Portnoy’s Complaint

Thank God, at any rate, for Heshie's weights. They became mine after he died. I would carry them into the backyard, and out in the sunshine I would lift and lift and lift, back when I was fourteen and fifteen years old. "You're going to give yourself a tsura yet with those things," my mother would warn me from her bedroom window. "You're going to get a cold out there in that bathing suit." I sent away for booklets from Charles Atlas and Joe Bonomo. I lived for the sight of my torso swelling up in my bedroom mirror. I flexed under my clothes in school. I examined my forearms on the street corner for bulge. I admired my veins on the bus. Somebody someday would take a swing at me and my deltoids, and they would live to regret it! But nobody swung, thank God.

Till Naomi! For her, then, I had done all that puffing and quivering under the disapproving gaze of my mother. That isn't to say that she still didn't have it over me in the calves and the thighs-but in the shoulders and chest I had the edge, and forced her body down beneath me- and shot my tongue into her ear, tasting there the grit of our day's journey, all that holy soil. "Oh, I am going to fuck you, Jew girl," I whispered evilly.

"You are crazy!" and heaved up against me with all her considerable strength. "You are a lunatic on the loose!"

"No, oh no," I told her, growling from my throat, "oh no, you have got a lesson to learn, Naomi," and pressed, pressed hard, to teach my lesson: 0 you virtuous Jewess, the tables are turned, tsatskeleh! You on the defensive now, Naomi-explaining your vaginal discharge to the entire kibbutz! You think they got worked up over those watches! Wait'll they get a whiff of this! What I wouldn't give to be at that meeting when you get arraigned on the charge of contaminating the pride and future of Zion! Then perhaps youll come to have the proper awe for us fallen psychoneurotic Jewish men! Socialism exists, but so too do spirochetes, my love! So here's your introduction, dear, to the slimier side of things. Down, down with these patriotic khaki shorts, spread your chops, blood of my blood, unlock your fortressy thighs, open wide that messianic Jewish hole! Make ready, Naomi, I am about to poison your organs of reproduction! I am about to change the future of the race!

But of course I couldn't. Licked her earholes, sucked at her unwashed neck, sank my teeth into the coiled braids of hair… and then, even as resistance may actually have begun to recede under my assault, I rolled off of her and came to rest, defeated, against the wall-on my back. "It's no good," I said, "I can't get a hard-on in this place."

She stood up. Stood over me. Got her wind. Looked down. It occurred to me that she was going to plant the sole of her sandal on my chest. Or maybe proceed to kick the shit out of me. I remembered myself as a little schoolboy pasting all those reinforcements into my notebook. How has it come to this?

" ‘Im-po-tent in Is-rael, da da daaah,' " to the tune of "Lullaby in Birdland."

"Another joke?" she asked.

"And another. And another. Why disclaim my life?"

Then she said a kind thing. She could afford to, of course, way up there. "You should go home."

"Sure, that's what I need, back into the exile."

And way way up there, she grinned. That healthy, monumental Sabra! The work-molded legs, the utilitarian shorts, the battle-scarred buttonless blouse-the beneficent, victorious smile! And at her crusty, sandaled feet, this… this what? This son! This boy! This baby! Alexander Portnoise! Portnose! Portnoy-oy-oy-oy-oy!

"Look at you," I said, "way up there. How big big women are! Look at you-how patriotic! You really like victory, don't you, honey? Know how to take it in your stride! Wow, are you guiltless! Terrific, really-an honor to have met you. Look, take me with you. Heroine! Up to the mountain. I'll clear boulders till I drop, if that's what it takes to be good. Because why not be good, and good and good and good-right? Live only according to principle! Without compromise! Let the other guy be the villain, right? Let the goyim make a shambles, let the blame fall solely on them. If I was born to be austere about myself, so be it! A grueling and gratifying ethical life, opulent with self-sacrifice, voluptuous with restraint! Ah, sounds good. Ah, I can just taste those rocks! What do you say, take me back with you-into the pure Portnovian existence!"

"You should go home."

"On the contrary! I should stay. Yes, stay! Buy a pair of those khaki short pants-become a man!"

"Do as you wish," she said. "I am leaving you."

"No, Heroine, no," I cried-for I was actually beginning to like her a little. "Oh, what a waste."

She liked that. She looked at me very victoriously, as though I had finally confessed to the truth about myself. Screw her. "I mean, not being able to fuck away at a big healthy girl like you."

She shivered with loathing. "Tell me, please, why must you use that word all the time?"