The Curse of Blessings: Sometimes, the Right Story Can Change Your Life

By Mitchell Chefitz

"The Curse of Blessings" is ten jewel-like tales nestled in a larger framework, wherein an aged storyteller passes on his craft to four unlikely apprentices. It is a gift that will leave them transformed - or not - depending on what they allow themselves to hear. These are tales of utter simplicity that express life's most complex truths. They can be read in a sitting, yet stay with you forever.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mitchell Chefitz
• Release date: Feb 3, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311805485

Mitchell Chefitz

Mitchell Chefitz is the author of two novels published by St. Martin's Press, the LA Times best-seller "The Seventh Telling: The Kabbalah of Moshe Katan" and "The Thirty-third Hour.""Blood Covenant" is the third volume of his Moshe Katan trilogy.His story collection, "The Curse of Blessings," was published by Running Press and is translated into German, Korean, and Mandarin.He writes and teaches primarily on matters related to Jewish spirituality.

Book preview

THE CURSE OF BLESSIGS

Sometimes, the Right Story Can Change Your Life

Mitchell Chefitz

Copyright 2006 Mitchell Chefitz

Smashwords Edition

© 2006 by Mitchell Chefitz

Running Press print edition published 2006

Smashwords version edited and published 2015

All rights reserved

under the Pan-American and International Copyright Conventions

for the boys

Josh

Adam Walter

much love

Table of Contents

Prologue

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The Curse of Blessings

The Wise Man Who Became Angry

The Kiss of Life

Gabriel’s Horn

Mouth of the Mountain

The Mi-kubal in New Jersey

Of Praise and Patience

Just a Miracle

The Measure of Success

Four Readers

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Afterthoughts

Prologue

Reuben entrusted these stories to me.

They were a parting gift. Now, they’re our gift to you.

Let me share with you some of the mystery of how they came to be . . .

I was one of four who gathered around Reuben in Central Park during our lunch break. Others came now and then, stayed a while, then floated away. But we four remained faithful to Reuben and each other nearly two years. He showed such a loving interest in each of us. And his insights were priceless.

All we knew of Reuben was that he commuted from New Jersey just to sit in the park, weather permitting. That was the work of his retirement.

Each of us came from some other place. One was a diamond merchant, one a social worker, one a Wall Street man, and me, an attorney. I specialize in intellectual property.

Only now that Reuben has left to be with his family in Florida do we realize how much his stories have changed us. I’m curious to see what effect they’ll have on you.

Shortly before he gave them to us, Reuben presented us with a puzzle.

An old story, he said. There was a great archer, the royal archer, the best in the land, who was dissatisfied because too often the wind played with his arrows and they struck just off center. He resolved to find a place beyond the wind. In his travels he came by a barn on the side of which were painted twelve targets with an arrow precisely in the center of each. Precisely. ‘This is a greater archer than I am,’ the royal archer thought. ‘I have to find him.’ So he inquired. Each person told him he was not looking for an archer. He was looking for a fool. ‘Perhaps a fool,’ the royal archer said, ‘but a great archer nonetheless.’ ‘You don’t understand,’ they told him. ‘He shoots the arrows first, then he paints the targets.’

It’s not a story. It’s a joke, said our diamond merchant.

Reuben smiled his old man smile, knowing he had us in his web. A joke may be just a joke, he said, or a joke may be a compressed story. There is a story here. Can you find it?

The next day we gathered around Reuben. He was sitting on the edge of his bench in eager anticipation. What are we to do with our royal archer? he asked.

It’s a joke, said the diamond merchant. There isn’t anything to do with it.

It’s a story, I said. I had found the royal archer in my dreams that night.

Reuben leaned forward. Yes? Then tell me the rest of it.

The royal archer must have been angry, very angry, that someone would make such a mockery of his art, I began. This painter needed a scolding.

With a sword, the Wall Street man said.

No sword, said the social worker. Just a scolding. He found the house of the painter, pounded on the door.

The door opened, the diamond merchant said, and there stood a middle-aged man with a beer belly, looking up through his spectacles at the royal archer.

Is this still a joke to you? I asked.

The diamond merchant opened his mouth to add to the joke, but in that moment, mouth still open, the joke turned toward a story. The painter said, ‘It’s you! You’re the royal archer! You’re the greatest archer who has ever lived, standing here, at my house, in my doorway! I have admired you for years! I can’t begin to tell you . . .’ On and on the painter went. With each phrase, the anger of the royal archer diminished.

So it’s a story after all, I said.

Maybe, said the diamond merchant. "The