How Pomegranate Reflects Our Permanence

David Brooks of the NY Times begins his article today about . . . Pomegranate, supermarket to the Semites. 

 

What continues is an homage to the lifestyle of us frummies, (as well as some percentages regarding our singles) with only one small flub, that women as well as men have an obligation to wed (which they don't). 

He concludes: 

All of us navigate certain tensions, between community and mobility, autonomy and moral order. Mainstream Americans have gravitated toward one set of solutions. The families stuffing their groceries into their Honda Odyssey minivans in the Pomegranate parking lot represent a challenging counterculture. Mostly, I notice how incredibly self-confident they are. Once dismissed as relics, they now feel that they are the future.  

That's right. We ain't going nowhere.   

Derech Eretz Police

One of my favorite books is James Clavell's Shōgun. While we in school are taught that the "civilized" Europeans "discovered" the world and enlightened it, this book presents a much different perspective. 

In 1600, a pilot by the name Blackthorne manages to get his ship to Japan. Now, the British in 1600 weren't a pretty bunch. They stank (since bathing causes disease), they were rude (blush to hear some of their conversations), and they had the table manners of a chimp. 

They reach Japan, a country of the pristine and polite. 

Who's the barbarian now? 

Blackthorne is encouraged to see that without manners, the world would go mad. If all of us just did exactly what we wanted to do, where would we all be?

It doesn't take long for Blackthorne to find serenity in the customs that were originally forced upon him, soon embracing them. Rather swiftly, he cannot bear to socialize with his former shipmates, finding them animalistic and primitive.

Richard Chamberlain as Blackthorne

That is how we view Judaism; by abiding to the rulebook, one is not restricting oneself, but rather freeing the mind and soul by keeping the body in check. 

Yet as we know, manners have gone the way of the dodo. What to do if one has an upright sense of etiquette, Henry Alford opines? 

Members of the New York-based frummie community can have the "Elizabethan sailor" problem, since due to our ghetto-like existence we are not exposed to certain basics; holding the door for someone behind you; eye contact with a "thank you"; the elusive "excuse me." We actually have centuries of being spat on by our gentile neighbors ingrained in our neural pathways, so politely interacting with the now relatively courteous world at large is a new thing for us. 

Alford concludes that it is all about how one points out bad behavior; after all, we don't want to be un-mannerly when teaching manners. 

So tone is everything to the person who finds himself on the business end of a manners cop’s pedagogy. What those of us with a propensity for schooling others need to remember is that we should never speak out of anger or impulse. Gentle, it’s important to remember, can also be a verb. 

But we are also New Yorkers. We are not used being criticized by complete strangers. 

A yeshivish fellow was having a loud conversation on his cell phone on the train. One really couldn't blame him; he obviously wasn't used to modulating his voice, as probably all his previous conversations took place in his car. Ta went over and told him he was disturbing everyone. The poor guy quickly snapped off his phone, and nervously apologized to my father repeatedly, once again thirty minutes later when the train reached the stop. 

That is a rarity. I applaud the chap for accepting the remonstration, eager to atone. 

But I have a sneaking suspicion he wasn't from New York.          

Label-less

I emailed my profile as per her request, but she needed clarification. 

"But what is your hashkafa?" 

Frankly, I have no idea. 

I have always been flummoxed by the concept of "labels." Consider the first time Jews were given subcategories; for that, we can thank the Reform movement. To differentiate themselves from the frummies, they tagged us "Orthodox." 

For that reason I refuse to refer to myself as "orthodox"; I say "observant" instead.

As for my outlook? I am not Yeshivish. I am not modern. (Whatever dating websites may imply, that does not make me "yeshivish modern.") I simply wander through life known strictly as "Jew."

I typed back truthfully; I know what my background is (hi-mish), but other than that I am clueless. 

She found that "refreshing." Phew.

Then she tried to set me up with Bren Derlin. Oy.

Girls: Girly, and Otherwise

In college, my schedule was of paramount importance; I would take classes I wasn't ecstatic about to ensure the beauty of a perfectly synchronized day. 

Required to take a psychology class, the only one that fit was—gulp—Women's Psychology. Ugh. 

