Oliver Benjamin
sick ones were missing patches of feathers, and I was instructed to
“throw them away.” I had a really hard time playing God and
deciding the fate of all these chickens—never had I been responsible
for so much slaughter in my life as I had been in the hatchery on the
kibbutz. Soon I became used to it and joined the others in throwing
chicks behind my back or under a raised leg into the reject bin. I
believe it was there, in that incubated depot of birth and death, that
I accrued enough bad karma to justify all that happened to me later.
Kibbutz life proved to be enjoyable. I thought of Charly often, but as
there were many interesting people around all the time, I never felt
lonely. I was in a strange state of mind. There were no threads in my
life, no connections, no ties. I was enjoying my first taste of real
freedom.
Due to my argumentative nature, I wasn’t always the most
popular guy around the volunteers’ quarters. I didn’t mind, though
because I had a good group of friends: Yippee, of course, who always
made sure things never got too mundane, a would-be Finnish rock
star named Manu who was always good for laughs, regularly
screaming out his Jim Morrison war cry of “all right, yeah!” and a
goofy Swiss-German neo-hippie named Greta who kept us well-
behaved with her easy femininity, loose flower-print dresses and
non-stop giggles. Greta not only lent herself to hyphenated
adjectives, but frequently spoke parenthetically as well. “Jake, you
have to give me a bite of that cake,” she would say, and then add, “(As
if you couldn’t guess that I was high).” Lastly, one of my favorite
people there was also the most widely disliked. He hailed from
Yorkshire, his name was Lenny and his mouth was a veritable
sweatshop of sarcastic remarks. Most of the other volunteers took
everything he said personally, but I knew that Lenny didn’t mean any
harm, he was just too good at being an obnoxious, sarcastic asshole
to refrain from doing it.
For a while, at least, I felt as if I was with my own kind.
43
 |
 |
 |
 |