By Joel Block
“The Wrong Schwartz” is the debut novel of Dr. Joel Block, the ‘Let Life In’ love and relationships editor. It is a powerful story about a relationship between father and son.
Here is an excerpt. The son begins by speaking in first person:
I learned about mental toughness through the dictate good enough isn’t good enough. In practice, regardless of how well I did with my studies–and I did very well–it was never good enough. “That’s nice,” my father would say in the most casual manner. “Next time, let’s see if you can do even better. You can do better. I expect better.”
“But, Papa,” I would plead. “I got 100 percent on the test.”
For my father, a big man with a gruff beard, a large belly, a bald head and dark glaring eyes, the only way to avoid appearing vulnerable was to be first. After he was humbled in the ghettos of
For my father, there was only extraordinary success and abject failure, nothing in between. His compound of ambition and unreachable standards could not be ruffled nor compromised by reason; he considered his views so right and others so wrong that his disdain for them was palpable. Yet he was a limited man with unlimited energy, a man quick to be critical and very slow to praise; a man for whom the most serious thing in life is to keep climbing despite everything and anything.
As his son, I was to be his climber. The alternative was not to be his son.
“Do better,” he insisted in a raspy voice as he left the room. “Being the best isn’t good enough,” he said over his shoulder. “You must be on the podium alone. Who remembers vice-presidents? Nobody remembers anyone unless they stand out, way out. Distance yourself from the competition. It’s not enough to win. Win big. Big! Don’t let up. Ever!”
Sometimes I didn’t make it to the podium at all. On those occasions I walked home from school in panic. Along the way I grew a list of my accomplishments to offset my failure and planned a time of day when I could catch my father in a light mood to recite my achievements. I rehearsed in my head and even found myself speaking aloud. Mouthing the words that would offset the failure. Anything to assuage the rage I anticipated.
The plan did not comfort me, nor did it save me. I reflected more on his predictable reaction, I seemed to feel it more. It was as if I could measure my spirit in grains of an imaginary hourglass and with each step closer to home, it was running out faster and faster. By the time I reached home I was empty, devoid of any inner core.
My anticipation was not fanciful.
When I failed to score the highest on a school-wide test, my father ripped into me for so long that I nearly passed out on my feet. Then he turned and extended a strap toward me.
“What’s that for,” I asked with terror.
“Beat me,” he demanded.
“Papa…”
“Beat me for having raised a loser! You want to turn out like the Wrong Schwartz boy? Is that what you want to become? Is that what you want to make of me!”
The Wrong Schwartz boy, as he was called, was the shining example of underachievement used by my father and fathers like him. It was shame enough if a child, especially male, was born dull. Shameful, but it couldn’t be helped. Those in my community might shake their heads about boys who simply didn’t have it. They might throw up their hands, but tragedies happen, and they would eventually understand.
To be capable and not hard working, that was another thing altogether. The family of such an offspring might as well have moved to a leper colony.
Harold Schwartz, older than I, in his twenties, was the firstborn of brilliant twin boys. Unlike his super-achieving brother, a Harvard law professor, he committed the unpardonable sin of having brains and not using them. He buckled under the weight of expectation and spent most of his energy making sure he would not be first in anything again. He disappointed every expectation his parents had for him. He was finally cast out of the family when he managed to get a full scholarship despite himself, then lost it due to academic failure, and appeared happy, a successful failure.
My father thrust the strap into my hand and my body shook with a palsy of fright. He made me beat him. It would have taken a lot more courage, much more than I could muster to refuse him. The question of how free of him I might dare to be was not open for consideration. I closed my eyes and pulled back my trembling arm striking him repeatedly.
“Harder,” he demanded. “Harder!”
“Noooooo!” In shame and rage I felt the scalding cry come from my throat. He would not release me. The pain of beating my father was so severe that it made me moan. A river of tears fell from my eyes and down my cheeks until he granted me permission to stop. Afterwards the tears continued to flow so heavily that I saw nothing around me for several moments.
Then I felt intense shame. Shame for failing to be the best, shame for failing my father, shame for crying. My father never cried, I wasn’t supposed to cry either. Crying was weak, and I felt shame for showing weakness.<<
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