Pumpkinflowers by Matti Friedman

Author:Matti Friedman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Published: 2016-05-17T16:00:00+00:00

35

THE PUMPKIN FINALLY introduced itself to me on the night Natalie was going to get undressed. I remember the anticipation with clarity because of the events of that evening but also because of Natalie’s unusual beauty—she was like an exquisite Sephardic elf, bewitching even clothed.

The old TV set that struggled from one of the top bunks to pick up the transmissions from Israel was advertising the upcoming episode of a dramatic series of no memorable merit. It starred Natalie, an actress hardly older than us. In the advertisement, or at least in the version replayed in my memory, you saw Natalie engaged in conversation before her right hand went toward her left hip and her left hand toward her right, and she lifted the bottom of her shirt toward her head, and there was nothing underneath—but at the crucial moment the camera cut away. The idea was that the viewer would have to watch the episode to see the rest.

Amid our menial lives the importance of this moment of televised nudity can’t be overstated, however pathetic it seems now. I believe that at this time most of us had yet to encounter the real thing. After rotating out of the line and boarding a civilian bus home a girl soldier would sometimes slip in next to me—a clerk or instructor coming from one of the safe bases inside Israel where such olive-drab unicorns roamed free, their uniforms concealing wild pinks and reds—and nothing more than the scent of synthetic flowers from her hair would render me senseless, sending my head falling forward, forcing my eyelids shut and the air from my lungs, my fingers clutching the grip of my rifle until my faculties returned. So potent was the effect of women’s shampoo on my nervous system in those days that I am still vulnerable to it now.

When darkness arrived on the night of the television show the sergeants inspected the sandbags and machine guns around the perimeter, as they did each evening. I checked the battery on my night goggles, pressing my eyes against the rubber sockets and seeing the world in green. Things became more focused. We had been in the army for ten months and on the line for two. Less had happened so far than we had expected or might have hinted to friends at home. The hour of the TV broadcast was approaching when a lookout on another hill spotted three guerrillas moving up our ridge toward the Forest.

The message reached the Pumpkin on the radio. Harel summoned us, and I raced with him and seven others from the bunker to a vehicle that lurked like an enormous porcupine outside the gate, its back bristling with antennae and guns. There were two such vehicles on the hill, old Centurion tanks that the army had refitted to carry infantry in Lebanon, removing the turret and cannon and adding layers of armor to protect us from rockets and roadside bombs. I’m grateful for those efforts, which enabled the writing of this book.

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