The Store

We said 'the Store,' as people say 'the White House,' a one and only.

Schmulka Bernstein's spanned 109-111 Rivington Street with two swinging glass doors and two long plate glass windows.  Entering, you came into coolness - a floor of red quarry tiles covered by clean sawdust and the mild, persistent hum of the refrigerated counters.  There was a wooden bench just inside the door that was darkened by use and age. Anyone could have a seat here and watch the world go by, and an occasional customer did.  Sometimes our grandfather, Schmulka, sat there, because by my time, the 1950s, most of the details of the business had been turned over to his sons, our uncles. Or a visiting grandchild might sit comfortably beside him and be pleasantly ignored while he greeted customers. Other days Zayde sat cozily wedged between two rabbis.  One ruddy and round, the other pale and gaunt. This threesome would sit facing forward, talking Yiddish to each other while their eyes faced the street. The two rabbis were paid a salary to certify that every beef and lamb carcass in the store and the smokehouse met kosher standards. But when all this certifying was done, they repaired to the bench. 

           

The ruddy rabbi was Levinson. He was corpulent, smiley, a cheek-pincher and a man who actually paused to pay attention to children. He had a bushy red beard, wild, unruly sidelocks and red moustaches that were always wet.  Years later I learned that with his family he had escaped Europe by going east, overland until reaching safety in Shanghai. The other rabbi was thin and pallid with a scraggly white beard. He was the younger son of a famous Talmudist who needed a job. And even though the business didn't need another certifier, Zayde hired him. Because this is what Zayde did. It didn't matter what his sons thought or the business could afford. Need came before profit.

Behind the men on the bench there was a row of immaculate white counters. Above the counters a mural of Biblical scenes covered one wall: Abraham at the opening to his tent, Rebecca waiting by the well, Joseph in the pit. Not great art, but good enough illustrations. The painted tales of our ancestors, along with the rabbis, gave the store a hallowed aura: A place of koshering, as in following holy commandments.  A place where just by standing in line waiting to choose your shoulder chops for dinner you were engaged in a ceremonial act.

We could not then imagine that we would someday find ourselves in the present world where friends state with an air of superior knowledge, "Oh I never eat red meat." Minute steak, chuck roast, shoulder or brisket, delmonico, flanken, steak cubed or rib, lamb chops baby or shoulder. We loved them all and dined on the best cuts - two, three, four times a week. Red meat was essential, like the human need for earth, air and fire. God Himself loved the savory fragrance of roasting beef or goat or sheep.  When, in Genesis, He "smelled the soothing aroma" of Noah's burnt offerings, He was convinced to spare the world.