My professor ended up being a young gal, rather than a zealous relic of the Women's Movement, who, thankfully, did not harp on female degradation at the hands of male overlords.  

The term "gender" is regarding the "masculine and feminine attributes assigned to males and females" (courtesy of Wikipedia), as opposed to their scientific status of male and female; in one class, she mentioned how placing young boys and girls together in schools reinforces gender stereotypes. 

I raised my hand, and as soon as I said, "I went to all-girls schools" approximately thirty heads snapped about to gawp at me. Turning fuchsia, I described how my high-school classmates were rather unaware of gender-specific behavior. Some played basketball every recess, or climbed trees, while some remained more typically feminine. But that was their choice, rather than bowing to expectations; if anything, the tomboys were the popular ones. 

Girls in general are often discouraged from pursuing higher education in sciences and math, whereas my BY classmates went into speech therapy or nursing; I was then able to inform my rather impressed professor that most of these girls (from a supposedly male-dominated society) had no barriers in their path.

A few years back the NY Times magazine had an article exploring the merits of educating boys and girls separately. Boys and girls learn differently, and by separating them they could be taught better. 

In the way their attention is gained, how they interact, how they respond to stress, boys and girls differ. One woman's son did a complete turn-around after being enrolled in a boys' school.  

For us frummies who were segregated at school, don't we notice the differences in teachers' tactics with boys' rebbes as compared to girls' morahs? Additionally, in an all-girl high school, topics can be discussed with less inhibition, without male snickers. 

These schools are trying to raise the standard for the inner-city children who have cultural standards in male-female relationships. In co-ed schools, one teacher describes, the concept of a civilized date without "expectations" from the girl is laughable. By separating the sexes it becomes a "date" rather than a "hookup." 

Ha! Separation of the sexes actually results in chivalry! Why do you think our guys don't proposition girls on our dates? Nothing like a little fear of the unknown to bring out respect.   

Those who objected to this article on gender segregation in education had predictably PC responses: It does not advocate tolerance, it is sexist, there are no differences between boys and girls. 

A letter to the editor was sent in regarding the article, and the author described her observations of a Lubavitch girls' school: 

I was fascinated by Elizabeth Weil’s article because I have studied an all-girls’ school in some depth. During graduate school, I lived among the Lubavitcher Hasidim, in Crown Heights, Brooklyn; I’ve recorded my findings in a book. I spent many days observing, in the girls’ high school and post-high-school seminary. Despite my reservations about same-sex schools, I was deeply impressed. In this ultra-Orthodox community known for its stark gender roles, the girls’ ability to adopt stereotypically male personas struck me. Many girls became noisy instigators, impish troublemakers, charismatic schoolwide leaders — niches that disproportionately may fall to boys in coed schools. The boys were not around to usurp these roles, so the girls snatched them up.

I don’t believe that single-sex schools are best for all students. Coed schools have their own benefits. But I am delighted that an option once reserved for private and parochial schools is open to growing numbers of public-school students.

STEPHANIE WELLEN LEVINE

Cambridge, Mass.

This woman was surprised to find, amongst observant Jews, who are, according to the world at large, sexist, freedom of gender roles. Due to separation in education, girls' personalities are allowed to develop without concern of societal expectations. 

There are some children, like my nieces, who entered the world riveted by the color pink, their brothers drawn to anything with wheels. Sometimes, it just is that boys will be boys and girls will be girls. 

But when my nephew chose to push a dolly stroller about the house while singing "Macho Man" at the age of two, not even his "macho" father freaked out. Gender stereotyping in the toy industry is in healthy force, but it ends up that we observant Jews, who are accused of belittling our women (it does get pretty old after a while), actually raise our children with less gender stereotyping just by putting boys and girls into segregated schools. 

To conclude: Ha ha.    

I Dream of Djinni

I usually make a point to differentiate between "young adult" fiction and "adult" genres, but I suppose Harry Potter smashed all those barriers. 

At a library book sale I picked up The Amulet of Samarkand: Book 1 of the Bartimaeus Trilogy by Jonathon Stroud. It was fifty cents, so it joined the rest of the books on my already teetering stack. 

