I became orthodox because Avi was, and we searched for God together. We kept our food kosher and I kept my arms and legs covered. I learned a lot about Talmudic Law, for example, swallowing semen is forbidden during the Yom Kippur fast.
Over summer break, Avi wanted to study Hebrew in Jerusalem. My parents wanted me to get a job. So Avi paid for me to study in Israel with him. We spent eight hours a day in class. Afterwards, we were so exhausted that we never saw more than two square miles of Israel. Avi's roommate went home on the weekends, so we spent the time together in his room, having eighteen-second sex and eating a lot, because in Jerusalem everything's closed on Shabbat.
After three weeks, I was sick of Hebrew. I was sick of Jerusalem. All I wanted were books in English. Avi wouldn't buy me books in English, because he thought I should be studying Hebrew.
So I started stealing books from the English book store, which was particularly scary because soldiers lurked everywhere with loaded machine guns.
I wanted to leave but the flights were full, so I taught myself to masturbate from a book, and I stopped going to class because Avi's phony Hebrew accent made me sick.
When I wasn't perfecting my masturbating technique, and sometimes when I was, I retreated to a study carrel in the library on Mount Scopus. There I mastered the thirteen Hebrew verb tenses -- each one reflects a different mood or feeling. But I wondered how anyone could ever use all those emotions, even if there were people to talk to.