To Get Through My Divorce, I Raised the Golem

I had to remind myself to breathe. My palms were sweaty; I was flooded with adrenaline. The artist was good at his job, continually making small talk to distract me from the pain. When I stood up, I was shaking but I was satisfied with the results. Three Hebrew letters—aleph, mem, and tav—now marked my inner arm, sepia brown with a fine black outline. They spell emet, the Hebrew word for truth.

This is the word that was inscribed on the Golem—a mythical being in Jewish folklore, part monster, part protector—to bring him to life. It’s the word inscribed on the clay Golem who now stands in my garden. It’s the word on my forearm now too.

“He’s Jewish Frankenstein,” I explained when a friend asked me why I was buying the vaguely human-shaped sculpture for my garden. “He’s a man-made monster. He will protect me. Or at least the idea of him will.” That, and the truth he stands for.

It was an acrimonious divorce. I wanted justice. I settled for truth.

*

As one of the best-known versions of the Golem story goes, in the sixteenth century, Rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel raised the Golem to protect the Jews of Prague from the same anti-Semitism Jews have endured for centuries and continue to endure today. During Rabbi Loew’s era, Jews were falsely accused of drinking the blood of Christians, falsely accused of causing the black death; these days it’s conspiracy theories about Jewish space lasers, checks from George Soros, and something called “globalism.” The specifics don’t matter so much; different time period, same terrible story.

Rabbi Loew made the Golem from mud, from clay. To bring the Golem to life, to activate his abilities as a protector, he inscribed the word truth in Hebrew on the Golem’s skin. To activate my own inner protector, I had truth inscribed on my arm.

*

The Golem arrived the same day as the email accusing me of “making things difficult.”

I had been making things difficult for the year and a half since I’d filed for divorce. He wanted things I didn’t want. What I wanted he did not want. The email said, “I told you I didn’t want that,” as though this would change things.

In truth, I’d been making things difficult for at least five years. I wanted a reasonable thing. He told me it was unreasonable. I was wrong for wanting it.

When someone blames you for being difficult but the truth is that they’ve created a difficult situation, it’s gaslighting. When people blame the Jews for anti-Semitism, that’s gaslighting. “It’s not my fault, they just insist on being, you know, different. Why do they have to be different?”

I suppose I could say, “He made me raise the Golem.” But I chose to raise the Golem.

Men blame women for the things women endure all the time: “I hit her because she made me angry.” “Of course I made a move on her, did you see what she was wearing?” “It’s her fault I had an affair. She was too tired; she made me get it elsewhere.”

By the same logic, this divorce is my fault; I got depressed, and it ruined my marriage. It doesn’t matter why I got depressed; what’s important is that it’s my fault. I couldn’t do all the things I used to be able to do. I couldn’t work, I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t think. So I made him leave.

I suppose I could say, “He made me raise the Golem.” But I chose to raise the Golem.

The Golem raised by Rabbi Loew sleeps in the attic of a synagogue in Prague, to be awakened as needed. My Golem arrived sleeping in a bed of pink tissue paper and bubble wrap and cardboard. I unwrapped him and placed him in the garden where he could watch for visitors, friendly or otherwise.

The dog lets me know if anyone is around, but he’s more of an information system than a protection one. “A thing is happening!” my dog will shout, but if a stranger approaches him, he moves away. “I told you a thing is happening,” the dog will say, “now you deal with it.” He is a good dog but a bad Golem. He is noisy; the Golem is silent.

I was difficult about the house. Difficult about a lot of things. I am a difficult woman. Women who do not give in easily are difficult. Women who do not allow men to take what they want are difficult. Women with strong opinions, with strength of any kind, are deemed difficult by men who themselves refuse to bend. Women like me are hardheaded, hard-hearted, stubborn. Ambition is a character flaw. We make a big deal out of nothing. We are selfish. We are difficult.

