He had several so-called girl friends in school. He was well liked. He was helpful. He illustrated the school stories that the girls wrote as school projects. He was good in geography, and drew fine maps for his friends’ schoolwork.

He "went out" with several young ladies in high school and in college--nothing very serious. They were always in groups, and everyone behaved as their friends did.

In the university that he attended, with the sometime hope of becoming a dentist, he met, and befriended, a good-looking woman.  They spent a lot of time together, shared many evenings in restaurants and movies, and eventually started to "make out."  It was normal and natural.

The girl was from another state, from a rich family, and during some vacation or holiday period, he joined her in visiting her family.  The parents liked him. Their daughter was their only child, and everything that they had would, of course, be hers. The father suggested that when he graduated and eventually became a dentist, he, the father, would either buy, or open, a splendid office for his son-in-law.  The relationship was so nice, clean, and warm, and everything worked out as planned and promised.

There was a big, happy wedding and a honeymoon trip.  Some time later, they bought their second home, furnishing it well.  His practice grew.  He took in more dentists and hygienists to work for him.  Eventually his wife was pregnant, giving birth to a little girl.

His wife was happy.  Since she disliked housework, they hired help and a governess for their daughter.

As was customary for those in their position and class standing, he joined several good clubs, and his wife became very active in cultural activities--the symphony, the opera, the theatre.  He saw very little of her, but he liked her charm, and she fulfilled her marital duties.

In his free time, and to relax, he took up painting.  Although he never took formal lessons, he could paint pleasant scenes, such as flowers, children, and landscapes.  He loved colors, and when he set up a little studio in one of his rooms with an easel, canvases, and many tubes of paint, his walls began to fill with colorful paintings.  Some friends who saw his work liked them, and he was pleased to give them away. He would then have more space to hang new ones.

His life was tranquil, orderly, and very normal.  He enjoyed visiting the art galleries and museums.  He always went alone, as he liked to study each paining.  He preferred the impressionists, and particularly delighted in the abstractionists.  He carefully examined each work, coming very close to the canvas to figure out why an artist chose this, or that, color, why he stopped here, and did not continue with the line.

One night after having sex, his wife turned around and without hesitation told him that she wanted a divorce.  It was nothing personal.  She did not want anything from him; just a simple, quick divorce.  She was in love with another man.  She wanted custody of the child.  She told him that in the morning she would take just a few personal belongings and move out.  The other man had already set up the new home.  She would leave for Nevada, where within six weeks she would be free to wed the new man.

His life, his tranquility, his orderly, safe existence was shattered.  He was stunned in disbelief and tears.

For days he stayed in his dwelling.  Nothing made sense.  He drank, but it, of course, it did not help.  Desolation and despair set in; neglect followed.  He walked the streets aimlessly.  He let some prostitutes pick him up, but he could not perform.

But despair and pain find their own solutions.  He began to rationalize the events.  Perhaps they really did not love each other; perhaps they just fell into the habit of being functional, but empty, people.

He started to paint again, and then tried sculpting.  Little by little he again found satisfaction in his profession of dentistry, and began to take interest in his patients.  He covered his canvases with colors; the compositions without any deep meaning.

One Sunday afternoon, being engrossed in a recently opened show in the museum, he became aware of someone watching and following him.  As he turned around, he saw this young woman with her dark hair, a very friendly face, and big, shining eyes.

"What are you looking for under these paints?" she smiled.

He blushed slightly. "I am just wondering why, why did he stop and not continue at this point."

"Because the brush told him to stop," she answered.

"Are you an artist?" both started to ask, and realizing this, they laughed.

 "Come buy me a cup of coffee," she suggested.

They sat down in the museum cafeteria, drank their coffee, and talked about art.  She explained about the great feeling when standing in front of an empty canvas without a set idea of what, or how, to paint, of how one has to give up everything and let the hand, and especially the brush, do the work.  She told him that a brush should not be held like it were a spear, but with tenderness, like a butter spreader.  The pregnant brush with several colors in its bristles will do the work. An artist just has to follow what the next move will be.

He never heard such talk. "I want to see your work," he ventured.

Yes, she would show them.  In fact, her art was on display in some galleries.  But it would not be today.  She was getting hungry.  Would he come along with her to her favorite restaurant?

They got into her car.  She drove to a little Italian restaurant where she was well known.  Some friends came to their table.  They drank dark wine and ate spaghetti.  They talked, they laughed.  She made a few phone calls, and finally asked him to take her to his place.

