Regretful Twinges

KOSHER-SMOSHER

 

The word 'kosher is a Judaism meaning 'clean or fit to eat according to dietary laws.' It has taken on new meanings such as, 'all right, proper, correct.' The Orthodox are required to live and die under strict Yiddish rules. For the millions who tend to be like me, aware, but not caring, living easy, we do pretty much what we want. With no schooling on the subject, I made up my own childish rules, tried to abide by my mother's while my father paid no attention to either of us.

 

In looking back, way back, I recall my daddy thinking I was going to be the 20th century's Michelangelo. He would make me show my little drawings of the funny paper cartoons to his friends and patients. At the age of eight I had no say in anything and he just enrolled me in the Boston School of Art. My mother almost burst a blood vessel. 'Betsy can't go to art school on Saturday. You know that is Shabbus (sabbath)!' His angry face still burns in my soul. 'Sophia, go ask the Rabbi if Betsy can go to school on Sat.' 'Go ask him yourself,' she replied and he came right back at her, 'I told YOU to go, so go.' My mother went and the Rabbi said, 'If it is to improve herself, she can go.' So I had to go, take two street cars on the Sabbath, a no no: buy art supplies, a no no: carry the heavy drawing board and then spend the whole day drawing, making snakes out of clay; God was going to slay me before I was nine.

 

Once a year our house was in turmoil. Passover does not pass over our house. It stops. Everything stops except the hard work. Fortunately, Mama tells me to stay out of her way. She has to wrap all of our milkic dishes, pots and pans in old newspapers and carry them down to the cellar, then bring up the Passover ones that were down there since the year before. I have to undo the pots and pans but not the glass ware. For that I am glad I am still eight. All drawers, shelves in the kitchen must be spotless, no bread crumbs anywhere, not even in the toaster.

 

Mama walks around in a daze. Daddy follows her as she seeks out every corner, moves rugs and still worries she didn't do enough. Daddy tells her to go ask the Rabbi if she did everything required. Mama is back very quickly. The Rabbi asked for a donation to the shule. That will take away any sin my mother may have committed. She gave fifty cents.

 

With a clean record, Mama makes a sedar. Daddy hides two pieces of Matzoh so my little brother and I can each find a piece after dinner. The first one to find it gets ten pennies. The other gets five. I catch daddy pointing his finger under his sponge cake plate so my six year old brother, Harold, can find his matzoh before me. I go crying out of the room and Daddy brings me a sip of Mama's home-made kosher wine to feel better. It's terrible and I am so mad because I could have had the ten pennies if my daddy didn't cheat.

 

He was allowed by my mother, queen of the house, to bring non-kosher food into our house, under the condition it be kept in the dank cellar, warmed if necessary, on the black stove that had two gas burners. She let him keep a box of large safety matches on a shelf so he could eat warm crab cakes and canned chili. My father, a traveler, made sure a hard boiled egg, a glass of orange juice was always available for my mother as she would not eat non-kosher foods and lived mostly on that diet wherever they went. I, too, ate little even at a five and ten counter, only wanting an ice cream sandwich or fudge sundae. My mother cringed that we ate off the plates that were 'maybe' washed with soap made from pigs.

 

By age fifteen I began to be my own person, had to, just had to, go to my high school's Friday night championship football game. I knew I would not be allowed to ride on the sabbath for such nonsense  so lied to my mother. 'I'll be over Ruthie's house. We're planning a Halloween party.' My clothes were at Ruthie's before I was. We took the bus with my classmates to the game and never had so much excitement, fun in my life. That did it. I became a Reformed Jew. It took courage, to give up on almost everything but I did when I again got a whiff of the wonderful odor of crabs steaming  every time a customer went in or out of the Suburban Restaurant when I walked to the movies. In my little purse, I was taught to always carry emergency money, a dollar. I had it, walked into the Suburban, trying to act very adult and ordered one crab cake on crackers with ketchup–to go. It went down like sweet molasses, was  heaven on earth and I was hooked forever.

 

So I rode on the Sabbath, ate non-kosher food, enjoyed Friday night school sports, told lies that hurt no one most of the time, never went to religious services except for Bar Mitzvahs and weddings (one of them mine.)  I eat what I like but have never, not ever, tasted any part of a pig.

 

After all, I have to at least keep in touch with my up-bringing, remember my parents, the good and bad times and still remain a Jew at heart.  'T'ain't easy but I, like Popeye, 'Yam what I 'Yam.