Category Archives: Personal Moments in an Anonymous City

Synagogue Retreat at the Norman Bates Motel

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Ok, this is a long, random recounting, so bear with me.

My sister thinks that her trip on a Greyhound bus to a casino — where, no joke, a medical conference and training were being held — brought her very close to the common denominator of humanity. She emailed me that when she got to the bus gate at Port Authority, the woman in front of her on line just started talking to her.  The woman was traveling back from Florida to Providence. She had to go to Florida to get her mother’s ashes, which were in the shopping bag that she showed to my sister in case she wanted to see. (I wish my sister knew how to use the camera feature on her cell phone. A picture would have really made the moment.)  The woman had spent 3 days on a bus and needed to smoke a cigarette, had trouble in her childhood but has now straightened out, etc.

Dear SOB (sister of blogger), welcome to my world.  It is good that you experience your birthright — i.e., Mom’s magnetism for the strange, creepy and absurd.

Well, I am at a synagogue retreat. It was a rustic experience. Lots of rules — you need to observe the Sabbath and subscribe to the Jewish dietary restrictions — not on the quantity but on the depth to which the culinary arts must sink in order to conform to Kosher laws. Alcohol is Kosher, for which many people gave thanks to G-d. Also, no coffee Saturday morning because it is the Sabbath and one cannot use electricity or fire. Really? Really? Does anyone want really want to deal with me de-caffeinated? Also tonight someone by accident started making coffee before the end of the Sabbath.  Before we could descend on the heavenly libation, the moshkiach (the Kosher police) told the kitchen workers that they had to dump out the coffee. Wastefulness CAN’T be kosher.

There are many blessings that are new to me. The place has helpful plaques to assist in mastering them. I took a picture of the blessing after one eliminates in the bathroom, thanking G-d for the creation of certain cavities in the body. Really? My orthodox grandmother said this prayer? Even when she had indigestion? This must be an invention of those “too cool for shul” types. I am not kidding. Look at the picture.

Ever trying to make lemonade out of lemons, I have decided that we would learn this prayer and recite it every time our father discusses his irregularity.  Maybe we could teach it to him.  Clearly, I am going on the slow boat the Hell.

The place was kind of like that.  As you enter, there is a sign saying, “We are blessed by your presence”.  Ok, someone should be holding judgment until we leave.  There should even be a sign flashed for a specific few (like me), “We are blessed by your leaving.”

“Blessed by your presence”?  Trying to create holy, kumbaya, religious space and energy at crash-landing impact, after braving hellish Friday night traffic.  I thought to sing, “someone’s kumbaya-ing my Lord,” but I didn’t want to say kumbaya to that.  This is getting to crazy, with the aggressive, reverse Kumbaya on the Sabbath.  Slow boat.  Nah, I am taking the express train to Hell.

As you may have surmised, we couldn’t do much documentation on the Sabbath because that required use of electricity or batteries, so I had to take pictures in secret and I couldn’t blog.  Now that was harsh.  As my own little rage against the machine, I turned on my iPod just BEFORE I left the premises to go on my run.  Ah, the little subversities. But, as usual I digress.

Friday night, after blessing the group with our presence (or so the sign said), we proceeded to our promised charming two bedroom cabin.  The advertising was so wrong it should be a felony.  So one civil crime justifies a religious crime — desecration of the Sabbath — to take these pictures:

Is this a charming two-bedroom cabin? Type that into wikipedia and I bet that you won’t see a picture of this.  Really??  This is a three-bed cabin.  Ooops, there must have been a mistake.  No?  No mistake, this is the very finest that the camp has to offer?  In the county in Connecticut with the highest per capita income?  Really?  Really?  I am in a mood most foul and approach the rabbis about the relative merits of, say, a Ritz Carlton.  Not so my friends can get business, but it is a base level that to which we should become accustomed.

But at least the turn-down service left conflict-free chocolate on the beds:

But the real kicker is that in the light of day on Saturday, I realized that I had parked my rented super-huge, gas-guzzling monstrosity here:

Ok, I am a convert:  There, but for the Grace of G-d, go I.

~ the Blogger

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A Typical Family Dinner

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As we do almost every Sunday, the extended family — dispersed far and wide on the Island of Manhattan — gather for dinner prepared by POB (partner of blogger).  Three generations of the family are represented and range in age from 7 to 89 years-old.

My 26 year-old cousin who is a runner was talking about her gastro-intestinal problems, which she believes somehow is a sign from her father, z”l, who was a gastroenterologist (sp?).  Ok, as much as our family is fixated on our intestinal fortitude, I am skeptical that her father, my dear cousin, would cause these kind of issues from Heaven so that she could remember him.  I suggested it might be a parasite from living for 5 years in China.  Food for thought, so to speak.

