What Were They Thinking? 

 

Perhaps it happened in the early evening of a sweltering day in the month of August when the dog star Sirius and the Sun rise and fall together. Known around the globe as “The Dog Days,” this weather-related phenomenon was noted by Homer in his Iliad:

On summer nights, star of stars, Orion's Dog they call it, brightest
Of all, but an evil portent, bringing heat and fevers to suffering humanity.

 

            For the six million souls traversing the asphalt canyon of New York City in August of 1947 it was just another hot, humid day to get through. The heat would become so oppressive, the city would open fire hydrants so children could cool off in the spray. The entire island of Manhattan would slow to a crawl as the The Dog Star radiated through the urban bodies on this bed-rocked island thirteen miles long by two miles wide.

 

            In August of 1947, as India and Pakistan were becoming nations, and Thor Heyerdahl was navigating the Kon-Tiki from South America to the Polynesian islands, Malvina and Solomon Hellman of New York’s Lower East Side were to have a romantic encounter that would produce me. My best estimate is that this exciting and creative act (one that I will always be grateful for), occurred between August 8 and August14^th during the month the Romans originally named Sextilis, until Julius and Augustus knocked all the months out of order. I have a very strong feeling that neither Molly or Sol were thinking of either the Julian, the Gregorian or the Roman calendar at that moment. 

 

            What were they thinking?  What were they doing on the day they created me? 

 

Black Narcissus and The Bishops Wife were playing at the local cinema and Brigadoon and Finnian’s Rainbow were the plays to see on Broadway. However, going uptown was a big deal for my parents, as the air seemed too thin for them once they got north of 14^th Street. They might have been watching a Brooklyn Dodger game on their black and white Dumont Television, checking out that exciting new second baseman named Jackie Robinson, however as much as I love baseball, I would hope for a more romantic setting for the day I was brought into existence.

           

 Knowing my father Sol, I imagine he ordered take out from Wah-Kees – Chicken Chow Main, Egg-Foo Young with a side of egg rolls. Meanwhile my mother Molly prepared herself for an evening of Chinese food, a nip or two of Scotch and then an intimate encounter. 

As my parents were never ones for air conditioners, I’m sure there was a sound of two old black fans creating a sort of calming white noise as the small machines did what they could to cool the air from another long day of Dog Star humidity. 

 

            Malvinia Hellman, the granddaughter of Rabbi Joseph Kanet from Czyzewo, Poland, was 30 years old. Solomon Hellman, the son of a carpenter from eastern Germany, was 34. And I was soon to become a diploid cell resulting from the fusion of two haploid gametes; a fertilized ovum, a Zygote. 

            Interesting to consider who I might have been before I was a Zygote. A passion, a twinkle in the eyes of Molly and Sol, or a spirit from one dimension about to bout to be “sired” into a new reality. I am certain my parents were not thinking in these terms. 

 

They were probably not thinking at all.  I would hope they had a moment of deeply fulfilled desire on that warm summer evening, when their respective gametes were joined. But if anything were going through their minds, perhaps my mother, being a classical pianist, was hearing one of Beethoven’s Nocturnes. My father might have been thinking about a sandwich, a really good sandwich, hot brisket of beef on caraway seeded rye perhaps with a touch of horse radish.

 

            There’s a strong possibility that the balmy summer evening might have drawn Molly and Sol to venture out afterwards to their favorite café for something special. Their destination would undoubtedly have been Ferrara’s up on Grand Street for an exotic coffee and a sweet desert. 

A perfect first night of existence for me. I was already smiling, already enjoying the ride in my mother’s fallopian tubes, my cells now dividing and dividing and dividing again at ever higher speed, warmed by the heat of a hot New York night and showered with a sweet rain of café au lait and chocolate cannoli.