my heart, into my heart,
I would screw up my eyes tightly, bury my head in my chubby little hands, and sing with the simplicity of an infant. I wanted it to happen to me; with all my heart I wanted it to happen. "Please, Jesus, please come into my heart today," I anxiously and silently pleaded, waiting for the "warm feeling" to enter me.
My father would begin to speak again. "All those boys and girls who would like to ask Jesus to come into their lives today should come to the front now," he would say gently.
I'd carefully wriggle off my seat and stand at the front of the church with numerous other children and wait for my father to put his hands on my head and pray for me. One or two tears sometimes trickled slowly down my face, and then I would return to my seat.
Five minutes later, Bible school would be over. "We are not going to have classes today. We are going to take the lovely presence of our savior home with us," my father would announce.
We would jump off our seats and run around, chasing and calling to one other. What presence? Had Daddy said something about a lovely presence? In a moment, the solemn peacefulness was all gone.
My father usually drove the children to their homes in the minibus, and I would wait with my elder brother and sisters until he returned for us. Sitting contentedly on the steps, full of the blissful peace of Sunday school, I would wonder innocently what was for dinner and if my mother had baked any cookies or cakes.
And so I grew up, enveloped by enchanting visions of a joyful heaven, waiting always for the promised "warmth" to enter me: praying, talking and living with the presence of a savior whom I believed to be my friend, and whose faithfulness I never for one moment doubted.
Early on, we were trained in the "ABC's" of spiritual growth and eagerly looked forward to attaining each stage. First we had to repent of the sin we were born with, until we were worthy of being "saved"; then we would be baptized, and our sinful hearts would be washed away; and finally we would be pure enough for Jesus' spirit to enter us and "fill" our lives permanently. This experience of "being filled" was a major milestone in one's spiritual achievement, for it meant that Jesus would never again leave the heart.
There was always a great pressure, even on children, to be "filled with the spirit," and it rested solely on the individual's power of belief. I had been up to the altar many times as a youngster, but I had no idea what being filled was supposed to feel like, and although I longed for it, I was never quite sure it had actually happened to me.
When I was eight, I once came to the altar call and knelt down; and to tell the truth, I think I must have fallen asleep, because I was still there with my head down after the others had returned to their places. My brother Philip came up and knelt down beside me, put his arm around me, and whispered softly, "Okay — now speak in tongues." "Tongues" was the unintelligible babbling that signified that a person had been filled and had received communication from above. I could not do this properly, but Philip assured me anyway that I was filled, and he joyfully went around announcing this landmark in my life to everyone in church.
From that time on, I told people I was filled, although I was never quite sure about it, and for a young child, this kind of doubt is excruciating. But for the most part, I passed my early youth in a rosy mist of belief, safe from the blandishments of the outside world, secure in the happy innocence of Jesus' friendship.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "To Play With Fire"
by .
Copyright © 2018 Tova Mordechai.
Excerpted by permission of Urim Publications.
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