A Fur Coat and Clicking Boots
Meagan Dwyer2010
I looked at the clock and sniffed. It was 2 am. I had a cold, work early in the morning, and a long walk home. I rubbed my eyes, said goodnight to my friend, bundled up, and headed out.
Looking around, it certainly looked like Williamsburg in the early hours of the morning: silent and deserted. I crossed Bedford, Lee, and came to Division. As the clicking of my boots echoed against buses and buildings, I felt sickeningly insecure. The streets were too quiet.
“I’m calling my guy,” I thought. A good escort would put me at ease. I pulled out my phone from my purse and dialed his number. After a few rings, he answered and I immediately felt safer.
I walked down Division and turned left down Marcy. I hit Broadway, my night still relatively uninterrupted.
“…for Shabbos this Friday night…” my boyfriend’s voice was ringing in my ears as I kept a very alert watch around me. My head darted left and right, and occasionally I turned around. I have watched far too many episodes of Law and Order to know that in order to be a victim, one has to look like one to someone else.
Looking back now, I guess someone thought differently.
I came up to Hooper Street and crossed behind a car that was stopped at a red light. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something black coming out of the window. I looked over, and saw a man with dark hair and a dark beard leaning most of his face outside his side window, which was rolled down. It was dark, but I saw his kippa. He was staring at me.
“Some Hasidic guy is staring at me,” I told my boyfriend, who was not only a threatened voice on the other line, but also ex-frum.
“What is he doing?” he asked as I was already walking up onto the curb.
“Nothing, just watching me,” I replied. This wasn’t the first time this had happened after two and a half years of living in Williamsburg. I took a few more steps and heard the slowing of tires.
The man was almost pulling up beside me, slowing down his car to catch up with me.
“Oh, he’s stopping, he’s…” I only vaguely remember my voice trailing off.
“You want a ride?” the man shouted from the car.
“What’s he saying, what’s he saying?!” my boyfriend kept distracting me. He was worried; I was angry. Insulted, annoyed, scared. All of it.
“No, GO!” I shouted.
“What’s going on? Let me talk to him!” my boyfriend kept shouting. I was shouting, too. The entire scene was too loud for 2 am on an early Thursday morning.
The man finally got it, and sped up down Broadway. He disappeared around a corner. I was afraid he would come back behind me again, making circles until I got home.
“Ugh, that was awful. I am really freaked out right now,” I stammered into the phone.
“They’re harmless,” my boyfriend stated, and he immediately resumed talking about what we were mentioning before.
On and on he kept talking, and I couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened. If I weren’t wearing my fur coat, I would have run home. But it was too heavy and I was too sick.
“Do you think,” I asked my boyfriend. “that he thought I was a prostitute? Young girl walking down Broadway. Alone. Fur coat, boots that click?”
Silence.
9 Responses
Unpredictable ending. Loved it.
Maybe.
Or maybe he was trying to be nice. Perhaps a little too intimately nice.
But I don’t think you were in danger. Chassidim don’t often do that.
Good writing. I knew this since I was a child, on one side of Broadway St. is holy Willliamsburg in every corner, on the other side is the complete opposite.
I agree you were not in danger he was prbably just a ‘rachmonas’.
As a chasidic woman who can not be mistaken for a hooker, clicking boots notwithstanding, I don’t think you or your boyfriends assumption is right.
I too have been offered quite a few “car rides” by chasidic men.
Predatory horny men will not cease to be predatory and horny, even if they grow a beard and sidelocks, or dress in black. What a surprise.
Meagan, thanks for the piece. Great writing, as usual.
As a formerly Chasidic man I can say that sometimes men do just want to offer rides and are being nice. I’ve offered many a ride in my day to a woman I’d judge to be genuinely in need of one — say, she’s standing at a corner alone 2 miles from the Chasidic neighborhood on a cold night — and I’ve had many occasions where the woman suddenly tenses up with extra caution and reacts like she’s about to have a very undesired sexual experience of a lifetime. (And responds, “I’m waiting for a taxi,” and quickly moves away 100 yards.)
But on the other hand, we all know of horny CHasidic men who do exactly what Meagan describes. (I know some of them personally.) And judging from Meagan’s description of the story, there does seem to have been reason to be a little cautious. Maybe it’s just in her mind, but this particular guy sounds extra creepy. (Then again, my own past offer of rides — always made in the most gentlemanly manner and the purest of intentions — could’ve stimulated the same reaction.) So, bottom line, these things are often hard to judge.
But what makes it a valid story that is *not* a complete besmirching of Chasidic men is that we do *know* that some Chasidic men are hyper-sexual due to sexual repression (a small minority, perhaps, but still…). And they certainly do sometimes act out in crass and sometimes predatory ways. So, an unpleasant reputation, sure. But not an *entirely* unjustified one.
maybe he was harmless but better safe than sorry. (ha ha, ironic from me who usually plays it unsafe…)
it reminds me of the an opposite reaction to a similar situation, what i would call UNDERvigilance-
My teenage sister and her friend were going for a walk or something in a park and their was this chasidic guy following them, they weren’t sure, but they thought so and they were very creeped out.
When my mom heard about it she pooh pahed them being so paranoid and suspicious of a nice frum boy. “So why can’t he walk there three feet behind you, it’s a public place, so what”
my guess is probably he just want to make friends but for bais yacov girls that’s almost as bad as rape. but anyway she’s the one who was there and she has to use her judgement and if she’s feeling creeped out she should never ignore it and no one should tell her too.
While some Chassidim may be hyper-sexual as a result of repression, most of the Chassidim who act inappropriately would do the same towards Chassidic women. A significant part of it is their perception of non-Chassidic women is skewed. They know that non-Chassidic society does not have the same sexual restrictions as Chassidic society. However, some of them get the idea that all non-Chassidic women are devoid of any limits on their sexuality.
If you read travel books for most socially conservative countries, they will state that western woman are sometimes subject to unwanted attention from local men that local women do not have to deal with. Having been in India with a female friend, I saw it first-hand.
rape is not the result of hyper-sexuality.
rape is not about sex, it’s about power and control. a man – any man – whatever level of observance he is or is not, does not become a rapist by hypersexuality.
it is possible that some hypersexual man, burdened with ideas that women are to be acted upon and not possessed of their own agency, may desire inappropriate sexual contact with a woman. it’s the actions of
-forcing- those intentions upon her – the lack of consent – that makes it rape.
rape is about power and control. sex is just the weapon of choice.
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