Tasting the Sky: Part II: Shoelaces–Pastries

But because I owned one pair of shoes, and was allowed to wear them only on important occasions, I was barefoot.

My dad was my favorite person in the world, and before the war I had an unwavering sense that all was well as long as he came home at the end of the day.

He told Mother he had heard that Israeli warplanes had been targeting Palestinian homes and the safest thing would be to turn off all the lights, leave our house immediately, and sit in the water trench in the garden while we decided what to do.

Inside the trench, I glued myself to my brothers, and my heart surrendered to the rhythm of our vigilant breaths, all rising and falling in anxious unison.

We quickly realized the footsteps were those of a stream of people from neighboring villages fleeing their homes.

“Find them!” she ordered. My brothers and I obediently searched until all three of us found our shoes, then hurried outside.

People continued to pass by our house, spreading word of impending terror.

But in spite of my desperate attempts to obey my parents’ commands, my three-and-a-half-year-old hands were unable to lace up the one shoe I had put on.

I wanted to cry aloud, hurl their names across the darkness, but dread stifled my voice.

But as the lights and sounds of distant bombardment continued and no bombs fell directly on us, it became clear that neighboring areas were the immediate targets of attack.

“I imagine so,” she replied. Imagine was Mother’s favorite word. In Arabic, she would say batkhayyal, which also means “to see the shadow of a thought,” as if one is separated from it by a thin cloth. Mother seemed to dwell behind this veil, gaze through it, and long for uniting with its other side.

“I hear something in the distance,” she whispered, so as not to disturb the spider-thread perception connecting the sound to her ear, “perhaps an engine.”

At the center of the road, he flung his arms open, ready to embrace a broad destiny.

Everyone seemed to understand the strategy, and in no time other men formed new barriers along the road.

The three of us, who had become more like soldiers than children that day, nodded our heads in compliance.

She then pulled me up by the arm and ordered that I squeeze myself among the bodies or, if I must, seep through them like water, but get myself to stand on the truck step, hold the door handle, and not let go.

The teeming tanker now rattled as it struggled to move as quickly as it could away from war.

I jumped awake with the noises of many vehicles beeping, children crying, people shouting across a huge crowd, all swirled in dust and chaos.

The sirens were warnings before or after bombardment, and they were always followed by a silent moment of nauseating anticipation of the destruction of our shelter.

We raised our arms above our heads in the shape of empty baskets for God to fill with the day’s rations of our lives.

And I could close my eyes and hide anywhere in my imagination, making the sounds of war more distant and less alarming.

Um and Abu Muhammad were happy to see all of us who had taken refuge in their home. Though they had not met any of us before, they kissed our cheeks and held us for a long time while thanking Allah for our safety.

Mother and Hamameh bent to kiss Um Muhammad’s hand, but she pulled away, refusing any gestures of gratitude.

The doctor reassured her that he himself was a refugee and understood the plight of parents during war.

Hearing about this incident, Mother became apprehensive. She couldn’t keep us indoors, nor could she make certain we would be safe outside.

Mother said she had heard that, after the war, the government of Jordan had turned many schools into temporary housing for West Bank refugees.

But I felt that even if she never saw her again, Hamameh’s name, like its Arabic meaning, “dove,” would always fly, glowing across the sky of Mother’s memories, leaving feather prints of a kindness birthed from the cruelty of war.

The school playground was filled with boys who kicked balls hard, tackled and punched one another, and fought as though they themselves were engaged in war.

Alef was a long line that stood vertically and ended with a round circle. It looked like a Popsicle, a dandelion, a sun flower, a streetlamp, or a man with a hat on his head, like my dad in winter.

Mother warned of illnesses that befell children who did not eat their lentils and of ghosts that stalked them in their sleep.

But we could swallow the fear of ghosts more readily than we could swallow the spoonfuls of lentils. When we resisted, she forced our mouths wide open and poured the lentils in.

“Two things should never be trusted—water and snakes.” This warning spread along with the story. And the stream seemed to slither like a watery snake. Was water an animal? Was it alive? It ran much faster than I could.

We ached with longing for the only joys we’d had—running freely, being outside, and getting lost in games that made us briefly forget war, fear, and even lentils.

I knew the taste of basbooseh and loved it. Before the war, Mother had made this treat by mixing semolina flour, yogurt, and sugar. She topped the mix with slivered almonds and baked it. When it was done, she drenched it with sweet syrup.

At that moment, my brothers swept to the cart with astonishing speed, clutched its big handles, threw their bodies against it, and wheeled it toward our home while I watched astounded.

Someone reminded him that we were hungry refugees and were to be pitied.

“God shall compensate you,” another affirmed.

The blows of his belt left long, dark stripes on our backs. We named those striped bruises shawarea, streets. For many days, up and down those streets, our pain tingled like unrelenting rows of ants.

But our sentence of confinement was suddenly forgotten when the tiny people I thought lived inside the radio set announced a list of names approved for return to Ramallah.

“We lost Palestine,” he said. “The pastries are nothing.” Then he flung his arms wide as though to throw away any crumbs of a grudge he had held against us.