He made multiple offers involving the house; each one involved some kind of co-ownership. I said no. This would put him in a long-term relationship with the house and thus a long-term relationship with me. The goal of divorce is to end a relationship, not to renegotiate the terms of an existing one.

*

I considered building a Golem myself, gathering the muddy Pacific Northwest clay of my yard into a shape resembling a guardian, writing truth on its body. I considered asking a friend who is a ceramics artist to help me, but my friend isn’t Jewish, and his clay doesn’t come from Prague. I am not religious, I am not deeply educated in Jewish mysticism, but this much I know: the Golem comes from Prague and is raised by a rabbi, not by a white guy in North Seattle.

So I went to Etsy.

From a laptop at my kitchen table, I browsed the internet for attractively photographed clay figures. I liked the look of a few of them, but only one was made in Prague. I was willing to compromise on some of the details because when you need a Golem, you raise him as best you can. I ordered my Golem from Etsy, made in Prague, probably not by a rabbi.

I planted the Golem’s feet in the wet ground of my backyard because I wanted the soil of Prague, from whence he was raised, to bond with the soil of my home. This is how the Golem would know he’s of this place now, no longer waiting in an attic in Prague. This is how he would know what to protect. I plan for my Golem to stand in the corner of my yard, surveying the gate, the door, the dog barking at everyone who walks by, for a long time. Since the Golem is made from fired clay, the weather will not degrade him. He may change color or get mossy, but he is built to last.

*

My tattoo cost $130. The Golem cost me $48.02, including $20.00 for shipping from Prague. I wonder if I should have summoned the Golem sooner, gotten the ink sooner. Both were cheaper than my lawyer.

I handed over a shocking amount of money to her every month. In exchange, she created piles of paperwork and requested more paperwork, and she asked me to sign yet more paperwork. This whole thing relied on paperwork.

In one version of the story, when the Golem completes his job and is returned to the attic, he is buried under a pile of books. If I ever have occasion to put my Golem in the attic, perhaps I will bury him under all that paperwork.

*

Whenever I heard from my lawyer, whose competence I was grateful for, I would panic because of the expense. My heartbeat would speed up; my skin would turn hot. Sometimes I would crawl into bed for an hour or two until the feeling of panic had passed.

When you call up a vengeance-seeking creature, you can’t expect to fully control the outcome.

“He feels . . . ,” said his lawyer.“I feel a lot of things. So many things.” My lawyer laughed when I said this. I asked if my feelings mattered, when they would matter.

“Not now,” my lawyer said. “Maybe, if we end up in court.”

Hiring a lawyer is a little bit like summoning the Golem. When you call up a vengeance-seeking creature, you can’t expect to fully control the outcome. As much as I would like vengeance—it would be satisfying—it’s not good motivation.

I wanted two things: to protect what I had earned and to end my marriage. The lawyer once told me we were early in the process, but that’s because her clock started when I wrote that first retainer check, after the floor-crying and pillow-screaming but before the hot rage of realizing my pain was costing me money too.

“A divorce settlement isn’t good unless everyone feels like they got screwed,” a friend told me.

*

There are versions of the Golem story in which the Golem is said to go mad and hurt innocent people, others where he falls upon and crushes his creator. Maybe these are parables about revenge, or motivation, or maybe they’re just telling you that when things go wrong, everyone gets hurt.

I like that the Golem is focused on truth and has the Hebrew word for it emblazoned on his chest. But in my experience with the law, truth and justice are not synonymous. I lost half my retirement in the settlement, but the truth protected my home, or the law did, or some combination of those things. I knew there would be losses; I knew they would not feel fair. I cried when I heard what I would have to give to get out. I stood at the kitchen sink and looked out into my muddy backyard. I do not know if I cried because of the loss or because it was finally over and I could take a deep-enough breath to be able to cry. I didn’t cry for long; there wasn’t time. I had to sign the papers.

I know what’s true in this story. I marked it on my skin so I would not forget. I believe that the truth protected me as best it could.

When there is no justice, the truth will have to do.

• 0