"I want to see your work, and I want to sleep with you tonight." 

 And what a wonderful night it was!  Never, never, in his while life did he feel like this - her pleasant, warm body fused with his, and his with hers.  A great hunger for more intimacy grew.  There was no end to the seeking and finding.

"This is the first time in my life that I feel like this," she whispered.  They gave and received more until, exhausted, they fell asleep.

When he awoke, the sun was shining, and she was gone.  He spotted a note: 

"Get up and have your breakfast that I prepared in the kitchen. Just warm the coffee. I will phone you later."

She not only phoned, but she also arrived in her car to share dinner with him in some other small restaurant.  And then they went back to his home and bed.

The day before, he told her something about his former life (well, just a little) and tonight she told him about herself.  She was married to a good man, and they are in love with each other.  He is a tenured professor in the university.  She had met him while a student in one of his classes, and they have been married a long time.  They have a young daughter.

Her mother, recently widowed, is taking care of the child and home, which was built on a hill overlooking the City and the Bay.  She had been a faithful wife until now.  Her new lover had awoken feelings in her that she never knew that she had.

Realizing that they could not stay away from each other, she told her husband.

There was no talk about divorce; they still loved each other deeply.

She decided to spend time in both homes.  They rented a place, and set up a studio where they occasionally met, and sometimes painted between sessions of lovemaking.  Her paintings were happy, full of vigor and life.  Several one-woman shows were given to present her talents.  Collectors and art lovers bought many of her works.

Their love and tenderness blossomed, until one day she put his hand on one of her breasts and pointed out a little lump.  It might be cancer.

She went to a physician who sent her to a hospital for tests and a biopsy.  It was too late.  The cancerous tissue had spread.  Surgery followed: a breast was removed; lymph glands under her arm were also taken out.  Then came radiation and chemotherapy.  Her hair, her beautiful dark hair, fell out.  More radical measures were taken.  A hysterectomy was performed.

She spent most of her time now in hospitals, and in her own home.  She refused to show herself to him, seeing how sad he had become; yet they talked, and talked, by telephone.

She still painted, and even had a student help her by holding the brushes and filling out some spaces on the canvas.

He begged to see her, and at last she asked him to come over.  She was in bed, attended by nurses and her mother.  She asked the people in the room to leave them alone.

"I want you to make love to me for the last time," she begged, "but please don't look at me."  

Two days later he received a telephone call: She had died in her sleep; a funeral was being planned. Could he come?

It was a sunny afternoon. A cemetery scene with a freshly dug grave lined with concrete, a casket, a pile of red earth, many people, words, more words, empty words, handshakes, and embraces.  Workers lowered the casket, and then waited leaning on shovels.  Handfuls of red earth were thrown into the grave.  He tried to visualize her face in this ugly box, but all he could see was his own face with his eyes wide open.

People began to drift away.  He stayed and started to walk among the graves.  It became darker.  The fog drifted in.  Some passage from a long-forgotten Bible story took root in his mind.

"In the beginning God created the heaven and earth and everything was darkness and in chaos."

Whose translation is this?  Who interpreted this?  It cannot be right, he thought to himself.  To begin with, if God started with heavens and earth, what was before?  The ethers and the solids?  As everything was in chaos and desolation, God had to improve the situation.  Why?  So he made the sun to give warmth and light the days, and the moon and stars to decorate the night, and then he separated the waters from the solids.  The earth then sprouted with fragrant herbs, and became populated with animals; all in peace in harmony.

He stopped. It must have taken even God a long time to find harmony.  Millions of years?  God days?  And then God created man, but man was lonely.  So God took a part of him, and when man woke up, he found woman next to him.  She was pleasant and warm and friendly.  They dwelled in the Garden of Eden, and ever since then parts of the man and woman have been trying to become one again.  Did he make this up?  Did he ever hear this?  Did she whisper this in this ear a long time ago?  He felt his cheek.  It was wet and cold.  Was it the fog or his tears?

Looking backwards he could not find the gravesite, but he could see his car in the parking lot.  He stumbled down in the darkness, sat in his car with his head on the steering wheel, and cried, and cried, and cried.

He woke up in the morning in his own bed.  He did not remember how he got home.  The sun was shining through his window.  He heard himself say,

"Get up, shave, shower, eat your breakfast, warm up the coffee in the pot. A new day is beginning."