All my father had to hear was that someone was having issues with diarrhea and he started a sidebar with my sister the doctor about his own issues.  Here is where there needs to be a firewall between parents and children.  Ok, even if there were such a firewall, we would have drilled a tunnel under that it a looooong time ago.  How did I know the topic of this sidebar, you ask?  The look on my sister’s face told me everything I needed to know.  Since my sister doesn’t drink, I needed to give my father more wine to stop the conversation.

All this is going on while I watch my 23 year-old cousin fade in and out.  He came over early to toss a football with my son, and just as we were getting into the really gross intestinal details (over hors d’oeuvres, mind you), he was finally feeling the hangover from the night before — as in, it took him more than 14 hours after his last drink to process all of the alcohol in his system.  I am not naming names, but he is a former hockey player and maybe some of my family will recognize the descriptions so far and call him out on that.  But I am not saying anything.  Nope.  Lips are sealed.

Then a cousin of my generation put together a beautiful, stirring composition, “At My Daughter’s Wedding,” for my sister and brother in law in a CD with the cover featuring a photo at their wedding with my mother’s picture in the foreground and my sister and brother in law in the background.  My sister and I fought hard to hold the tears back.  We talked today and we were both choked up that my cousin captured the joy of the event and the sadness that our mother was not alive for the wedding, all in the beauty of his music. It was an extraordinary moment.  We also played a song he wrote about our family history so the young ones could be further indoctrinated into the cult of our family.  I really cannot say enough about my cousin’s music — it hit a chord in my sister and me that is too deep for words and I hope he understands the depth of his gift from the looks in our eyes.

Of course, this same cousin gave me cassette tapes about dealing with loss when my mother died and I had forgotten about them for over seven year until POB reminded me about a week ago.  Then, my head and heart exploded when I realized I had the tapes when his mother died.  Oy.  Oy.  Just when he needed them.  Oy. Oy.  I returned them to him last night.  A little late.  Oy. Oy.

Then, of course, my cousin and brother in law had to have an eating contest, just like two brothers, which warmed our hearts.  POB made a traditional roasted chicken and vegetables using a Kosher chicken for our young cousin and an Indian chicken dish with basmati rice and some other vegetables for those of us more culinarily assimilated.  Of course, the “boys” kept asking our kosher cousin if she had had enough so they could consume the rest.  In other words, eat fast or don’t eat at all.  It’s a tough world out there and our house is sometimes a little like boot camp.

Of course, one never knows what will happen next at a family function.  My sister and brother in law brought over their wills to be witnessed.  My sister wanted to do this quietly, so of course I had to announce what we needed to do to all assembled.  So after dessert, we assembled the necessary witnesses and signed as appropriate.  The lawyers at the table asked if they were each of sound mind and then we decided that no one in our family could really pass that test.  We respectfully withdrew the questions and proceeded with the signing ceremony.

From the mundane (diahrrea) to the emotional (music for my mother z”l) to the eternal (the wills).  No wonder these dinners are exhausting.  And wonderful.

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One thing leads to another

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I started the weekend early by slipping out to go to the ear doctor.  Most people wouldn’t call that the start of a weekend.  But my ears have been clogged and itchy on and off for some time and more and more people have told me that they’ve been to the ear doctor and the problem was wax.  Deriving from a deep-seating egotism or martyrdom — I am not sure — I assumed that the ear doctor would look into my ears, faint at the sight of the wax and then, once regaining consciousness, would suit up (a HazMat, of course) and begin excavation.

He looked into my ears, my ears and my throat.  He said, “No wax.  Your ears are clean.”  He looked at my expression and asked, “You were hoping for serious wax, weren’t you?”  I nodded.  He felt bad.  He said, “I am really sorry, but your ears naturally dispose of excess wax, just the way they are supposed to.  And it just may be allergies causing the itching and clogged feelings.”  I was so dejected.  He started to feel really bad.  He continued, “Look, I kept you waiting for 30 minutes and there was no wax, so I am waiving the co-pay for the visit.”  I protested, after all, it wasn’t his fault about the wax and he apologized for being late the moment he walked in the room, so my anger at that was assuaged.  “No,” he insisted, “give it to charity.”

