On a hot summer afternoon my two younger sisters and I sat licking ice-cream cones on our front stoop on Clark Street, while our parents occupied two kitchen chairs alongside us. Old Mr. Jacob Malamud, leaning heavily on his cane, hobbled by slowly on his spindly bowlegs and nodded politely in our direction. He was so bent over, his torso from the waist up was almost parallel to the sidewalk. The translucent fine skin stretched tightly over his sharp cheekbones, the narrow slightly slanted eyes, and the bald oval head, all gave him the appearance of a leprechaun. Every day he made the laborious trip to Irving’s corner store to buy a Pepsi and a piece of cake.

“Pepsi, cake and cigarettes never hurt anybody,” he said, grinning. He never paid attention to our mother who insisted that smoke was bad for the heart“It’s not healthy food,” our mother commented as she started another darn on a sock that had already been darned from toe to heel. She took pride in reading the leaflets from the clinic that instructed mothers on the benefits of wholesome foods.

Our father set Der Tog on his knees, slipped a Turret between his lips, took a long puff and exhaled with undisguised pleasure. “Pepsi, cake and cigarettes never hurt anybody,” he said, grinning. He never paid attention to our mother who insisted that smoke was bad for the heart.

“Is it true that Mr. Malamud is 150 years old?” Helen, the youngest, asked.

“No one can live that long,” I said.

“Our father came back with, “He can even be older.”

“Impossible,” I said. “No one in my encyclopedia lived that long.”

Our mother came to my defense. ”Even Moishe Rabaynu lived only to 120.”

“Never mind Moishe Rabaynu and your encyclopedia. I know better,” he said, and told his story in the usual way, switching back and forth from English to Yiddish even in mid-sentence.

“It is written in the secret books of the Kabbalah that when a person is born, the shammes of Heaven receives the information from the Riboyno Shel Oylam Himself. You may ask, what information? So I’ll tell you. Where the person will live, if he’ll have a family, how he’ll make a living, when he’ll die. The only information he doesn’t get is what kind of person he’ll be. A person can choose to be good or bad, that is left up to him. It is written, ‘If you choose good and not bad, you will be blessed with milk and honey.’”

“I don’t like honey,” Helen said.

“I’m never getting married,” I said. “I don’t care what’s written in the secret books.”

“So go on with the story,” Bena said, and hugged her knees.

“I’ll go on if people don’t interrupt.” He held our attention with his keen brown eyes, waited for total silence, and continued. “Anyway, the shammes has to have a good memory, because he gives the information to the bookkeeper. The bookkeeper writes it down in a ledger, like in a factory. Once it’s written, the person begins his life.”

“In what language?” I asked. The note of skepticism in my voice was not lost on my father.

“In Hebrew, like in the Torah,” he answered sharply. “What language do you think? Turkish? Any more klotz kashes?” There weren’t any, so he resumed. “You know, it is written in the Yom Kippur machzor that Heaven knows who will live and who will die before the year is over. But if a person promises from the heart to be good and change his bad ways, he is forgiven, and the shammes tells the bookkeeper to erase the old information.”

Her eyes filled with tears. My arm went about her and I assured her that she’ll be forgiven if she doesn’t do it againI threw Bena a pertinent look. She had scribbled in my story notebook because I refused to take her downtown with my friends. Her eyes filled with tears. My arm went about her and I assured her that she’ll be forgiven if she doesn’t do it again. And Helen said she’ll always “do messages” for our mother from now on. When the others turned their pointed gaze in my direction, I reluctantly promised to hang up my clothes. Our father was pleased with the effect his story was having.

“What does this have to do with Mr. Malamud?” our mother asked, holding her needle up and threading it. She looked younger when she wasn’t working in the factory.

“Patience, I’m coming to it.” Again he waited for total silence before he continued. “Well, it happens that the shammes is very busy. Thousands of people are born in the world every day, and there are millions more praying to change the information in the books, so he can get mixed up. After all, he is only human.”

Our mother gave a little gush of laughter. “He should get an assistant.”

“I’m telling the children a serious story so they should learn something, and you laugh?” our father said, peeved.

“Go on, Daddy, tell the story,” Bena and Helen clamored, as did a few neighbors who had in the meantime gathered around our stoop. The growing audience delighted him. Placated, he went on. “Well, the day Jacob Malamud was born was a very busy day. It was on the first night of slichos, in the year that a great holy man, Nachman of Bratslav, was praying hard for his people. It was also a record day for births all over the world, so the shammes forgot to tell the bookkeeper that Jacob Malamud was born, and his name doesn’t appear on the books.”

“You mean he can live forever?” I asked, incredulously.

“It’s possible.”

“Unless the Riboyno Shel Oylam calls in an accountant to check over the books,” our mother laughed.

“Your mother is a real comedian,” our father retorted. “She should be on Jack Benny.” Our mother grinned, taking his remark as a compliment.

Helen said, “I hope they forgot my name too, so I’ll live forever.”

“Don’t say that,” our father said, shaking his forefinger. “Mr. Malamud is all alone in the world. His children, his family, everyone went before him. It’s a curse I don’t wish on no one.”

With that our father tucked the newspaper under his arm, asked our mother for a glass of tea, and, with the hint of a bow to his rapt audience, went into the house. Our mother beamed at her children, collected her mending paraphernalia, and followed her husband. By now we had finished our ice cream and ran off to play before the day faded.

I took it for granted that he would live forever. So it came as an overwhelming shock when he left usSeveral years later, when Jacob Malamud went to meet his Maker, my father said, “Nu, the bookkeeper finally balanced the books.”

Our father died at the age of 102. For years I assumed the heavenly shammes had forgotten to report his birth, and I took it for granted that he would live forever. So it came as an overwhelming shock when he left us. The shammes hadn’t made an error, and my father’s longevity was the decree of the Almighty after all.

Der Tog: “The Day”: Yiddish newspaper, 1914–1919 and 1922–1953; later merged with Der Morgen Zhurnal (The Morning Magazine)

Klotz kashes: foolish questions

Machzor: holiday prayer book

Shammes: beadle or sexton in a synagogue

Slichos: penitential hymns recited during the days preceding the High Holidays and through Yom Kippur, and on fast days.

Moishe Rabaynu: Moses, our teacher

Riboyno Shel Oylam: the Almighty; Lord of the world.