A. Blinken About this time every year I start thinking about my Jewish almost heritage. I found out about it when I was staying with Granny Wise one year. We sat down to a crispy ham with apple dressing, and she said, "Lord, may I eat this goat" as she cut it up. I said, "goat? Ham is pig." Granny said, "I know that, boy, I was remembering your great grandad Aaron Wise. He was a Jew and couldn’t eat pig, but in the old days lots of times all we had in winter was bacon and ham, since they keep so well. Whenever he had to eat ham, he would ask permission from the Lord to eat goat. Oh, there was never a man like Aaron Wise, A.B. I remember the first time I saw him, in the Mission district, only a few months after we stopped in San Francisco. We’d left Ireland six months before, and after an eternity on a boat, spent an eternity on a train. My father had indentured his soul to a ship building company to pay for our passage and rent in a two room cold water flat. He worked ten hours a day, a lot of times more, and he got my brothers Patrick and Bryan on, as well. It was the depression, we were lucky to have work.  I was 16, and Pop didn’t figure I needed more education, so I went to work washing clothes. Aaron would come to get his laundry, his clothes were plain, but very well made. I would be sure to take his money and brush his hand with my fingers on the change. Mam saw it and one day she told me, "that boy’s a Jew, a Christ killer. I’ll be waiting on him here after." She told Pop and he told my big brother Patrick to bust the Jew’s jaw. It was after work one night, Patrick, who was known in the Mission as a stout boy with a fast hook, put on his best jacket and bowler hat and said, "I’ll be after breaking your Jew boy’s neck, so throw his laundry in the fire." I cursed him as he left and waited a minute and followed Pat, who picked up Irish rogues along the way, until we came to an upscale drinking house. "I’ll be bringing him out," Patrick said, and he went in. After a minute, the door burst open and a body flew out, and I was of two minds as I realized it was Patrick spilling out into the gutter. Aaron pushed out the door and said, "do you need a hand up, mick?" Patrick jumped to his feet and, hands grasping rushed Aaron, who was like a dancer, whirling around Pat, punching his kidneys, cracking his nose, finally hammering Pat’s hard head from the right, causing Pat to spin around and go down, staying down, this time. It took a moment of disbelief, then the Irishmen around started to grumble menacingly, and Aaron, upright and composed, glanced at them and said, "was this a fair fight nor not?" They had to admit it was. Aaron looked at me and said, "I guess this was over you?" I nodded. "Right, well, tell your father that I’ll be courting you now, and unless he want’s his boy to get a beating again, I’ll hear nothing from him." I took Pat home and told Pop what Aaron said, and he got red in the face and hollered at Pat, offering to beat him again for failing. Then, I told Pop that I was 16 and would see who I like, or leave his house. It wasn’t long after that Aaron lifted my skirt in a dark alley, against a brick wall, and I felt so well drilled I figured I might plump. The next day, Aaron told my Pop he was going to marry me straight away, and Aaron and I went to city hall, and with Mam crying to Jesus and Pop gnashing his teeth we were married and left north looking for work. At once Aaron loved the hard life.  He worked what work there was in town, then we heard they were finding gold in the mountains.  For the next ten years we followed the chance to find gold north.  He loved characters of the old days, and I did, too. Aaron was always up right, always decent. I loved him breathlessly those years." Granny was silent a long time, and I was already done with my food. "So, am I a Jew, then?" Granny was solemn. "Aaron never asked me to convert, but with Catholics, someone has to convert because kids with no religion automatically go to hell, or they did back then. Aaron was more Jew than I Catholic, and the little rituals he followed, even in the camps, like breaking bread and praying over it at each meal, were interesting, so I decided to become a Jew, though Aaron didn’t ask it. I read the Torah, which was mostly the Old Testament, and the Talmud, and the writings of important rabbis. I learned berakhot and memorized important holidays of the Jewish calendar, which is different from ours being based on the moon instead of the sun. Then, after several years of reading holy books by lantern light to three nursing babies, we finally had a chance to visit an actual synagogue in Sacramento, and I realized in two minutes why he had never asked me to convert: because no matter how many holy books I read, and how many rituals I learned, I would never, ever, really be a Jew. And, since I wasn’t a Jew, my children weren’t Jews, because Jewishness is through the mom. I had been living a sham those years, and Aaron hadn’t told me, and I hated him for it, but I also realized that he had given up his heritage by marrying me, and I loved him so much for that. I learned that Aaron was the pride of a family of New York Jews, considered a prodigy, likely to become a rabbi. Aaron was only supposed to be west for a few months, taking care of some textile shipments, and he was supposed to go home. Because he married me, an Irish Catholic, he would never go home again.  I was crushed, didn't know what to do, but I liked the ceremonies, and the idea of one’s place with the Creator, and I liked the idea of personal responsibility, and Tikkun Olam, healing the world and so I continued to practice Judaism until Aaron went to his awful death. I sat Shivah over his broken body, but after forty years, the gestures seemed empty. I looked up his family to let them know he’d died. His father was dead, broken hearted, but his brother and other family were still alive. They were very decent to me, replying to my letters, reassuring me that I must be very special for Aaron to love me. It was the kindest thing anyone ever said. So, are you Jewish? No. Not quite." I spent some time reading the Old Testament, and even got a simplified version of the Talmud, which I didn’t quite read, but still, it made me feel closer to my great-grandfather, my namesake, who died days before I was born, Aaron Wise.