I walked onto the street and tried to hail a cab during that ridiculous time of day when ALL cabs are “off-duty” — why every cab company must have the shift changing times is beyond me.  I inadvertently cut in front of a guy and ran to an off-duty cab because sometimes the driver will take you if the destination is on his way to the designated shift-changing location.  I felt bad — I don’t usually cut a line and this was right after the doctor waived a co-pay.  The guy looked odd but harmless enough.  So, I offered him a lift to his destination — Port Authority. This is a very non-New York thing to do.  A cab is one’s (rented) private domain from the beginning to the end of the ride.  Don’t get between a New Yorker and his or her cab.  It would get ugly fast.

It turns out the stranger in my cab was a doctor and a sheep farmer near Binghampton, NY and was in the city for a medical conference.  He hates the city and the thought of living on a farm gives me hives.  So, total opposites and that does not bode well for the 20 minutes remaining in our time together.  That is an eternity in a small space with a stranger who somehow feels beholden to make conversation.  And he was clearly not a natural conversationalist.  For example, he mentioned that not only does he get wool, milk but he also gets hides.  Picture a dead Bambi starring in the movie, “The Silence of the Lambs.”  He had noooooo sense of humor and seemed somewhat sad.  When we got to Port Authority, I declined his offer of payment and told him that my doctor waived the co-pay, and telling me to give it to charity and so I am doing the same here.

As the cab driver and I continued on to my destination, I said congenially, “Was I crazy to give a stranger a lift?”  The cab driver looked at me in his rear-view mirror and said, “You seem like a very nice spirit and a professional, educated person.”  I knew that that was a compliment and a way to say he thought I wasn’t crazy doing a good turn for a stranger, but it is fascinating how different cultures and the “immigrant experience” shape our language.  He then asked rhetorically, “You are Jew?”   Turns out Moustafa is a Muslim from Egypt and a civil engineer.  (A weird factoid: he is the third cab driver — all were Egyptian — to ask if I were a Jew.)  We had a wonderful chat about life, happiness and universality of humanity.

It is crazy how a doctor’s waiving a co-pay led ultimately to a conversation with Moustafa.  A conversation that lifted my spirits and reminded me of our common humanity.

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Dear Brother-in-Law,

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Yes, we were impressed with your preparation of all those vegetables for SOB (sister of blogger) [see yesterday’s blog].  I know she was working in the hospital this weekend and you, the dutiful husband, prepared dinner for her again tonight instead of your both coming over for Sunday night family dinner.  (Remind SOB that she scored so big when she met you.)

Because we want you to feel included, I am sending a picture of the food you could’ve had if you had come to dinner tonight.  This is not a competition.  No sirree.  It is just that we missed you and we wanted you to know what you left on the table, so to speak.  I made sure that we didn’t clear away the main course before dessert so you could see the full array:  wild salmon, rice, and roasted asparagus.  Followed by a delicious fruit selection of strawberries, melon and grapes.  There was even ice cream if asked.  Ok, this is a competition.  And POB (partner of blogger) outdid herself.

So, maybe next time.  We did miss having everyone together but FOB (father of blogger) and COB (cousin of blogger) rounded out our dinner table.  (And ate your portions.)

Mwa, mwa (big kisses) to you and SOB,

~Blogger-in-law

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Our family

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Today, my son went on a bird walk led by my brother-in-law.  My son, who has encyclopedic knowledge of all things bird-nerdia, was — how shall we say — an active, vocal participant in the walk.  The non-family “walkers” (Cousins Boss and Gentle were also in attendance) were apparently quite taken with his knowledge and enthusiasm.  One octogenarian asked, after hearing that my son is almost 8 years-old, “how long have you been interested in birds?”  My son responded, “since I met this guy” and pointed to his uncle and my brother-in-law.  About 3.5 years.  “This guy“? The man that takes care of my beloved sister?  Later, I had to make sure that my son showed proper respect for his uncle.  “In the future, Buddy, “this guy” is Uncle Bird-Nerd to you! ” So, we have nuanced levels of respect in our family.  But respect is respect, however, absurdly we define it.

Of course, my son and Cousin Boss (the family name for POB (partner of blogger)) were the ones who got out of the house at 8:30am on a Saturday.  I was a slug and arrived just in time to kiss and congratulate my brother-in-law at the end of the 2.5 hour walk.  SOB (sister of blogger) was impressed even at my effort.  It was, in fact, the least I could do.  We have such low expectations of each other.  Maybe that we like to get together so much because it is nearly impossible for us not to exceed the expectations.  And when that does happen, well it is fodder for family gatherings for years.  So, while we are easy-going, we forget no detail that we can hash and rehash to our delusional delight.

So, how well does my brother-in-law take care of SOB?  He vowed to take good care of her (including making her eat vegetables).  So, here is a picture SOB sent of part of tonight’s dinner:

Clearly, the intense interest in the mundane details of human existence is genetic.  Mutant thought it may be.

