The Tamm-inator

Tammi Petrocelli hangs out at Hanaan's Diner. She is only a girl in her mid 30's, so the only thing she has to say to the Greybeards at the table in the southwestern corner - where the afternoon sun spills over the window sill to warm us - is things like "Would youse mind passing me the salt?", or "Would ya's please pass the pepper?", or "Is somebody using this chair?"
We don't mind passing the spices, but the chair business is annoying. Usually the chair has just been vacated by one of the TYBALTs, The Young Bucks At Lunch Together...mortal enemies of the ROMEOs, Retired Old Men Eating Out. As I said, the chair was recently vacated, and the man who had been sitting there was usually just taking a jaunt to the Mens' Room. So it seems a bit premature to ask whether the chair had become superfluous. Unless there was some sort of infarction in the washroom, the old fellow should be back very soon. That's what we don't like about it: the implication of infarctions.

Infarction. Funny word. Sounds like something to do with flatulence, only more nasty: heart fart.  Hank Jacobowski spent one afternoon making similes between the TV and flatulence, sort of how loud some of the cable shows were, and how some of them were right in your face, and some were inflammatory - a references to BIC lighters and seat of the pants operations back in middle school; in short, a perfect symmetry between cable TV news shows and intestinal gas.
That's how we met Tammi. She liked the symmetry. Every time some one switched on FOX now, she said "Who cut tha cheese?" We laughed. She was cute, what can I say? She said other things for other shows:
Glenn Beck was Silent but Deadly, Anderson Cooper was One Cheek Sneak, various financial reports were Baaroooom, Squeak, Blitttt, and a whole variety of onomatopoetic names.
We still laughed, even though now we caught each others' eyes and rolled them heavenwards. She was a cutie. We admitted it was a shame that the only thing she had to talk about with men of our age and wisdom was potty humor, but people have settled for worse in their lives.

Tammi sells real estate. Rather, she sold real estate. Nowadays you give it away, as she says. The 7% of nothing is nothing, she adds. Wise beyond her years, we think, and nod our heads.

So the other day, she says "Ya know what the problem with people is?"
We look up, and by our looks, invite her response. It's like our eyes did not say "No. And we don't care! Buzz off!" with inverted daggers for exclamation points, rather they formed limpid pools of reflecting waters and softly said "We could not think of anything more precious than hearing you answer your own question."
She said "Religion."
She looks around. We sit there somewhat blankly. I mean, this may not be the first time we've heard this observation; we may have heard it once or twice before in our lives. How could such an innocent little tyke sell real estate? I suppose that explains her attempts at seeming a "tough guy"...or "tough broad", as the case may be.  She chewed gum...aggressively at times. She often seemed as if she had just come in from a date with Nathan Detroit.
On her business cards, she spelled her name:  Tammi  " the Tamm-inator " Petrocelli.
We supposed that she had spent a good deal of time agonizing over the choice between that or "Petro-zilla".
Then she pipes up "Ya know what the problem with religion today is?"
Again, brand new stuff. We were silent with stupefaction.
She extended her pause. Then, "I know you think I'm just a ditz..."
We were old and wise, and the one thing the old and wise owe to the young is that they should always tell them the truth...always! I mean, if you didn't tell them the truth, you may as well turn the whole country into a gigantic Ponzi scheme.
Hanaan sensed blood, and she was smiling as she stood perched like a buzzard next to the apple pies, a large knife dripping raisin and apple filling.
"Nawwww...!" we said as one. Each one of us made his own articulation of sincerity and his belief that she was a sharp cookie, best thing since slice bread, and out of the mouths of babes. Giant Ponzi scheme. Bunch of schnorrers!
She smiled, not a business-Hi-how-ya-doin'? smile, not a Pleased-ta-meetcha smile, but one of those smiles when you sense that all the tension of concealment, hiding, and subterfuge has left a person's body, allowing the most brilliant nova of a smile to burst forth, and you think it is the most beautiful smile that ever illuminated the most holy sanctuary of history.
She said "Religion today thinks the world is science and hard fact, and God is a choice..."
We stared...we stared like people stare just before something explosive happens; we were in that breezeway leading from Blessed Hum-Drum Elementary to the church of Saint-Blow-Us-Away...we stared with an anticipation that began to make our armpits moisten.
She went on "Actually, God is the hard reality, and the world is a choice..."

Everything was sort of hazy after that. She got incoming on her cellular, Hanaan told us to order something or get lost. When I was standing outside on the street with Levine, I began to come out of my fugue state.
"Levine! What was that all about?"
He shrugged. "Would you believe such a shikse sells real estate?"
I stared at him in unbelief, for he had said it  שיקסע
And he just meant she wasn't Jewish...and I think he meant that all of a sudden, he realized she was smart and intuitive, and he would have liked to have been able to tell people he had been at her Bas Mitvah...and something like why should a girl named The Tammi-nator sound like a rebbe? Levine was a businessman - owned the fish market - and there was an underlying motif of discord between what the modern world was, and what Levine used to think it was...or should be.
I'd heard all of it reverberating in my head, like he was Isaac Bashevis Singer...singing a tune, no less,  in the morning shower, and like I was Isaac Singer's echo...even though I felt more like Mr. Singer in The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter.
Infarction, I thought. Clearly an infarction of the rules.