Stefan Zweig quotes Honoré de Balzac as saying, “The woman of forty will do everything for you—the woman of twenty, nothing.” Hmm.
You can’t tell me that all those smug, self-satisfied couples out there were both at the absolute apex of amour-propre and mellow fruitfulness at the moment they met, in perfect, gooey synchronicity, like Camembert. I’m not buying it.
Like when they say you have to love yourself first, before anyone else can love you, it’s just not true. I’ve had lots of boyfriends! And all of my boyfriends have taught me something: From Joe I learned about architecture. From Steve I learned about music. From Anders I learned about art. From the giant I learned about sadism and the finer points of Adobe Illustrator 1.7, which is also sadism. From Roger I learned to speak Swedish and identify mushrooms. From Bruce I learned that some people have webbed feet. What then, did I learn from Yakov?
YAKOV: Russian form of “Jacob,” meaning “supplanter.”
“Trinculo, if you trouble him any more in’s tale, by this hand, I will supplant some of your teeth.” -William Shakespeare, The Tempest
Madonna, Cher, Pocahontas, Yakov. One sobriquet suffices to invoke a unique personality, one so original that any additional information would only dilute its exquisite, one-of-a-kind power. Imagine a much younger Matt Dillon, brought to a party at my loft by a mutual designer friend. Now create a compact version with a Russian accent, a MacBook Pro, and an iPhone. Dress him in a black T-shirt, black Levi’s 501s, and black Converse Chuck Taylor All Star High Tops. Now —and this is the most important part—shave his head completely.
Yakov, twelve years my junior, and I entered into a May-December relationship, wherein I played the part of a bleak December twilight and he, a lovely May morning.
He had made his ambitious way to New York’s School of Visual Arts via Moscow and Jerusalem, to take a typography class with the great Milton Glaser. He stayed, eventually finding work with a designer who was also an Orthodox Rabbi, who helped Yakov find a tiny studio apartment in an all-Lubavitcher walkup building in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. This outer borough location was more foreign to this impostor yenta than Lick Skillet, Tennessee. In the 90s, a Manhattan snob like me wouldn’t be seen anywhere near this ultra-orthodox neighborhood with its gigantic hats and unconvincing wigs. Now of course, it’s a desirable address, where ethnicities and faiths and socioeconomic groups of all kinds can suffer the evils of gentrification together in perfect misery.
In this building, every single door sported a huge yellow poster: “THE MESSIAH IS COMING! MOSHIACH IS COMING!”. On the top floor, the farthest door had a tiny yellow Post-it, with the word “MESSIAH” written in pencil. What a wise-ass. I was enchanted. One Sunday night I slept over in Brooklyn. So on Monday, Yakov called in sick.
We were lying naked on the futon when a key suddenly turned in a lock and the door burst open, bashing into my naked thigh. There, frozen in terror, stood a freakishly tall young Jew, lavishly bearded, outfitted in full Lubavitcher drag: payot, fedora, tefillin, the works. Emitting something between Rysanek’s glass-shattering “Sieglinde” scream at Bayreuth and an Elmer Fudd whimper, the apparition turned and ran, shrieking like a rabid bunny, his tzitzit flying, charging wildly down the stairs and out to Eastern Parkway.
“What the Hell was that?” was all I could say.
“That was Budinsky.”
“What’s a Budinsky?”
“Well, he’s studying to be a rabbi and today’s his big day—he’s being ordained as a rabbi. He has my key. When I’m at work he uses my bathroom; he doesn’t like to share showers with the other guys at the Schul. For him, even fully clothed women are trayf! He can’t sit next to one on a bus! What just happened is going to set him back ten thousand years. I’ll bet they can’t ordain him now that he’s had a look at…you.”
Oy. My 2000 square foot Lower Manhattan loft seemed a more appropriate setting for our romance, somehow, than Yakov’s Crown Heights broom closet. There were challenges.
Trichophobia is a fear of lint, fuzz, fluff, towels, hair, eyelashes, and dust. My beloved felines were given away. I stuffed rugs and sweaters into closets, ensuring smoother, fuzz-free cohabitation. I even hired a miniature cleaning lady, newly arrived from Warsaw. She showed up an hour late in scarlet Dr. Denton’s footed pajamas, wielding a can of Comet and a Swiffer® Sweep + Vac™, and screaming, at the top of her voice, “I am Iola! I am artist! I hate to clean!”
One September afternoon, Budinsky phoned Yakov at the loft, but Yakov wasn’t home.
I engaged the young rabbi in conversation.
“You know, that was a pretty crazy thing that happened in Brooklyn, huh?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“When you saw me. You know we made eye contact!”
That’s when Budinsky said, “I didn’t see no eyes!”
When we entertained Budinsky, I stocked up on plastic plates, cups, Coke and small bags of potato chips. Kosher edicts proscribe my filthy hands making contact with anything he would eat or touch. He would often whine, “Why am I doing this? I’m not even allowed to masturbate!” I liked him.
Yakov and I were both graphic designers. The disparity in our respective professional achievements, reputation and net worth was such that I decided to devote the twelve hours a day that I normally reserve for my own career entirely to Yakov’s. This included a campaign of public relations that would have made Michael Ovitz look like a Vermont housewife, and resulted in a Communication Arts magazine feature, a book deal, and an elite client roster that, not unsurprisingly, resembled my own. At one point I remember being concerned that by lending him the money to start his art magazine it might “damage our relationship” if this debt went unpaid. Why not just give him the money?
It seems that Balzac might have been right. After a year and a half of qualified bliss, we broke up. In the middle of the breakup mêlée, he brought his laundry over for me to wash.
