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“So you’re not really,” finishing the last of the hamburger, “Elizabeth Herzon anymore.”
Glad to see it gone. “No…” Leaving most of her salad, “so now I guess I’m Elizabeth Lipshitz.”
“Lipshitz?” Chuckling, “That’s almost as bad as Lipensky.”
“Mitchell…” Their eyes locked, for the second time saying one of those things that are occasionally said before the brain has a chance to process one’s thoughts… Or maybe not, “…I’d love it if my name was Lipensky.”
She loves me!
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Chicago, Illinois
December 28, 1962
Remembering; hearing Marsha’s words: “What I think of you?” Remembering; seeing Marsha’s lip curled in disgust, seeing the look of scorn on her face, hearing: “What I really think of you? Mitchell, you don’t want to know!”
His forehead furling, his brain processing: “I’d love it if my name was Lipensky.” Scaring him now, Elizabeth loves me! The ramifications terrifying.
Sending a shot of electricity through both, taking hold of her hand. “Elizabeth… honey,” the word now rolling off his lips. “I’ve…”
Honey, Elizabeth thought. He called me honey!
Stopping, chewing his lip to keep from saying what he really wanted to say. Their eyes locked once again, “…I’ve got tremendous feelings for you and I know you do me, too. But I’m… we’re both married and we… Elizabeth, I love my kids,” he said emphatically. “And I just can’t do it. I’d like… If things were different, I’d love nothing more than to hold you and,” whispering, “kiss you and…” Oh, God! “But I can’t!” His eyes shifting, looking at her hand in his, seeing… feeling her fingers tightening about his. Wanting to hold this hand for the rest of his life. However, “I don’t think we should do this again.”
Her heart quickening, He said he loves his kids but not her, and he just about told me he loves me! Knowing what he meant but, attempting to smile, “Have lunch?” she asked.
Seeing the shadow of Elizabeth’s crooked smile, fighting the urge to lean across the table and kiss her… Instead, reluctantly releasing her hand, “Meet… in any way because I…” Shaking his head, leaving it unsaid. “I just think it would be best if we didn’t see each other like this again.”
Elizabeth…
When Mitchell left for Peoria in January of 1959, Elizabeth felt relief.
Actually, Elizabeth Herzon could not wait for Mitchell Lipensky to be away and out of her life because from that moment in December of 1958 when she had impulsively initiated a kiss within Transco’s cardboard canyon and Mitchell’s instantaneous sexual reaction and spontaneous return of that kiss, Elizabeth Herzon had fallen deeply in love. And knowing it was not, nor could ever be what she wanted—to spend her life with Mitchell—she wanted him away and out of her life.
And, if not mentally than certainly physically, Mitchell was out of her life…
Until August 18, 1961, when, going over a complicated quotation for a million special size, special window envelopes, Gene Tarnowski had mentioned that Bill Krupper had given a definite, approximate retirement date and that he was considering who to place into the remainder of Tom’s territory when Elizabeth, in another of those instances of impetuously speaking before thinking—Impetuously? Maybe—had suggested contacting Mitchell.
Other than her desire for a married man with a child, now three children, Elizabeth Herzon was a pleasant, well brought up, extremely nice young woman.
However, when she’d met Mitchell, other than just his appearance—which was certainly a large part of the attraction—there was something about Mitchell’s unassuming, quiet demeanor that reminded Elizabeth of herself.
As a child that always found herself on the outside looking in. As a child that due to her weight was taunted and tormented in grade school, and in high school snubbed and rejected by those whom she wanted to be accepted by, and ostensibly befriended by a few boys that thought she was pretty but fat and wanted only to get their hands onto her breasts. Consequently, Elizabeth spent those sad years as a “loner”.
Until Tuesday September 2,1956, when entering Wright Junior College, at near age eighteen, when at that time Elizabeth Herzon decided that she no longer wanted to be…
“Oy, such a punnum! Such a beautiful face!” Her mother and father and aunts and uncles would say. “Such a shame she’s so fat!”
Upon entering Wright Junior College, Elizabeth Herzon decided that she no longer wanted to be a fat girl. So she then spent the next fourteen months eating only what necessity demanded for her to remain a viable human being.
Days going into weeks…
Weeks going into months…
The excessive fat within her face, neck and shoulders gone, her cheeks and jaw taking shape, her neck thinning.
“Oy, such a punnum! Such a beautiful face!” her mother and father and aunts and uncles said.
Months going into a year…
The excessive fat within her body gone, her bust, waist and buttocks having taken shape.
“Oy, such a figure!” three of her uncles said.
“Oy, such a tush!” her fourth uncle said playfully—playfully?—patting his niece’s left buttock.
****
Fourteen months and a bit more than seventy pounds later, turned from an overweight duckling to a beautiful swan, Elizabeth graduated from Wright Junior College in late May of 1958.
