ISRAEL: One plus one equals zero

TEL AVIV (Haaretz), June 12, 2008: Easy Start By Ariel Hirschfeld "Come here for a minute, please. Pardon me, but you're Hirschfeld, right?" Right. "There's something I wanted to ask of you." Okay, sure. "Have a seat for a minute, if you don't mind. There. Please forgive me for taking some of your precious time. I wanted to ask you something. You write in Haaretz, right? You write there about the snails and the lizards?" Yes. "So I wanted to ask you, if you've written about snails and lizards already, maybe you could write about me, too." Huh?? "About me. I sit here on this bench almost every day, under the trees, by the door to your house, with my Filipino." But why should I write about you? "About me doesn't mean just about me. I'm just an example. The people with the Filipinos. I don't want to complain or anything. I just want you to see me at least the way you see lizards. I see you leaving the house sometimes, always with books under your arm, absorbed in thought. You've never seen me. But it's not just you. I wanted to explain to you what happens to us, the people with the Filipinos. From the moment we have a Filipino, no one sees us anymore. I see that you don't understand. _____________________________________________________ For readers who don't understand, Seniors World Chronicle may add: There are an estimated 50000 Filipinos in Israel, most of whom work as private caregivers. _____________________________________________________ "See, from the moment we become two - an old man plus a Filipino - we become zero. And this is the thing that I want you to write. But don't make it all sentimental. That's all I need. What I want is for you to explain what happens in this transition from being one person - albeit an old man - but one man - to someone who has been doubled into a man plus another support-man, and how from this moment on, I'm telling you, no one sees him anymore. "And we know it. We know that having this Filipino is not like consenting to use a cane or even a walker. And you should know, even just consenting to use a cane is no simple thing. And a walker, that's the worst. When you realize that now it's time for the walker, you know that that's it. There's no going back anymore. And you, who walked on two feet for 86 years are from now on going to need six, and you're going to bother people as if it were 20. But a Filipino - with the Filipino you're signing off that it's the end for you. "It's not that they're bad. Just the opposite. They're good souls. And I trust him 100 percent. But I want you to understand: Anyone who sees us in the street thinks we're finished. The butcher speaks directly only with the Filipino. The guy who came to take over for my body also took over for my mind. "I want to tell you something. Sometimes I'm jealous of old people who have already lost their minds. At least they don't understand what's happening to them. But I - I do understand and my mind works like that of a 20-year-old. I don't want to tell you what it's like to look at what you are and to see this insult. Don't write that part. Haaretz readers are sensitive and only prepared for ugliness if it pertains to leaders or the downtrodden. I just want you to understand that inside this zero of a-person-plus-a-Filipino there's someone who is cognizant of everything that is happening to him and sees perfectly well how others view him as an empty shell. And I see myself that way, too. I really am an empty shell. "I want to ask you to explain what it is to be a person who sees and knows that he's in the midst of his end. And you should know that this is all just nature's way in my case. There's no malignant disease or anything. I'm just an old man who can no longer get up from a chair by himself." But there must still be a few things that make life worth living, aren't there? "Quit it. I'm the one who should be saying this bit of nonsense. Not you. I have grandchildren and great-grandchildren and the sky is blue. There's that of course. I read books and see the horrors and even read Haaretz Magazine. Life is full of interest. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about how we, who by some dubious privilege have reached an age where we can no longer stand up on our own, and for whom death did not come at the right moment, but instead left us here to watch and see exactly how it works, see and understand everything, and there is no one - no one - to tell all this, and no one to teach what we learn every day. I want to tell you that even though I've done some things in my life and overcome some obstacles, this project of seeing myself unable to get out of bed and move to a chair is harder than a lot of things. And it demands just as much stamina and strength as raising your children. And you're all alone with it. Other people your age, who understand what you're talking about, don't want to hear about it, and younger people - Why do they need to hear about such problems? "To live like this from day to day and to find meaning in life in the face of this ruin that opens up before you like a scroll, a new page every day, you have to get smarter from day to day. I'm telling you. Smarter. And the worst thing is, you have to keep all this wisdom to yourself. There's no one to give it to, and it has no future. When you're young, everything you do is done for the sake of some sort of future. You think that you'll eventually reap the benefit. The harvest is always in the future. It will come. It's yet to come. But me, I have to learn something even though I won't have any opportunity to do something with it. And tomorrow, apparently, what I learned today will already be irrelevant, because I won't even be able to sit on this bench anymore." What does that mean? "What does that mean? It means that you know that everything, and I mean everything, will only get worse. From the moment you're a man with a Filipino, you know that you're on a single narrow track, that nothing can be fixed anymore. The only thing that's still growing for me like in the past is my fingernails. All the rest, from day to day, is falling off and going to ruin. This, you should know, is what old age is. And I would like you to write, if it's not too hard for you, that old people see and understand everything. Ah, and I wanted to ask you, to write one time about Shlonsky. Not just about his "Onegin." About the brilliant and crazy Shlonsky. He was a great man. I knew him." © Copyright 2008 Haaretz