 

I find the writing style very much like J.K.'s—meaning that it could be read by the young and older—except that it is much funnier. The book changes narrators every few chapters; Bartimaeus' viewpoint is hysterical. As an immortal, crabby, and shape-shifting djinni (genie), one finds oneself rooting for him rather than any of the human characters. 

I've read the whole trilogy (The Golem's Eye, Ptolemy's Gate) as well as a prequel (The Ring of Solomon, which is a tad blasphemous to whatever vision previously had of Shlomo HaMelech)

I hear they're making the series into films. They better not mess it up by adding emotional Disney-esque goop. Bartimaeus wouldn't like that.

I'll Give You Something to Ban

I say this with love. 

It comes, truly, from a good place. 

Please, do not judge me too harshly. 

I cannot stand vorts. 

It takes approximately an hour to prep. Driving time can be up to 120 minutes. You walk in. You shriek "Mazel tov!" 

Now what? 

In as little as three months there will be a wedding, with all the accompanying pomp and circumstance. Is it really necessary to have a smaller party before that, where I carefully apply makeup and make the effort to travel and cut a chunk out of my day just to say, "Hey. So, you're having a wedding soon, right?"

I consider vorts to be a supreme waste of time and money. There's nothing necessary about it. There's nothing to do other than standing around looking awkward, because of course the one other person you know has yet to arrive. Sometimes one gets fed, but that's not a given.  

At a recent vort, an acquaintance sidled up. "God, I hate these things," she groaned. I am not alone. 

Just think where that vort money can go instead!

A bigger diamond. 

A better band. 

A beautiful-er gown. 

Who am I kidding? I mean only the bling. 

God of Parking Spaces

It is considered to be a common quandary for the religious: If there is a God, how can it be that bad things happen? 

It was not until I read this article by Stephen Marche that I realized that atheists have the opposite conundrum: If there is no God, how can it be that good things happen? 

. . . I was showing off my attic study to friends visiting from New York — a feeble attempt to demonstrate the advantages of living in Toronto by means of square footage — and their 3-year-old daughter, Emmy, wandered away while we were chatting. I looked over, then rushed over, both too late. All I managed to catch was the sight of her falling, a kaleidoscopic chaotic tumble. She flipped over three times. Her head hit the stairs, then her feet, then her head again, leaving a crumpled ball at the bottom. I knew instantly she must have been seriously hurt.

My imagination whirled with body casts and neck braces. Emmy’s father, rushing to her side, calmed her while surreptitiously and meticulously checking her body, piece by piece. She could move her neck, her legs. She could put her arms over her head. Relief poured over me like a pitcher of ice water. At least nothing major was broken. Then her dad began to look her over more closely. Not only was she uninjured, but she wasn’t hurt at all. Not a bump on her head. Not a bruise on her leg. Not a scratch. She didn’t need so much as a Band-Aid.

It’s not too much to say that Emmy’s wholeness shocked me. I could barely stand to look at her afterward. Every time I thought about what might have happened to my friends’ child, a fierce constriction grabbed my chest and a sickening feeling roiled in my belly. Over the rest of their visit, I kept randomly repeating, “That was a miracle.” It was the only phrase I could come up with. I didn’t know how to deal with inexplicable good fortune. Even after my friends returned to New York, the strange constriction in my chest persisted.

Judaism does not rely on miracles as proof of God's existence. We are taught Hashem appeared to our forefather Abraham, and to his son and grandson, as the aspect of God seen in nature (Shakai). When good things happened to them, they could be considered miraculous, yet were cloaked enough that they could be explained via natural laws.

The miracles of the Exodus of Egypt were meant to be a one-time deal; Moshe's life was to be that of miracles, and that is one of the reasons why he could not lead us into the Land of Israel, in that the Jewish people had to reaccustom themselves to natural law after living forty years in the super-natural. It's easy to be religious when lunch falls from the sky; let's be religious when dinner is harder to get on the table. 

We are encouraged to see the miraculous in a Brooklyn parking spot, in a reduced-price skirt, in ideal weather for an outdoor chuppah. We are always taught Hashem is in the mundane. But I find it odd that that the same person who will gush that it was a miracle that they were on time when they were stuck in horrible traffic can say in the next sentence that their niece is drowning in a "shidduch crisis." 

