HUNGRY GERALD

Bathgate Avenue. East Bronx. Circa 1935. This was a loud, ramshackle street of pushcarts and shops dispensing a huge variety of food, fruit and vegetables at astonishingly low prices (even for 1935). The prices were why my Mom, with HG at her side, was there. The quality was good. But, wariness was necessary. Sharp dealing abounded. Lots of things were sold live..chickens, ducks and turkeys; lobster tanks and trays of wriggling crabs at the Italian-patronized fish store and a big fish tank with lively fish at the Jewish fish emporium. There was lots of blood. From the butcher shops and especially from the chicken store. My Mom bought her chicken live after much careful selection. The chicken guy slit the bird’s throat (much blood on his already bloody apron). Then the chicken was handed off to the chicken plucker (known as “the flicker”). Plucking the chicken cost about 2 cents, I recall, and in those Depression days many housewives did their own plucking to save that sum. The chicken guy usually eviscerated the chicken. My Mom did her own because she rendered chicken fat (a staple of the HG diet) and did many wondrous things with chicken innards. A chicken “flicker” was not held in high regard. A bad boy was admonished: “You’ll grow up to be a chicken flicker!!” Trade on Bathgate Avenue was conducted in very loud, tones of Yiddish, Italian and heavily-accented English. Deportment could be termed in-your-face. Okay. Let’s segue to Mom at the fish tank. She points to a fish. That’s my guy. Crafty fish man turns his back to Mom, obscuring the tank, lowers his net. The fish is on the cutting block. Before the knife descends, Mom screams (and I mean screams): “THIS FISH IS DEAD!!!”
I look.  Damn, that’s one dead fish.  The fish man looks at my Mom and says,benevolently: “Ehr shluhft.” Translation: He’s sleeping.  Of course, he was replaced with a wide-awake guy and the incident was recorded permanently in family lore. Two morals: (One) Watch out!! (Two) If you screw up, have a funny excuse.