B000FC0RL0 EBOK (37 page)

I glanced at Sam. Still no voice contact between us. Martha’s Vineyard was off to the right. My eyes dipped toward his feet, which were on some pedals, controlling the ailerons or the rudder or something. I noticed the soles of his shoes were flapping. They were not sewn to the shoes themselves. I immediately experienced a severe loss of faith in the airline.

For the first time I spoke to Sam, who seemed to be in an entirely different world than the one I remembered on our porch. “This is a very unusual plane,” I said. There was a long silence. I hoped my question was not interpreted as impugning the credibility of the airline. “The fuselage has a lot of space,” I said.

“That’s on account of the fish,” he said.

“Fish?”

“Yeah, that’s how I make a living, I transport fish from Nantucket.”

“Oh, I see,” I said. That explained the smell. My business manager’s warning words were suddenly ringing in my ears.

My remark seemed to evoke a quiet anger in the pilot. He had a mood change. It was scary. I immediately realized that I had gotten to the heart of the matter. The dark side of this guy was emerging, and here I was five thousand feet in the air. I’d better shut up. We didn’t say a word to each other for what seemed like an eternity. I gazed at Long Island, now below us.

Without warning Sam started his descent. “Is this La Guardia?” I asked.

“No, we’re going to Islip,” he said.

“Why? That’s hours from New York.”

“There’s a landing fee at the other airports.”

Minutes later we were on the ground and I stood in a small terminal with my bags.

“Where can I drop you?” Sam asked.

In semi-shock I said, “Gee, I didn’t expect door-to-door service.”

He said, “I’m going into Midtown. How about 34th Street and Eighth
Avenue? I’d take you home, but I’ve got to be someplace at eight.” We drove from the airport in silence. I asked myself how I’d gotten into this. I was just riding my bike past a guy’s house, and I end up delivering fish and almost buying into an airline.

When we reached 34th and Eighth, Sam helped me onto the street with the suitcases. He said again, “Sorry I can’t take you all the way.” I hailed a cab and arrived home a half-hour later.

Some years later I ran across a story in
The New York Times
. It was about Sam, who had been sentenced to prison for transporting arms parts to Iran. It described how he flew from an airfield at the tip of Long Island across the Atlantic. He must have been a pretty good pilot, after all.

One day in the early ‘80s I was jogging and discovered I couldn’t do five miles. I could barely do three. I felt winded. The experience frightened the hell out of me. It seemed so precipitous. I felt I had been betrayed by my body.

Up until the
Sullivan
years, and even during the
Sullivan
years, I’d eat anything, drink limitless cups of coffee, and enjoy a couple of scotches two or three times a week. My body seemed resilient. It could withstand anything. Now I was at the YMCA on West 63rd Street, circling the oval with the regular crowd, when I realized that guys I’d once lapped were passing me. I attributed everything to pollution.

During the next few weeks I continued to hit the Y and struggled to do my three miles. The frustration now made jogging painful. I visited my internist, who did an EKG.

“You’ve got low T’s,” he said, meaning a dip in the cardiogram.

“What does that mean?”

“It could be nothing. It’s indeterminate. You should have a stress test.”

I didn’t take the test. The thought scared the hell out of me. Instead, I decided to fast.

I envisioned cleansing myself in Biblical fashion. I’d purge myself of all the impurities I had ingested in those jogging years. I could see huge chunks of my body dropping off. All the coffee, pastrami, and booze would be washed away by going to a fasting farm.

I arrived at the fabled Health Manor in Pawling, New York, with two suitcases. One contained necessities—underwear, toothpaste, etc. The other, all the Super 8mm film I had ever shot of Anne, myself, and the
kids, and a splicer. My intention was to keep occupied during the difficult days ahead, during which I’d be fasting.

I’d heard about the Health Manor from actor friends. There was also a nutrition program, where non-fasters could enjoy food that appealed to the mind as well as the body. Sy Travers, an actor who’d toured with Anne and me in
The Prisoner of Second Avenue
, spoke of his having “gone up to Dr. Gross” as a child with his family. I envisioned an entire overweight family stuffed into a Buick, plodding up the Taconic Parkway for a fast. It almost sounded as if they’d been going on a picnic.

“What’s the longest you ever fasted?” I asked Sy, wondering if I could handle one day.

