You may consider me a Semite

You may consider me a Semite

During my graduate studies, I lived in the atmosphere of the Arabian Nights with a very Western elegance. Close friends in the department called me by names derived from the legend, such as Ali Baba, for fun.

The University cafeteria, a high-ceilinged hall buzzing with the clatter of trays and the intellectual hum of a thousand simultaneous conversations. It was a place of fuel, not fellowship, where I retreated daily with a paper or a launch to create a quiet island in the hectic sea of my doctoral work.

Towards the end of my study, the silent exchange of smiles over three days was no longer just a flirtation; it became a subtle, sustained inquiry. Her smile on the first day was indeed genuine and appraising, but now it carried the weight of a specific curiosity. When it repeated on the second and third days, it felt less like a coincidence and more like a question being posed with increasing urgency: "Do you see what I see? Are you what I think you are?"

My returned smiles were my only answer: "I see you. We are not strangers."

When I finally approached her, the ritual complete, the air was thick with unspoken words.

"You have a nice smile," I said, the words a key turning in the lock.

"And you have a nice style," she replied, her eyes sparkling not just with warmth, but with recognition. She was not just complimenting my clothes; she was acknowledging the entire presentation, the performance of the self.

"Will you join me?"

I sat. The small talk was a mere formality, a gentle current carrying us toward the waterfall. She leaned in, her voice dropping into a more intimate register, a space for shared secrets.

"In the context of all this," she began, her gesture encompassing our easy, unspoken rapport, "I have to ask. Are you a Jew?"

The question now landed not as an intrusion, but as the core of the entire, silent three-day dialogue.

 My defensive "Why are you saying this?" was not an actual offence, but the final veil.

She met my gaze, her own steady and clear: "The nose."

It was not an accusation or a stereotype. In her mouth, from her context, it was a familiar landmark. It was the same way one Jew might note another necklace or hear a particular inflection in their voice, a quiet, internal signifier. She was saying, in the oldest of coded languages: "I see my people in you."

And my answer, "You may consider me a Semite," was no longer just a clever deflection. It was a nuanced confession. By choosing the identity of an ancient man, the one who dealt with all cultures but was rooted in none, I was telling her: "I am on the road. I am adjacent. I understand your map, but I walk a different path", and in doing so, honouring the truth of her observation without claiming a membership I did not hold.

A slow, dazzling smile spread across her face. She hadn't been rejected; she had been understood on a profound level. "A Semite," she repeated, savouring the word. "A traveller on the ancient roads. You carry stories from many lands." She saw the romance in it, the mystery. I had accepted the premise of her world and found a place for myself within its mythology.

Our time together in her rented unit, which smelled of old books and tea, now took on the quality of an ethnographic and emotional exchange. She, Leah, was not just a cultural historian; she was a member of the tribe, studying the man at its borders. Our conversations about identity, philosophy, and poetry were infused with a new subtext.

When she traced the line of my nose, it was with a sense of ownership and wonder. "My Semite," she would whisper, and it was an endearment that acknowledged everything: my outsider status, my proximity, the connection that thrived precisely because of its ambiguity.

The intermittence of our relationship made sense. It was not a casual fling, but a series of intense, clandestine meetings between two people from adjacent territories. We were building a connection in the liminal space between her defined world and my nomadic one. In the silence between our meetings, I wasn't just a man she was dating; I was her Semite, a figure of intrigue and intellectual romance, a traveller who would always return to her door, bringing stories from the outside, yet never fully coming inside.

But as I stepped from the scent of her old books back into the cold, sharp air of the city, the weight of the nomad returned. To be her Semite was to be a guest in her history, a guest who must eventually depart. I was her traveller on the ancient roads, but they are notoriously lonely. By accepting the romance of the border, I had also accepted the exile. We were connected by the very thing that kept us apart; I was a story she loved to read, but I was written in a language she could never truly speak.