Free Between Gods: A Memoir by Alison Pick Page B

hard it is that the other women in our class will be “allowed” to convert, but I won’t, despite being half Jewish already. Not “allowed” because I plan to marry a Gentile.
    “That’s too bad,” she says blandly when I explain.
    We find a table at the small café in the foyer of the community centre. She sits and motions for me to do the same.
    “The other women,” I say. “I don’t think they are really interested in Judaism. They’re only interested in getting married.”
    “And isn’t that a noble cause?”
    I’m silent.
    “Isn’t it?” she asks. Her piercing gaze reminds me that Degan and I still haven’t set a date for our wedding.
    The waitress arrives and the rabbi and I both order lattes.
    “So,” the rabbi says evenly. “You’re faced with a difficult decision.”
    “Whether to convert?”
    “Whether to get married.”
    I pinch my earlobe between my thumb and forefinger.
    She eyes me. “Intermarriage is frowned upon,” she says. “You do know that, right?”
    I blink. Blink again. They want me to ditch my fiancé? I forced myself to walk away from Eli, from that beautiful scene in the glossy magazine—in other words, I’ve done the right thing—and this is the result?
    “Can I have some sugar here?” the rabbi asks the waitress. She turns back toward me reluctantly. “Do you know about gilgul nefashot ?”
    I shake my head: no. My eyes are wide.
    “ Gilgul nefashot translates to ‘rolling souls.’ It’s a concept that applies to bringing Jewish souls back to Judaism. There are lost Jewish souls. They attach to someone who will eventually find a Jew to marry.”
    “So it’s all predetermined?”
    But the rabbi won’t bite. She repeats, “When you convert, you are bringing a soul back to Judaism.”
    I wonder if she’s been listening to anything I’ve said. “I’m not allowed to convert,” I remind her. “Unless Degan does, too.”
    A look of mild annoyance crosses her face, as though I have interrupted some well-polished speech. “In your case, you’d be bringing two souls back.”
    “But Degan doesn’t want to convert.”
    She shrugs. That part isn’t her problem.
    We walk in silence back up to the room where our class takes place. Rabbi Glickman greets the rest of the students and then asks if anyone knows what month comes after Kislev. People have been studying up: several hands wave in the air, Debra’s included, but the rabbi chooses to answer her own question. “Tevet,” she says. “The month of goodness and bodily heat.” She pauses. “Judaism has a notable lack of emphasis on sin. With regard to sexuality especially.” She pauses again. “Unlike certain other religions.”
    I lower my head to my notebook, brow furrowed.
    Debra, the minister’s daughter, refuses to be shamed. She raises her hand again. “For example?”
    “Well,” says the rabbi, “for one, making love is considered a good thing. A sanctified part of Shabbat. In Judaism, the pleasures of the body are celebrated.”
    I feel again the heat of Eli’s hand on my cheek, the pulse of my skin under his touch.
    “Between married partners,” she adds.
    I flush.
    “In Tevet,” the rabbi says, “we ask ourselves how we can bring the goodness of the sexual impulse into our homes.”
    I wait for the answer, but she doesn’t supply one. She peers at us over her glasses. She is a woman with almost no extra body fat. Her close-cropped hair gives her the look of a bird.
    “In the Torah,” she says, “we are told about a human being’s two inclinations: toward good and toward bad. These are not states but tendencies .”
    “The yetzer harah ?” one of the baseball caps asks.
    “The yetzer harah is the impuse toward bad. And who knows the good impulse? The yetzer —?”
    I remember my conversation with Dad. Bondy.
    Bonas dia .
    Good day.
    Yom TOV .
    “ Yetzer tov ?” I ask.
    The rabbi nods, acknowledging me. We hold eyes for an extra moment, as though she is seeing me for the