“A month,” he replied, his eyes suddenly ablaze.

“What did you do after it ended?”

“I ate a cheesecake,” he said, as if that was the stupidest question anyone could ask.

“A whole cheesecake?”

“Made with ricotta cheese, Italian. It’s less fattening.”

Of course, I thought, you always binge after denial. It’s like when Prohibition was repealed. People went out and got drunk.

I saw myself attacking a cheesecake after losing a pound a day. After thirty pounds, I’d have a right.

I was told that some of Dr. Gross’s famous clients included Shelley Winters (whom he’d ordered off the farm for sneaking in a pizza), Grace Bumbry, and Charles Mingus. Of incidental interest was the fact that Cus D’Amato, the manager of Floyd Patterson and José Torres (and later Mike Tyson) trained his prospects in a gym next to the main house. The boxers were also on Dr. Gross’s regimen.

Intellectually I was prepared to stop eating, but emotionally I knew I’d have to psych myself. I called Anna Berger, an actress friend who’d also been up to Dr. Gross. “How much did you lose, Anna?”

“Lots,” Anna said, “but it’s not easy. Bring up lots of books.”

Instead, I brought all the old family movies.

When I arrived at the Rhinebeck railroad station I was met by Dr. Gross himself. He looked like an “in the pink” bantamweight boxer, with curly hair, eyes that twinkled, and skin that glistened.

“Jerry,” he said, shaking my hand with enthusiasm, “I’m Dr. Gross. Come on, let’s get in the car.” Each of us grabbed a bag. “Glad you’re up here.”

“Me too,” I said, marveling at his health.

“I’m a great admirer of you both. How’s Anne?”

“Fine,” I said.

“What’s in those bags?” he asked.

“Oh, books, and some Super 8mm film. I’m going to make a feature film out of all the home movies I ever took,” I said, joking.

“Nothing else?” he asked, discreet admonishment in his eyes. “No food?”

“No, no food.”

“Good. I’m going to put you in one of the deluxe cabins. It’s a single. You’re not far from the main house. You know who’s up here?” Dr. Gross asked. “Sugar Hart. Jimmy Jacobs thinks he can be a champ. We’re trying to bring him down a class to welterweight.”

“Fasting?”

“Yes.”

“You’re in great shape,” I remarked. “How do you do it?”

“I’m the same weight I was when I boxed in the ‘20s,” Dr. Gross said.

“You boxed?” I suddenly thought of Sam Jaffe in
Lost Horizon
, who lived to be two hundred.

“Yeah, under the name Baby Gross. I won a lot of fights.”

The car pulled up to a huge mansion on a hill.

“This is the main house. You can register and meet the staff. They’d love you to say hello.”

I entered the spacious old house with its high ceilings. We walked past the living room filled with people, mostly ladies in bathrobes, conversing, watching television, all losing weight.

“Come with me to my office.”

We passed the kitchen. I could smell food. I saw carrots being shredded, tomatoes sliced, potatoes being made ready for baking.

“See?” said Dr. Gross. “All vegetarian. I haven’t had meat in twenty-five years. Not everyone up here fasts. Some come just to change their eating habits. But you’re going to fast.”

I was getting hungry.

We reached his office.

“Sit down and fill this out. I’m going to examine you.”

He took out a stethoscope and placed the ends in his ears. “Open your shirt.” He was listening. “Okay.” He made a notation. He checked my blood pressure.

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll show you where you’re staying.”

We walked down a hill to my cabin.

“Let me explain. You’re not supposed to eat. If you get hungry, drink some water. There’s a pitcher with ice cubes and water on the night table. If you feel like eating, put an ice cube in your mouth. The first two days are the toughest. If you get dizzy, there’s the buzzer,” he said, indicating it. “Just ring it and I’ll bring you an orange. We can put in a TV if you want.”

“Yeah, I’d like one,” I said, suddenly feeling isolated.

“I’ll have one sent over,” he said.

A young man appeared with my suitcases. “Where can I put these?” he asked.

“Under my bed?”

“Not enough room,” he said. He slid them in the closet.

Minutes later the TV was hooked up.

The cabin had a double bed, shower, and a bureau. Outside was a porch. Halfway through unpacking, I decided to say hello to my neighbors. I strolled past their cabins. They were all women.

