Thursday, March 27, 1975 Page Fourteen THE JEWISH POST Thursday. March ~. 1975 THE JEWISH POST Page Fifteen

i ·The,;", .' Lonely Road, to Sde Boker THE OTHER ·LETTER By BeSS KAPLAN Another chapter in the co",tinuing saga of Malke During his last twenty years, David Ben-Gurion amined herself in the mirror. What would Mr. By ARI RATH Perhaps one of his bigges.t disapP?intmen.ts Brenner, searching for happiness through the per. '" ' spent much of his time at the of Finkle think of her? She turned slowly, sideways, (Reprinted from The Jerusalem Post Weekly) came with the celebrations of his 80th birthday m WORE a dress," Goldie said, drinking her sonal column of the Free Press. Sde Boker. Ari Rath, who knew him well, outlines 1966. It was the year of the "great split" in "SHE her bulging stomach, free of its girdle, falling for. the paHem of the great statesman's life at the tea in loud sips, "from thirty years back. Did Reproduction of this material by any means ward. She wished she was a little thinner, a little beloved desert home which was to become his final and although thousands of people had come down you see anybody wearing lace lately? I ask you! w'hatsover is strictly forbidden. resting place. more mentschlach. Maybe he liked a wife .who DEW VOICES in the history of a nation live on to Sde Boker to attend a big pageant, depicting the From her 'baba's times!" ~ cf"beyond the lifetime of the men who bore them. histor'j of his life, some of his cl,?sest c?I;Lea~es, MaIke, dizzy by now, sighed. She COUldn't reo was flat? But no. Her Mr. Finkle WOUldn't caFe" with whom he had shared his entlre political life, Morris had been like that, yet he'd been a good about things like that. Already she could see wm David· 'Ben-Gurion's voice and preachings became 'istic of his fixity of purpose. He had long felt the member half the things Goldie had told her. The stayed away. Ben·Gurion was then th~' head of ~he man. She would have to give them both a chance, . . .'. not a shadowy man but It tall silvery.headed, ifuirtortal on the day he died. It was a cloudy win, need both to set a personal example and to have . stories that started with: "Nobody knows this ex. but she would start with Finkle; because she had ter's day; exactly eight weeks after the traumatic small H)-member Rafi Knesset factIon, the fIrst cept me, so keep it a secret," had gotten mixed up gentleman with nice manners. . . • He would l®l\ beginning of the Yom' Kippur War. , still some time for reflection after nearly three decades time 'that he had been in opposition to the Estab- , opened his letter first. Now MaIke could clean only at the eyes, the face, not the figure. '. iJ.,;,:. of intensive pOlitical activity. The problems of the with the ones that began: "'fhe whole city knows the kitchen having satisfied her curiosity at last. 'licking the wounds of the grim and bitter war that lishment. Yet he seemed undeterred and stepped , . . • everybody is talking about it!" She washed, thinking about w.hat a rich young State seemed immense and Ben·Gurion up the writing of his memoirs. Answering the letter wasn't as easy as she'd could be like. He co~Id. be a Qastard, .or else ha.d 'been thrust upon it, was longing for the voice wanted to be able to look at matters in perspective, "Anothe! piece cake?" thought it would be. After the words, "Dear Mr. of 'a leader with ~on, someone. who would lead January 1968, brought personill tragedy. Paula, "No thanks. I ate too much already." did he get so rich? Finkle like her lQ.n.d' '. ' to map out strategy for years to come, to devise Finkle," she was stuck. How should she begin?', of person, Ukf,l a mixture of and.. . . his faithful companion for 50 years, died suddenly. So what .else is ,new and different, Malke asked new ideas and plans that would help Israel. Ben·Gurion went to the Sde Boker College, the What do you say in a first letter to a man' who Schenkle sou~ded like a. HoW herself. But it wasn't any concern of hers if sounds 'like he 'could be the one, but might turn Once his mind was made up, nobody: could fulfilment of one of his dreams of an institute of Goldie wanted to stuff herself. fooled that Reuben! With ,the' change it. With his forceful manner and his p

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