When Breaking the Law Was Breaking My Word
Sarah Shapiro
Jaywalking is in my blood, but as my mother would say, I come by it honestly.
For example, one morning in Los Angeles when she was about eighty, Mommy got a ticket for jaywalking on Ventura Blvd. This in itself was nothing unusual, but hurrying out of the post office a half hour later, she was still so mad at herself about the $35 that she crossed against the light and got another ticket. "On the same corner," said Mommy. "Isn't that remarkable? I just wasn't thinking. When the policeman saw it was the same woman he'd just written out a ticket for, he was so surprised. You should have seen his face."
"It was the same policeman?" I asked.
"Oh yes. He's such a nice boy."
For years, I upheld my mother's legacy to the best of my ability, and jaywalking became increasingly meaningful for me as time went on. For the lone individual in this digital world, how better to register a small, quaint protest against mass standardization (and civilization in general)? It's one of the only ways we have left to indulge in a minor act of civil disobedience without going to jail. The underlying rationale goes something like this: If no cars are coming, why should I wait here like a dummy just because everyone else is? Don't these people know I'm in a hurry!? It's not my problem if they have nothing better to do than stand around like statues because a little man in the red light is telling them, "Don't walk."
Which brings us to a sunny morning in Jerusalem, when standing on the corner of Rechov Schatz and King George, I looked to the left and looked to the right, saw that no cars were coming, and kept walking.
"Geveret!"
I didn't realize, at first, that I was being addressed.
"Geveret! What do you think you're doing!"
At whom was this shout directed? I turned around and the answer became apparent. An angry-faced policeman, in blue uniform and badge, was coming right at me. How innocent I felt!
He, too, was probably a nice boy, but he wasn't being very nice to me. He was making that Israeli gesture - pointing a finger to one's head to indicate something missing. I returned this gesture with one of my own - hands opened wide, palms turned gently upward - to indicate: Dear Sir, Your Royal Highness, why in the world are you yelling at me? What have I done?
He was jabbing his finger at something overhead and my eyes followed: A traffic light! Wow, what do you know! On such a small, insignificant side-street. Truly, I hadn't noticed.
He instructed me to halt right there and made his way to my side of the street. All my smug fellow pedestrians - having been well-behaved and escaping his wrath - were flaunting their freedom as they strolled on by.
The policeman took out a pad of pale pink and lime-green paper and started writing something.
"Officer! You're not going to give me a ticket!"
This was in English. I didn't choose my mother tongue on purpose, though it probably didn't hurt. My mother tongue... perhaps it had to do with my mother. In any case, at such a moment English came naturally.
He kept intently jotting things down, glancing ostentatiously up at the sky to check the street sign, and flicking out one wrist to get the exact time.
"Officer, please! Don't give me a ticket! Are you giving me a ticket?"
He condescended to give one tight little nod of his official head without lifting his eyes.
"Oh, Officer, please! Please don't give me a ticket! How much is it?"
He understood English, apparently. Briefly holding the pad out under my nose, he pointed with one index finger. My reading glasses were in my purse so the numbers were fuzzy, but there were definitely three of them, much too much money. And I knew already what would happen. I wouldn't find a stamp and it would take me a while to get over to the post office. The deadline would pass and they'd increase the fine.
"Officer, please don't give me a ticket. I really don't want a ticket."
Into each of my eyes sprang one pure tear. It was then that I said the fateful words: "I won't do it again, I promise."
He paused.
Quick! I told myself, say bli neder! This phrase, meaning "without a promise," is added to virtually every verbal commitment, because according to Judaism, making a promise is an extremely serious matter.
But I knew that if I said bli neder, the policeman wouldn't believe me.
He stood there for a long moment, looking me straight in the eye. "All right." He wagged his finger. "Never do it again." Then he tore up the ticket.
* * *
I kept my word. What choice did I have? Lights would turn red and green and yellow and there I'd stand like an automated dummy, at one corner after another, one intersection after another, waiting for the go-ahead from the little green man.
Months went by. It was on a trip to America that inwardly I began to weaken. Maybe the neder didn't apply in the United States? Perhaps there was a rabbi somewhere who would let me off the hook? But no, I knew the answer, and held my ground.
Then one morning back in Jerusalem, I was rushing at 9:05 to a 9:00 class at the Israel Center. Everywhere you look on Rechov Keren Hayesod, it's another traffic light. Green lights, red lights, blinking lights, flashing lights. Take one step forward or one step back and the little red man's telling you: Stop in your tracks!
I dashed to the curb and glanced down the street. The little man was saying, "Don't walk," but there were no cars coming and I was missing the class! I thought of the neder and a soft inner whisper confided: It doesn't matter, so out I darted.
* * *
This incident occurred half a year ago, and I've been wanting to tell the story ever since. But I didn't - and don't - have the words for what happened upon leaving that curb. How to convey the... tremendous velocity of the bombshell that exploded around me, a great missile the size of a bus... roaring to a screeching halt, stopping a hairsbreadth away from my very soul.
It turned out that the municipality had created additional two-way inner bus lanes, each with its own set of traffic lights, to better accommodate the heavy traffic on Keren Hayesod. Looking to the left, I hadn't noticed that there was a bus hurtling towards me from the right, a rocket with its weighty load, catapulting at top speed along the unobstructed lane.
The whole world came instantly to a halt. Frozen in time in the middle of the street, in silence stood I, struck dumb with shock, and awe. The massive bus was soaring up before me - its great, round headlights two staring glass eyes - and the furious face of the driver was scowling at me through the dark windshield as he gestured in that Israeli way. Are you crazy?! Cars were slowing down all around, drivers and passengers and passersby were staring blithely, irritated and scornful, and the driver of another bus, who'd seen what just happened, paused in the street to yell through his side-window, You want to get yourself killed? Idiot!
He was right. So close to death had I come that I sensed its warm, breathing presence... the way it suddenly reared up its head... and the vast shadow retreating fast into the darkness from whence it came. If the driver had glanced to one side at that moment, or yawned, or sneezed... If he hadn't braked in that fraction of a second...
Thankfulness came later. For now, a fool trembling uncontrollably, I was a vessel filling with shame. I'd tossed my life thoughtlessly into the arms of death because I was in a hurry.
I felt the voice of Mommy in my heart, though she'd long ago departed from this world. What was she saying? Stop jaywalking!
And Hashem was saying, My dear daughter, do not break your word.