“Hello,” I said, trying to be as unobtrusive as possible. Privacy seemed to be the order of the day. The women all nodded politely and went back to losing weight.

I returned to my own cabin, turned on the TV, and finished unpacking. I took out the Super 8 film and set the splicer on the bureau. I had also brought along some bouillon cubes, a heating filament, and a ceramic mug. I figured that if by some chance my willpower failed me, I could make a little bouillon. It seemed harmless. How much damage could water and a bouillon cube do? The filament was a piece of metal shaped like a deformed triangle. It plugged into an electrical outlet. When inserted into a mug of water it made the water boil.

I went into the bathroom, dropped a bouillon cube into the mug, and filled the mug with water from the faucet. I plugged the filament into the outlet near the medicine chest. I watched as the bouillon bubbled, my mouth beginning to water. Suddenly the television went off and I could hear women shouting, “What happened to the lights?” The mug had cracked, and muddy soup was oozing into the sink. The cabin door flew open. Standing in the doorway was a livid Dr. Gross. Had he been waiting outside?

“You got a filament, right?” he demanded, like a teacher who’d caught a kid throwing a spitball.

“Yeah,” I said.

He surveyed the evidence in the sink.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“You blew a fuse, Jerry. It happens all the time. They come in, they say they want to fast, and they cheat.”

I looked and saw a man who hadn’t eaten meat in twenty-five years, and I felt terrible. I started to tremble.

“I’m sorry,” I said again.

“Give it to me,” he said.

I handed him the filament.

“Made in Japan,” he noted. “Remember, if you get hungry, suck on the ice cubes.”

“Okay,” I said.

He left.

That day I occupied myself by visiting the Roosevelt Mansion in Hyde Park, just up the road. I tried to substitute historical artifacts for pastrami. It filled me for three hours.

When I got back I pulled out reels of Super 8 film and examined them through the viewer. I started to splice. My eyes got blurry, so I stopped and switched on the television. The ever-present pitcher of water and ice cubes sat staring at me. I survived the night.

The next day Dr. Gross visited me. “How’re you doing?” he asked.

“Fine,” I lied.

“Come on, I’ll take you up to the gym. You’ll meet Sugar Hart. He’s from Philadelphia. He’s won all his fights, all knockouts. Jimmy Jacobs and Cus D’Amato are training him.”

“That sounds great,” Isaid, following Dr. Gross up a hill.

We watched Sugar Hart work out. Dr. Gross promised me tickets to Hart’s next fight in Madison Square Garden.

I decided to return to my cabin to work on splicing the film, and after working for a few minutes heard a knock. My cabin neighbor stood at the door. She introduced herself. She said she taught school in Queens. “How much are you trying to lose?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve got no big goals. I just want to feel better.”

“I’ve lost fifteen pounds. I’m happy to lose twenty-five,” she said. “Have you met the rest of the girls?”

“No, I haven’t.”

“You’re the only man in the cabins.”

“I noticed,” I said. “It’s like I’ve got a harem.”

She laughed. “Yeah, fasting gets you horny.”

“Why is that?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” she said, smiling, “but it’s true. Come on, I’ll introduce you to my roommate.”

We walked next door, and I met another chubby lady who said she was in advertising.

“I love your ads,” she said. “Does Anne fast?”

“She doesn’t have to.”

“Listen,” the teacher’s roommate said, “it’s nice to have a man around.”

“Okay, I’m here if you need me,” I said by way of a joke.

Around 5:30 that afternoon the northern sky took on a strange yellowish glow and the birds stopped singing. It was as if nature had suddenly gone on strike. I don’t know what made me turn on the television, but I did. The regular programming was interrupted by a local announcer, who said there was a tornado watch in Dutchess and Putnam counties. I remembered the scene in
The Wizard of Oz
just before the tornado, when everything stopped. I watched the sky getting darker. I could hear silence. Tornadoes in New York State? But this was for real.

I suddenly wanted to eat. If I was going to die, I wanted at least to have a last meal. It seemed bizarre to die while fasting. Maybe this was a dream. I’ll check with the ladies. I walked into a cabin full of anxious women watching the tube.

“Is it true?” I asked.

“Yeah, it’s a tornado.”

It dawned upon me that when Mother Nature strikes, both sexes have the same thought: Save your ass.

“What do we do?” one of the women asked. “Do we go to the main house?”