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Notes from Aboveground

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I am on the Acela from Boston to NY. I came to Boston for a business lunch and am now going home. It is what you do to build business.

You might think that the “Quiet Car” sign is self-explanatory. It is not. I think we’ve diluted the meaning of our words so much that no one believes signs without adjectives. “Free gift”: when was a gift something other than free? Or does “free gift” reflect the cynicism in our society that nothing is without strings? But then why do people fall for too-good-to-be-true scams? But I digress (of course).

Back to the Quiet Car. So maybe we need signs like: “Quiet-like-a-church-mouse Car” or “No kidding: no cell phones or whispering-at-the-top-of-your-lungs Quiet Car”?

Why is ok to expect a call and then leave the Quiet Car as you are yelling, “hello? hello? hello?”

I might have to take a real chill pill to deal. Another reason why it is dangerous to unleash me on the populace.

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A New York moment

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Ok, no one is going to believe this. But I think it is clear already that I attract the bizarre and inane like mosquitoes to carcasses. But POB (partner of blogger) is my witness. (And she agrees that I have a certain magnetism that I might want to have reversed.)

A woman is walking ahead of us on our street on this beautiful spring day. She is shouting into the phone. I look over because my attention is drawn to the noise. At that moment I notice:

that toilet paper is making a paper tail from her pants.

She feels something flying around at just about the same time and looks around as she is grabbing the toilet paper.

Our eyes meet for what seems an eternity. I think of Gilda Radnor doing a 1970s Roseanna Roseannadanna (Saturday Night Live) skit about Princess Lee Radzwill (Jackie O’s sister) with toilet stuck to her shoe. Except in this case, IT WASN’T STUCK TO HER SHOE!!

I am also shell-shocked.

She keeps yelling into the phone as she grabs at the toilet paper and her slightly horrified look dissipates.

Another New York moment.

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Life – one week later

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Yes, to answer one comment from an everyday reader, there were sufficiently crazy things that happened in this last week, but, in my pledge not to alienate family and friends who read this blog, I must hold back.  Think of a big

CENSORED

where blogs about this last week ought to have been.   Maybe I will write about going to the acupuncturist.  Mañana.

So, we start again with today:

When we were kids, our dad used to take us on more-or-less yearly pilgrimages to Paragon Sports on 18th Street and Broadway to get outfitted for the Spring and warm weather sports (we also did an ancillary run in late June, just before camp, but it was epic in a different way). We all grew over the winter (why do kids grow over winter?) so the prior year’s gear didn’t fit anymore.

For me, this was our family’s official opening day of Spring.  Passover was religious but this was visceral. The promise of warmer, longer days leading into endless summer.  I still hold on to the fantasy even though I am 45 years-old and haven’t had a summer of play in 28 years. I bet my siblings don’t remember this, but I do. My father, in his hat that looked vaguely Russian, with a dress coat and wing-tipped shoes, in a sports mecca.  In fact, I would bet money that my brother doesn’t remember these excursions because he can only remember that Dad dressed him in a Mets outfit at a Mets game (in 1969 when they were the champs).  But you have to remember that my dad wore wing-tipped shoes on the weekends until the mid-80s, so the man did the best he could.

In truth, since my siblings were 3 and 4 years older than me, these outings probably lasted until I was in 8th grade, after which it was impossibly embarrassing to shop with my dad. Maybe in my mind’s eye, these trips loom larger than they really did, although I associate Paragon with Dad.  Also, in the 1970s, to schlep from the upper east side to 18th Street and Broadway with kids in tow was not for the faint-of-heart because Union Square was a needle park and there were many unsavory characters all around.  And in these 28 years, that area transformed, so it is not like going parent-and-child into a combat zone.

Maybe today it felt like a Family Event because my son and I made the trek to Paragon, this time from the Upper West Side.  My son wanted to stay home because it was raining cats-and-dogs (which is one of the stupidest expressions ever) and the wind was howling.  No way we are staying in.  We are going on a pilgrimage, young man.  You have outgrown all of the sports gear you have.  And, now that you are interested in football, hockey, baseball and basketball, we are going to get you the right stuff.  Yes, sir.  You may have two moms, AND you are going to have the right sports gear.   Even if you NEVER use it.

My son is more of an intellectual sports fan.  He likes facts and information and he likes to watch others play.  So, this trip was a little, eensy, bit more about me than him.   Never mind, one of the joys of parenting is that you can thrust your desires upon them and then pay for the years of resulting, required therapy.

