Our Hairy Jewish Bodies, Ourselves - Page 3

Other than my indulgence in an ear-hair trimmer, I decided to keep accepting myself as I am. Certainly the women in my life have never complained - at least not to my face. I successfully fought the urge to call one of those Village Voice advertisers for a wax-and-rip. My hairy Jewish body is my physical self. I’ll never deny that. I get positive reinforcement of this attitude by watching lots of Israeli movies. They’re enjoyable because they show bald, hairy Jewish guys doing cool things (driving tanks, shtupping) without a dollop of irony or self-loathing.

Lately, hairy guys are winning more respect. My self-confidence has bounced further back, hobbit ears be damned. A friend of mine told me about a blog posting about actor Hugh Jackman's fuzzed-up chest. I commented, “Fausta - you can rest even easier after looking at some of my profile photos. Hugh Jackman is a Euro-girlie man compared to, well, me.” Men’s fashion magazines show more natural, fuzzy models.

A British newspaper ran pro-and-con essays under the headline, “Hairy Chests or Polished Pecs?” complete with photos. Arguing the “Yes, oh my God, YES!” (my paraphrase) position was Tanya Gold, who winsomely explained, “I am a Jewish woman, and making passionate love to textiles is in my genes. But the real reason that I love a hairy chest is this - when you see hair nestling like a headless squirrel on your beloved's chest you know you have a man in your bed. Not a metrosexual, but Man. Grrr.”

Often, I revel in the presence of men with the same look. At my gym, I’ve checked out other guys and vice versa, in a silent but friendly male competition to see who’s got the biggest and hairiest whatever.

This spring, I’ve felt deep kinship with a Chasidic man who exercises at the same time I do. Off come the black hat and suit, on go the gym clothes.

Once we stood in line for a shower and I marveled at the tribal similarity. While he was much heavier than me and older, our backs and shoulders looked identical. We never spoke, but in that silent fraternity of the shower line I knew we were landsmen (Yiddish for people from the same town).

We both come from the same Eastern European stock; two guys whose families crawled out of the mud of Ukrainian shtetls to eventually deposit their hirsute offspring in the United States, where we unashamedly maintain our burly physiques. Here are two Yids who’ll never get a back waxing. Roz Chast may find us horrifying, but that’s her problem, not ours.

Article Author: Van Wallach

Van Wallach is a writer in Connecticut. He is a native of Mission, Texas and a graduate of Princeton University. His interests in Judaism and languages such as Spanish, Hebrew, Yiddish, Russian and Portuguese often color his essays, so keep your dictionaries at hand. …

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