I walked into the North Shore Cigar Club and headed toward my usual seat next to the six-foot tall Cigar Store Indian standing in the corner. No one was in my seat, so I grabbed it. There’s nothing special about the seat. It’s just a plain metal frame padded stacking chair, but it’s where I like to sit. Call it habit. The Indian is a modern reproduction of one of those old wooden Cigar Store Indians that are now too expensive to keep outside, like in the olden days. Richie, the owner of the club, doesn’t like to waste money, and thought the Indian gives the place a little class. It does.
Mark and Gary yelled, “Hey Reb!”, their usual greeting. I just responded, “Hey,” and sat down. It’s been three years since I started coming to the club, partly for my love of cigars, partly for the fact that my wife won’t let me smoke them in the house, and partly for the friendship with the guys. But then again, everyone says they are there because their wives won’t let them smoke in the house. The truth is, it’s not really a cigar club at all. It’s a Cigar Store with a big walk-in humidor. Richie put in half a dozen chairs so the guys could sit around and have a place to smoke. We’d bring in coffee or soda, and shmooze for an hour or two. Last year Richie put in cigar lockers which the guys rent out, and we put our names on the lockers. I put Reb Meir of Essex Street on mine, and I’ve been called either Meir or Reb ever since. I can always count on finding a few of the guys around to chat with, trade cigars, and tell a story or two while enjoying a fine cigar, because, as the saying goes, life is too short to smoke cheap cigars.”
Mark is an accountant who recently got divorced. It was a messy situation, and for months, he would come in and give us a daily update of her latest demands, and what he planned to counter with. Everyone would give their opinion, and we all stood by him. We’re relieved that it’s finally over. Mark loves the New York Mets, and has season tickets. He offered me the tickets sometime if I want to take my son. I would have liked to take him up on it, but my son is a Yankees fan, and feels he has too much class to consider going to a Mets game. When I asked my son, he exclaimed, “Dad!”. I tried again, “We would sit in box seats, and have a great time.” “But”, he wasn’t budging, “it’s the Mets! We’re Yankee fans!” Well, Mark meant well.
Anyway, we were sitting around talking about Michael Jordan’s retirement, and Rob walked in. He owns a used car dealership and drives around in a Rolls Royce. Not that he’s pretentious, it’s just business. He’s a nice guy who loves to tell dirty stories about his sexual exploits. Once I was talking with the guys about something we saw on the Jerry Springer show, and I said to Rob,
“I don’t mean you, I mean a normal person.”
He met me outside the humidor and confided, “I just want you to know that everything I say in there about sex is pure bull. I love my wife and I don’t cheat on her.”
I asked, “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I just wanted you to know, but if you tell them in there, I’ll deny it.” I said I wouldn’t tell, but what difference would it make anyway? Nobody believes his fantasies.
I’m the religious guy, in a group of not-so-religious guys. Most of them are Jewish, but we have a few Italians, who agree with us that Italians are practically Jews anyway. We have similar values, customs, and ways of relating. I function like the Rabbi of the Cigar Shop. When one of them has a problem and needs to talk seriously, they talk with me. If someone has a religious question, they come to me. Even though they are not very religious, they come to me because they know I like them and respect them even if they are not religious. When they had the annual Cigar dinner at a fancy restaurant, they arranged for a Kosher meal to be brought in for me; and not one of those cheap meals either. It was as nice as theirs. After dinner, I was about to clip the end of a very good cigar, when Rob the car dealer shouted, “Hey Reb!, Is that cigar kosher?” The guys all laughed. I clipped the end off. “It is now!” They loved it.
A couple weeks ago Richie, the owner, sat down and started telling me about Pete Hamill’s book Snow in August, which is about a Golem. His brother-in-law Sandy was there, and put in his two cents. “I read that book. It was a dog.”
I told them I read it too and didn’t think it was that bad. Personally, I don’t think
I answered that the Golem was a character in a Jewish story about a Rabbi from
I told him not exactly, but Mark busted his chops, “You know Gary, a guy made of clay, like you when you get home from a bar.” Everyone laughed. I said it was more like our Cigar Store Indian than like Gumby. It was big and strong, and delivered the Jewish community.
The book happened to be a great book, because it was based in modern times, and in the end the Golem not only delivered the little Jewish community in Brooklyn where the story takes place, but also delivered all Jewish people in every time. I said, “you know, this book is only a story but it helped me understand the book of Job.”
Rob asked, “What’s the book of Job?”
I explained that the book of Job was about a guy who loses everything he has and contracts a terrible skin disease. His friends tell him he lost it all because he sinned, but Job kept saying he didn’t sin.
Richie turned to Rob and warned, “Watch out Rob. You could be next! No one sins more than a used car dealer!” We all laughed.
“In the end,” I continued, “Job received back double for all he had lost. Except for his children, because he received back the same number of them.”
Rob wanted to know, “well, did it say why he had all that stuff happen to him?” I had to admit that it didn’t. He continued to protest, “well what good is it then, if it doesn’t tell you why?”
I explained that, “Even if you lose everything, but trust in G-d, everything that is lost to you in life, is not really lost. Loved ones will be restored, all injustices will be made right.”
Richie asked, “Do you really believe that Reb?”
I said “Yeah I do.”
“It would be easier to believe one of Rob’s stories,” Mark added sarcastically.
Rob didn’t let up. “But what good is that for me now?”
This time I gave them my buck and a half sermon. “It means that if you live your life believing that G-d will make everything right in the end, you can afford to be generous with the way you live your life now. It effects the way you treat other people, and the way you do things.”
Rob still didn’t get it. “What kind of life is that?”
“It’s called faith.”
Richie asked, “Oh, faith in a Cigar Store Indian?”
I continued my sermon, “No. Faith in G-d, who could even help us through an inanimate object like a Cigar Store Indian if he wanted to. The Torah says man was made from the dust of the earth, the Rabbi made the golem from clay. Neither had life before G-d gave life. G-d doesn’t need us to make things happen. Of course, you guys don’t have to make the job any harder for Him either.”
“So why is it so important for you to sit next to the Indian all the time?, Mark asked pointedly.
I said, “I trust the Indian. He’s the only one who doesn’t spread any bull around here. Besides, he’s a member of the tribe, The Shmohawk tribe.”
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