We get to Paragon, which has gotten bigger over the years, but it essentially the same store (ok, I have been back over the years, but it is amazing how much the same it is).  A young man, Vladimir, helped us get the right size baseball mitt (I got one, too), basketball, soccer ball and football.  Also a solid, well-made baseball and an air pump.  I inquired about oil for the glove and how long he needs to sleep with the ball in the glove under his pillow to mold the mitt.  My son was browsing the sports jerseys for his favorite teams.  Ok, this really was all about me.

I did not get him hockey gear because there is no way he is playing that insane sport.  Oh, and, football, you ask?  Only two-hand touch, thank-you-very-much.  I did not bring him into this world to watch him go out on a stretcher.

I wanted to play with everything once we got home (even if doing so violated the house rules I set).  He wanted to play Star Wars: The Clone Wars on the computer.   Ah the picture becomes even clearer, you think.

At one point, I worried that I bought all of this gear and didn’t get my son a “cup”.  Then I realized that I am the only one who will be playing with this equipment and I need different protective gear, including some for my ego, my heart and my hopes of playing ball with my son.

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Look away

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I have been pretty good about a new gym regimen since I started my new job.  (My 2010 horoscope said that I should keep up an exercise schedule, and that is as good a reason as any.)

Since the global economic melt-down, I have taken to drinking wine.  One glass goes straight to my inner thighs.  No joke.  I feel it the next day.  So, I need to work out just to maintain the usual mid-40s spread.

Since going to the gym, I have been feeling much better about myself and my degeneration into older age (in our family we call it “decrepitude” because we are — er — so gentle).  And I have noticed that, in the afternoons on the weekends, men have been looking twice at me at the gym (and not because I have stains on my t-shirts or my outfits are disastrous).  Most people would feel good about that.  But I have to tell you who is looking.

Imagine we are in the early 1980s when the Olivia Newton-John exercise outfits were popular.  Imagine your relatives who were moving down to Florida around that time.  Remember how they couldn’t pronounce “condominium” and kept saying “condominian” (which now sounds like a group of ten prophylactic devices)?  Remember the men who wore short-shorts with dark shoes and dark socks, dyed their hair and uber-cool sunglasses?  You know, the ones who drove Cadillac El Dorados.

Imagine now it is 2010, and these men have aged 30 years and wear white free spirits and white socks and they dye their hair an odd shade of red.  Apparently, mid-afternoon on the weekends, the older set comes to the gym.  The upside is that they wipe down the machines and don’t do many reps.  The bad news is that the men think I am old enough to be interested in them.

I wear bi-focals, but generally my eye sight is good.  I am graying, but I have few wrinkles.  I have a little extra thickness around the middle but I still have muscle tone in my arms and my breasts still hang comfortable above my waist.  Also, I am a lesbian for Goodness sake.  Ok, they don’t know that last fact.

I just wish I weren’t so attractive to the 85+ crowd.  Maybe once, just once, a young, beautiful woman would give me a second glance that doesn’t telegraph, “oh, you really should have taken better care of yourself when you were young. . . .”  Oh, well, that isn’t what I need.  I need the old men to look at me and think, “she is way too young for me.”

So, my cousin just called and I told him about this blog entry.  He lamented that only really older women check him out on the street.  We were laughing/crying to each other and he mentioned that this could be a schtick for http://oldjewstellingjokes.com/.  I checked out this site and there are videos of old Jews telling jokes.

The internet is worthwhile if only for bringing us this website and keeping the tradition available for the younger generations.  Also, if there could be a registry for “I’m too young for octagenarians”, that would be awesome.

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We live in a crowded city

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I went to the gym again tonight as part of my new mind-body balance regimen.  Who am I kidding?  Myself, of course.  But let me dream for another day and then crash-land into Hershey milk chocolate nuggets, take-out food and acne.  For two days, I have breathed calmly and deeply, in with nourishing oxygen, out with bad energy.  It started out great, until I realized I was breathing car exhaust and then started hyperventilating, but I digress.

In my karmatically balanced state, I walked into the locker room, certain I would rise above the bloggable moment.  Then I rationalized even a vegan sneaks a bacon rasher every now again.  I had to entertain this juicy rationalization because I have to report the bloggable moment.  I walked over to the toilet stalls to the left of the sinks.  At the sinks were two women — strangers it appears — one, brushing her teeth (bravo on the oral hygiene), the other shaving her underarms (obviously ANYthing can be done in public nowadays).

Let’s reflect on that.  Oh, and someone was eating a power bar of some sort not 5 feet away.  I guess I should have mentioned that you shouldn’t read this while eating.  My bad.  All that carbon monoxide I was deep-breathing to cleanse my body.  Hmmmm.

I happen to know where the chocolate nuggets are stashed. . . .

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