Although still seeing a fat girl when she looked in the mirror, wisely knowing this was nothing more than an unhappy illusion from the past, forcing a show of confidence, Elizabeth found her way to an unknown beauty shop and, for the first time in her life, had her eyebrows plucked and shaped and, for the first time in her life, had her long hair styled and tinted to bring out the honey colored highlights in her naturally dark blonde hair and—after obtaining a job as salesgirl in the woman’s clothing department at The Boston Store in downtown Chicago—for the first time in her life Elizabeth Herzon purchased stylish, well fitted clothing.
On Monday, September 8, 1958, Elizabeth answered an ad in the Chicago Tribune for a female sales trainee for Transco Envelope Company, and an appointment was made for 9:00 a.m. Wednesday morning.
Wednesday morning: Dressed in a navy blue linen suit and matching low heeled pumps, Elizabeth Herzon was escorted to the office of Gene Tarnowski where, calling upon all the self confidence and courage she could muster, Elizabeth attempted to convince Tarnowski that she was the right woman for the job. Surprisingly, she did convince Tarnowski that she was the right woman for the job and so began her training phase on September 10, 1958, a week and a half after Mitchell Lipensky.
****
With the bittersweet reality that Mitchell was away and out of her life, one would assume that Elizabeth would attempt to place herself into a position to meet men. However, not one to frequent bars, Elizabeth had no idea how or where to place herself to be in a position to meet men. Occasionally a customer would ask her out, but adhering to her strict “no customer dating” policy she, very politely, refused.
Unable to shed years of an indifferent, contemptuous attitude, Elizabeth’s personality still repulsed or intimidated most of the young men she did meet, until…
“Oy, he’s such a nice Jewish boy!” her aunt Bertha said. “He’s the nephew of my best friend, Clara, and he’s graduated from U of I…” Speaking rapidly, attempting to convince her no longer fat, now beautiful niece—short of a doctor or lawyer, it’s every Jewish mother’s, or aunt’s dream that their daughter, or niece, marry a—“And he’s going to be a C.P.A.!” Aunt Bertha said, absently stirring her tea, seeing the unconcerned look on Elizabeth’s face. “And Myron’s…” winking, flexing both arms to signify, “so good looking!”
After a week of cajoling, to shut her mother and father and Aunt Bertha up, Elizabeth agreed to meet her aunt’s best friend’s nephew.
Yes, Myron Lipshitz was good looking, and would, eventually, earn a very good living as a C.P.A. And now that Mitchell was away and out of her life, “Okay,” she told Myron on March 3, 1959, when he called for the seventh time, “I’ll go to a movie with you.”
Tired of being alone. Tired of dreaming about a man that was, after all, married with a child.
Tired of being a virgin and finding “such a nice Jewish boy” with good potential that told her he loved her and agreed—their mothers should only know—that they would not have children.
Also, Myron agreed that it was okay to keep their marriage a secret from anyone she worked with and, being an accountant, Myron knew they would net a healthy IRS refund after she received her yearly W2 form.
Myron Lipshitz also agreed to no sex until after they were married.
As for Elizabeth? Elizabeth tried to convince herself that she loved Myron.
Insisting on a small wedding, Elizabeth Herzon and Myron Lipshitz were married on Sunday, May 10, 1959, which, coincidently, and as she never planned on having children, ironically, was Mother’s Day.
****
Though, literally, kept in the dark the first few times, upon seeing his new wife’s nude body for the first time, although enthralled with her overall beauty, the new husband also saw the stretch marks across her flaccid stomach, breasts, ample buttocks and Elizabeth’s cellulite dimpled, still somewhat pudgy thighs.
Being an athletic type, Myron undertook a…
To Elizabeth, her husband undertook a mentally and physically stressful campaign of exercise that in time, a very short time, became a hateful duty that….
Elizabeth’s metabolism finding its niche, telling her body the weight she was, was the weight she most probably was going to be.
Although Myron’s regimen of exercise did keep additional weight off—along with Elizabeth’s low calorie and at times near starvation diet—and did firm “things” up, Myron’s by then despised program of exercise did nothing to alleviate the stretch marks and very little of the cellulite.
****
Both being “only” children…
“So, when you going to make me a bubbeh?” The parental pressure beginning early in their marriage. “So, nu, we going to be bubbeh and zadde soon?”
“Ma, Pa,” Myron and Elizabeth told their parents, “we’re not ready to make you grandparents yet. Wait; we’ve plenty of time!”
In time, in not too long a time—much as Mitchell Lipensky’s continuing campaign to have Marsha patch things with his parents—besides his ongoing push for more and more strenuous exercise, that Elizabeth hated, Myron Lipshitz began his own continuing, “Let’s get pregnant” campaign that his wife flatly refused to consider. Which, obviously, led to heated arguments. Which, subsequently, subconsciously, may have been the reason why, after a bit less than two and a half years of marriage, when on August 18, 1961, Gene Tarnowski had mentioned that Bill Krupper had given a definite, approximate, retirement date and that he was considering whom to place into the remainder of Bill’s territory, it was at that time when Elizabeth—another of those instances of speaking before thinking… maybe—had suggested contacting Mitchell.
