Retribution?
Every year around this time I have the same memory. It was October of 1946. I was then a lineman (left guard) for the Dickinson High School football team. In those years there was a Texas-like intensity with high school football in Jersey City; particularly at that then tradition-rich school.
Imposingly placed at the crest of a gently rising knoll overlooking what was called lower – geographically and socially – Jersey City (invaded by Yuppie Manhattanites in recent years, it’s not socially “lower” anymore), the Hudson River and the luring New York skyline, the mixed architecture façade of the building made for an imposing structure.
Many of us who attended were second generation Americans. A polyglot student body with Italian, Irish, Polish, German, Swedish, Norwegian, Jews, Catholics, various Protestant denominations – you name it – heritages, we really exemplified the United Nations. For me now it represented a positive aspect of bringing young people together in public schools, rather than the separateness prevalent now in parochial, religious and private institutions.
We learned about and respected cultural and ethnic differences, and, some of the parents with their old-world prejudices notwithstanding, became friends.
Under our new coach, Milt Singer, a former lineman for the NY Giants who had just returned from military service, we were undefeated after 2 games. Our next game, against a city rival, Ferris High, was scheduled for a Saturday evening in October at Roosevelt Stadium where the minor league, Jersey Giants baseball and football teams played.
Most of our games were played on local high school fields, but this one was to be played under the lights in a real professional stadium. All of us on the team were excited, and looked forward to the experience.
I, however, had a problem. Yom Kippur, the most solemn of Jewish holidays, the Day of Atonement, for most Jews the most important of all in the Jewish calendar, fell on that day.
Now, while I did the Hebrew school and Bar Mitzvah bits, our family was not that religious. However, my mother insisted on observing 3 holidays, Rosh Hashanah
(the Jewish New Year), Yom Kippur and Passover, with the prior two requiring synagogue attendance and missing school if occurring on a school day (that was a plus).
During practice the week before the game, I was asked daily by Coach Singer if I was going to be able to play. Since it was a night game, I assured him, I would be there.
I did not, however, reckon with my dear parents. On the day before the game (and holiday) on informing them of my intention to play in that game, I was advised in no uncertain terms that I would not be doing so. Instead, I would be with the family that evening to “break the fast”. Oh boy! I had forgotten that I was expected to fast for the whole day. Then at sunset the family would gather to eat and celebrate the conclusion of the holiday.
The next day was a dilemma for me. While even then I was starting to question my religious conviction, I did not want to be disrespectful to my parents. Sitting in the temple, my mind was more on coming up with a permission-to-play strategy than participating in the service. The lack of nourishment did not affect me as much as the tension and stress of disappointing the team and the coach. Finally, at a little after 5, the October sun set, we returned home, and my mother put out a huge spread.
What to do? How do I “escape” to make the team bus to the stadium? Like a lightening flash, the “solution” came suddenly to me. Gulping down food morsels rapidly, I informed my parents that I was invited over to a friend’s house to break the fast with him and his family. While they looked at me incredulously, they acquiesced, and away I darted. Luckily, I quickly caught a local bus, and made it to the school as the team was lining up to board the chartered bus taking us to the stadium. I ran to my locker, gathered my equipment, climbed aboard, and away we went.
Now, ponder this. There I was on a day of one of the holiest of Jewish observances, a day when Jews throughout the world ask their G-d for forgiveness for their transgressions, lying to my parents to play in a game that they had no interest in that night or ever (they never attended one of our games). If you believed in retribution from “upstairs”, you would not have wagered on the brightness of my future.
As we approached the lit up stadium, our excitement and anticipation increased. We could not wait to put on our uniforms and get on that field. Everyone dressed, we gathered at the end of a tunnel leading to the field, and at the command of the coach, entered the playing area to cheers from the gathering Dickinson fans.
Excited as we stretched and loosened up, I felt a slight discomfort, a tightness in my stomach, but attributed it to nervousness. After the warm up, as we trotted back to the dressing area, I thought I tasted some of the gefilte fish and brisket of beef my mother had prepared, and commenced to feel slight cramps in my stomach. Still attributing it to pre-game apprehension, I ignored the discomfort.
Coach Singer gave us final instructions and his standard pep talk, and, again, only this time with a packed stadium and exuberant fans cheering on, we charged onto the field. The coin was flipped, our captain called heads, the coin ended tails up, and we prepared to kick off.
At the referee’s whistle, our guy kicked off, and down the field we charged. The Ferris High receiver, a big (6’3, 200+ lbs. – remember this is high school), swift, really talented, running back by the name of Billy Paine took the ball, darted left and right and headed down my lane. The two of us collided, he with his helmeted head down as if to run through me, and I with my right shoulder on his thighs. I can still hear and feel the thud.
As Paine went down, I felt a sudden, grabbing, overwhelmingly painful cramp in my stomach and chest. With a huge, almost volcanic eruption, I regurgitated (puked, if you prefer) over everything within 5 yards of me, including poor Paine. I mean that area of the field was covered with the semi-digested remains of Rose Silverman’s end-the-fast buffet.
The refs called time out as I lay in agony (and embarrassment) on the field. Not knowing what my problem or the cause there of was, my vomit-soaked jersey fouling the air, they carried me, fans cheering “Silverman rah, Silverman, rah, rah, rah, Silverman”, on a stretcher to the dressing area. Afraid they might take me to a hospital, I explained to the doctor in attendance what had happened.
Not of the faith, but understanding, he let me take a shower and wait for the team to return for half time.
A little peeved at and concerned for me, and, of course, also concerned that he might be chastised for playing me that night (he was not), Singer did not let me return to the field. We won the game, and, as a matter of fact, not only went undefeated in our remaining city games, but were also city and co-county champions that year.
I returned home, said nothing of my experience, and went to bed. Dreading that what happened would be reported, I thought about “confessing” the next morning, but did not. That was a mistake, for my father belonged to the local YMHA, a problem because Coach Singer was also a member. Sure enough, as was his custom, Lou Silverman went for his Sunday ritual there (no work out; just pinochle, a massage and the steam room). Of course, he met Singer there, and, of course, was asked how I was feeling. I can just see the look on his face when Singer told him what had happened.
When he returned home, he confronted me with what he had been told by the coach. No way to escape, I confessed to what he had heard. What surprised me was that he saw some mirth to the story. My mother, however, did not. Except for the remaining games, I was restricted to the house for a month of weekends, given multiple “hard labor” chores and really did not regain full credibility with her until the next year when I dutifully observed the holidays.
As the years flew by – college, military service, marriage, children and career – my observance of religious traditions diminished significantly. While from a heritage perspective I am what I am, I believe fully in religious pluralism including the right not to believe. That said, however, I sometimes wonder if “somebody up there” did not love me that evening.
For all of you of the faith and those of you who are not…
A joyful holiday, and a healthy, prosperous and fulfilling New Year.
Arnie Silverman
Laguna Niguel