Have we kept God for the most minute of our lives? For the petty tasks of a found shopping cart, yet we cast Him aside when it comes to the big things? 

It says in the text that Hashem spends His time (not time as we know it, since God is outside of time, but whatever that means) making shidduchim. It's not just a cute line for a Hallmark card. If we don't see the divine in the major occurrences in our life, then we are just viewing Him as a good luck charm. 

The same Hashem that guides my hand to the most beautiful yet surprisingly on-clearance pair of shoes is there when a date happens, whether it falls flat or ends well. He is certainly there for every other hardship as well, the horrors that my grandparents managed to survive. 

My bashert will be, well, bashert. But why can I not view my single state as bashert as well? It is not only bashert when everything works out; it is also bashert when everything goes to pieces. It is the same bashert if I circle blocks endlessly yet unable to park, if I emerge from a store empty handed, if skies open on a wedding day, forcing an indoor chuppah.   

Bábi has been having restless nights, when she talks wildly, forgetting where she is. Her aide, a lovely Hungarian woman who truly cares for her, said soothingly, "It's all right, I'm here with you." Bábi replied, "All I need is the Jóisten." (Jóisten means "good God." Emphasis on the "good.") 

What Snooki and Shadchanim Have in Common

Shadchanim are our version of reality television. 

Consider: There are no credentials to become a "shadchan"; one doesn't even have to have a marriage at one's urging to qualify one of that status. One just needs a loose-leaf with arbitrary names, and poof! One is a shadchan! 

One day a woman (or every once in a while, a man) decides she wants to get into this business. Her motivations may differ; they could be financial, or be as pure as driven snow, or something much less noble. She cheerfully heads out front with a hammer and nails, and erects a homemade sign announcing the shadchan is in the house. 

Almost immediately she is besieged by phone calls. She is sought after. She is admired. She is pursued by eager supplicants. Her name is whispered reverently and respectfully.

She is awash in her fifteen minutes of fame.

I don't haunt shadchanim, since I rarely have had a date from them. But I do end up going to one from time to time, since they call me. "Hi, Mrs. ___________ mentioned your name, I would like to meet you." 

I can almost predict what happens. You sit, they ask about you to the minutest detail, then they pretty much admit they don't know anyone for you, did you ever try this shadchan in LA? Why don't you fly out to meet her? 

Lady, what are you smoking? 

It gets worse. 

One who is known to the family decided to inform a "shadchan" of my existence, and told me to email the woman. I thought it was the same way as all my previous "dates" with shadchanim; they asked to meet me. However, next thing I know the middle-person is screeching how could I have dared to insinuate in my email to this all-powerful deity that she would "want" to meet me; you want to meet her! You are supposed to act, she bellowed, and I quote, "confident and eager." 

If I am ever going to be "confident and eager," there better be an eligible bachelor across the table. 

Is this what people think the shidduch system is? That I need a shadchan for a shadchan?

I am very thankful that I have many friends, family, and acquaintances who constantly try to set me up, and they have engineered many a date on my behalf, all without shredding my ego. Some even called themselves "shadchanim," but they actually had some qualifications; along with treating another human being with dignity, and not wasting my time. That is what is known as "the shidduch system."

But in all sadness and hysteria, wouldn't it make an awesome reality series? "The Shadchans of Kings County," or "Matchmaking Mavens," or "New York Yentas"? 

Anymore suggestions? 

It would show the initial interview with the so-called shadchan, and the resulting bad dates (a few good ones would be included from time to time). 

"My name is Chaya, I am 25, I live in Brooklyn, and I'm seeking . . . the man of my dreams." 

"My name is Aharon, I am 25, I live in Queens, and . . . I am on the search for my life partner." 

"My name is Mrs. Schwartz, and I am a shadchan. I set up Chaya and Aharon, and tonight we will see if my intuition was correct." 

Cut to restaurant. Splices of awkward conversation. Then, the aftermath. 

"Um, he's a really nice guy, but I am not sure yet if he is for me . . ." 

"She's a great gal, but I would like one more date to see if this has any potential."  

It would get rockin' ratings!