A few weeks later, I made the mistake of attending an Art Directors Club opening. Young Guns – Designers Under Thirty. I mentally added, “who have been nurtured, encouraged and supported financially by broken and obscure dowagers on the wrong side of forty.”
Bravely, I approached Yakov to congratulate him on a prizewinning poster (silkscreen class, $450.00) which depicted my lamp from my bedroom announcing a reading series at the coffee bar on my corner.
If you have seen “All about Eve”, can recall the lyrics to Human League’s “Don’t You Want Me”, or endured spinal cord surgery, you will know the feeling. Eight ghoulish words escaped his lips. “This is my new girlfriend. Isn’t she cute?” “Why yes, she’s adorable,” I concurred. Beside him was a diminutive Japanese nymphet of seventy-nine pounds. I took care not to crush this fresh, delicate blossom as she expressed reverence for this ancient, decrepit oak of design wisdom, as all young Japanese have been instructed. I managed to careen almost noiselessly out the door, narrowly escaping bodily collision with the 247 major art directors in attendance.
This regrettable encounter marked the world premiere of a disturbing phenomenon, which has gone down in history as “Bald Male Pattern-ness” or, “The Recurring Yakov Response”.
Dear reader, permit me to present to you a theory. I would submit that New York City in general, and Lower Manhattan in particular, hosts a disproportionate number of inhabitants who prefer somber clothing, an all-black costume being not at all unusual. Are we agreed? Splendid. I would further postulate that one bald-headed guy dressed all in black resembles nothing so much as another bald-headed guy dressed all in black. Particularly from behind. It is the central tenet of my argument.
I hope you have seen the Federico Fellini masterpiece, Nights of Cabiria (1957)? It’s the story of the plucky little prostitute, played by Giulieta Masina, who believes she has at last found true love, right up until the moment where he steals her pocketbook and attempts to throw her off a bridge. I have a tiny aluminum bucket that accompanies me to Cabiria screenings. At Film Forum I was weeping noiselessly into it when I noticed an unmistakable profile in the third row, the smooth, rounded skull attractively adorned with a perfectly matched set of adorable, shell-like ears. I grabbed my bucket and bolted.
Thursday night at the Whitney, the ovoid vision, in its same inky outfit, repeated itself no less than eleven times. When one appeared at Pinkberry, my sanity took a nosedive. A girl ought to feel safe at Pinkberry.
Further sightings occurred at Trader Joe’s, Equinox, and The Apple Store, but when one turned up at my great-aunt Ruth’s memorial at Temple Emmanu-El, I began to question the veracity of the sightings. Any downtown street, avenue, corner or alley featured a handful, if not a platoon of Yakovs, in black tee shirts and black Levi’s. Baldly texting, walking, or talking, holding their little black iPhones up to their little bald iHeads.
Research reveals the following facts: Of the 753,221 people residing in lower Manhattan, about half are men. That leaves 376,610. Of these males, some are too young or too old, leaving 282,457. Of these, a staggering two thirds dress exclusively in black, leaving 188,304. Of these, one quarter, or 47,076, are either intentionally or unintentionally, bald.
I developed a rabid aversion to hard-boiled eggs, new potatoes, and, as always, studiously avoided bowling, billiards and ping-pong. I took care to avoid theaters, art galleries, and avenues or streets perpendicular or parallel to Canal, Houston, Fourteenth and Twenty-Third. Anywhere free wifi was offered, or fresh-brewed coffee was served was off-limits as well.
Time passed, the way it does.
Yakov has done well for himself! He published a mediocre design book with a thoughtful dedications page, thanking his many benefactors, every one of which he met through me. I see it is now available on eBay for $1.29. Plus postage.
And that’s not all. Yakov’s put on weight, and no longer resembles anyone even remotely cute. Best of all, he is not young anymore. And, with the passage of time, plus certain Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors, I’m feeling a lot better. Also, though the black-clad-baldy trend has increased by 31.7 percent in the subsequent decades, at the time of this writing, the sightings have decreased from 67.3 Yakovs per week, to 22.4, calculated as of Wednesday. Comparatively few of these eggheads, on closer inspection, proved to be the genuine article. On the occasions where the actual Yakov does make an appearance, usually accompanied by the above-mentioned female and its young, great care is taken not to disturb it, particularly during the mating season.
Laurie Rosenwald is a painter. In spite of this, she has done hundreds of illustrations for The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Atlantic and The Wall Street Journal, among other publications, and designed posters, typefaces, book jackets, logos, and some terribly, terribly important shopping bags for Fiorucci and Bloomingdale’s. She has written “All the Wrong People Have Self-Esteem,” (Bloomsbury, 2008) a stellar year for publishing, the economy, and sarcasm, “New York Notebook” (Chronicle), and “And to Name but Just a Few: Red, Yellow, Green, Blue” (Blue Apple). Google, Adobe, Ikea, Scholastic, Buzzfeed and many others have hosted her “How to Make Mistakes on Purpose” workshop. Its details remain a mystery, as participants are sworn to Omertà, the Mafia code of silence. With the publication of “How to Make Mistakes on Purpose,” (Hachette, 2021) these secrets are at last revealed. She’s given TED talks and appeared on many podcasts, including Google Design Notes and Design Matters. She speaks Swedish like a native New Yorker, played “Woman” on The Sopranos, (a role she was born to play) and David Bowie really did buy her a cheeseburger. Deluxe. She speaks Swedish like a native New Yorker and has never used an emoji. Her illustrated “Memwah” is finally finished. It is the only book you and your family will ever need. Instagram.com/rosenworld
Illustration by author.