that made up the tiny but growing Jewish community in El Paso, Texas. But he had never encountered a customer like me.
Silverman measured my feet, shook his head as if he were having a conversation with some unseen audience, and quickly disappeared through the worn, velvet curtains that hid the stockroom. Within a few seconds he came through those curtains with the exuberance of an actor bounding on the stage for an encore. He cradled several boxes as he made his way to where Mama and I sat.
Silverman presented the same style high-tops that I had just outgrown. I looked up to see my mother biting her lower lip, which I would come to recognize as a telltale sign that she was worried. The pride I had felt at being “big for my age” a few short months before had disappeared. It was replaced by foreboding. Not knowing what to do, I closed my eyes tightly and descended, inside; a lifelong way I had of escaping. Sitting in Givens, embarrassed and worried, I sought refuge in an inner world where I longed to find something to soothe me. But no comfort materialized out of that murkiness.
As if he couldn’t tolerate the vacuum, Silverman filled it with chatter. “This is a first for us,” he said, looking over his spectacles and down his nose. “I mean I’ve never sold so many shoes to one kleiner bocher (little boy) in so short a time. Chaa, Chaa.” He laughed with a German accent. I wondered if he was laughing or struggling for air. “What are you feeding this boy, Mother Erlich?”
I squirmed and Mama’s jaw clenched. Silverman’s loud voice was a magnet for attention in that small store. He, like many others over the years, seemed unaware of my increasing anguish. Another mother, this one towing a little girl who wore a yellow bonnet, craned her neck to see what all the fuss was about. The cashier and another salesman, like deserters from the Foreign Legion, left their posts to see what was happening. That was the first time I remember drawing a crowd. I couldn’t wait to get out of there. I felt mortified. At that point, I would rather have gone barefoot.
Unfortunately, I would become a constant visitor to Givens Shoes. Within a few years, Givens could no longer accommodate me; I would bust out of even the largest shoes in El Paso. At great expense for any family, I would have to have shoes custom made.
XXXX
Two months and four pairs of shoes later, I sat on Dr. Epstein’s leather-covered exam table. In those days, he was the best doctor in town. My mother and father flanked me, sitting on uncomfortable iron chairs that had been painted white. I was nervous. I subtly scanned my parents and sensed their apprehension.
“Dr. Epstein came by the store last week. I sold him a zeiger. He should be on time,” said my father, trying to lighten the mood in the sterile examination room. “Then again, maybe the watch is already kaputt.” He smiled at me. I forced myself to grin back.
“Once in Poland during an influenza outbreak, when I got deathly ill, they made me take kerosene,” said Mama, frantic for something to talk about. I recall that I grimaced, imagining what kerosene tasted like. I wondered if Dr. Epstein would prescribe it for me.
“Weh es mir, Dora!” said Papa, rolling his eyes. “Are you trying to scare the poor boy?”
Mama folded her hands and looked down. I watched. Something’s the matter. Papa never leaves work for something like this, I thought. It was rare for me or anyone in the family to even visit a doctor. It only happened when someone was very sick. Mama had told us boys that when she and Papa were children, neither of their families had geld for doctors or medicine. Babies were born at home, delivered by midwives. Often, children got very sick and even died without ever seeing a doctor or going to a hospital.
“Dr. Epstein will have an answer for us,” my father said, directing his comment at my mother. A forced smile came to her lips. She slowly looked away and out of the third-story exam room window in the Blumenthal Building onto the plaza below. I tried to see her face. I noticed that she opened her purse, took out a linen hankie, and dabbed at her eyes.
“Mama, what’s going on? I don’t feel sick. Why are we here?” I asked. “When we came last week, why did the nurse take my blood?”
Just then, Dr. Epstein entered the examination room. That middle-aged physician had prematurely gray hair. He walked with the stooped shoulders of a man who often bore the heavy burden of bad news. Epstein wore a stethoscope around his neck and carried a manila file in his right hand. He placed the file down on the exam table next to me and carefully opened it as if it were a prayer book. Then he put his right hand on my knee and looked over at my parents. He made no small talk but immediately spoke in a grave tone. If his words had a color they would have been gray like the stones in the cemetery.
“I have never had a patient like this.” My eyes darted back and forth from the doctor to my mother and then my father. “If Jake was my boy, I’d take him to Los Angeles, maybe Chicago…to a specialist,” said Dr. Epstein, shaking his head.
Los Angeles or Chicago; I’ll miss school, I thought. I liked school. The thought of leaving home, El Paso, and Doogan—our new police-dog puppy—made me queasy.
“Was ist a specialist?” Mama asked.
“In my training I did study about this type of syndrome: monstrous growth, consistent with that of giants,” Epstein said, ignoring Mama’s question.
Two words, monster and giant, pierced my ears like bullets. This would be the first of many callous doctors I would come to dislike; doctors who would want to poke, prod, and measure me like some kind of prized specimen; doctors whose callous words would almost destroy the only man I ever met who was taller than me.
I was dizzy. My heart began to pound. I felt my throat closing.
“If he keeps growing like this, by his eighth birthday he’ll be close to six feet. I don’t know what’s going to become of him. We’re not looking at the development of a normal child here.”
I remember he talked as though I wasn’t even there.
“What’s going to happen with his schooling?” asked Mama.
“Mrs. Erlich, this is serious,” Epstein rebuked her. “School should be the least of your concerns at this point. I’m worried about him.”
I started to feel strange, almost like I was eavesdropping on a conversation about someone else.
I thought my father looked pale. “Dr. Epstein, is there nothing you . . . ?”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Erlich. There’s nothing more I can do.”
My ears buzzed. I got up off the examination table, unable to contain myself, and moved away from Epstein and my parents. My thoughts raced. I’m not like the normal kids. Something must be wrong with me. I moved toward the window, as if to fly right out of it.
“Jake, sit still! You’re distracting me. Mind your manners,” Papa commanded.
I forced myself to sit down on the exam table. My thoughts ran in no particular direction other than away, like the lizards that Doogan chased in the yard. My parents and Epstein continued their conversation. I tried to listen but all I could hear was my heart thumping. I can’t breathe, I thought. The room grew dark, almost black. That was my first panic attack.
I had to escape. I jumped to my feet and ran to the door. Before anybody could grab me, I bolted. I almost knocked down the nurse standing in the hallway as I charged by her. Then I sprinted through the waiting room that was full of patients and dashed down the stairs and out onto Oregon Street.
