JEWS DRIVING HOME FROM CHURCH – 1973
When I was twelve, my brother and I were the only Christian Scientists in the Paramus school system. Uniqueness is not something one strives for at twelve. About a third of the kids in school were Irish Catholic and rowdy – the kind of kids who played stickball on blacktop and drew on their hands with ink. Another third of the kids were Italian Catholic and lived in a world of vinyl runners over the carpets in their houses and vinyl covers over the car seats of the big Impalas, which their mothers drove while smoking lipstick ringed cigarettes.
When I was twelve, my brother and I were the only Christian Scientists in the Paramus school system. Uniqueness is not something one strives for at twelve. About a third of the kids in school were Irish Catholic and rowdy – the kind of kids who played stickball on blacktop and drew on their hands with ink. Another third of the kids were Italian Catholic and lived in a world of vinyl runners over the carpets in their houses and vinyl covers over the car seats of the big Impalas, which their mothers drove while smoking lipstick ringed cigarettes.
The last third of the kids were Jews. Now, I believe that we are all the same…but, something inside of me liked the Jews best. They scaled baseball cards with me and played knock hockey with me. They included me in kickball. And though they made fun of me for being a Christian Scientist, “My grandmother's older than your religion,” they actually talked to me.
Still, as much as I liked them, I did not belong among the Jews. They went to Hebrew School in the afternoon, while I went to the Paramus Boy’s Club to play pool, eat Hostess cupcakes and watch reruns of "The Munsters."
On Sunday mornings, when my family drove to church, it seemed as if ours was the only car driving out of town, past the Catholic churches and the Chinese restaurants all the way into Ridgewood– where the Christian Scientists went, where for an hour each week, Christian Science was normal, until we climbed back into our car and drove back to our town.
Then, one day, driving home from church, driving from the place where I had my hour of normalcy to the place where I was "that Christian Science kid" that my dad started talking about one of the families in our church… a family that had a son my age, and my father said that the family changed their name so that people wouldn’t know that they were Jewish.
This conversation went on to include all the Jews in the First Church of Christian Science of Ridgewood, New Jersey. There were the Rosenbergs, the Levins and the Greens. My father was convinced there were probably even more. And as the car rolled down under the Erie Lackawanna tracks, my mom said it’s true of the Englewood Christian Science church too, after all, her mother went there.
Now, you don’t hang around with Jews for twelve years, and not have it pounded into your head that the Jewish religion is passed from mother to child. If your mother is a Jew, you are a Jew. And my mother was saying, out loud, that here mother was a Jew, which meant that I was a... ohymgod... could it be true?
I did the math instantaneously.
“WE’RE JEWISH?,” I screamed in delight.
"Well, sort of... but we're Christian Scientists..." my mom answered.
Sort of was good enough.
No words had ever been spoken before as wonderful as these. I was sort of a Jew.
My mom tried to stem the damage… explaining that yes, we were a little Jewish, but we were not allowed to tell anyone…because of the terrible things that had happend in the past to Jews… but that she guessed it was okay that I knew I was a Jew as long as I never told anyone.
I nodded my head and promised; no one would ever know that I was a Jew.
Monday morning, I got early and dressed in my best Lee jeans and Sears t-shirt with the Triumph motorcycle iron-on decal on the front. I ran down to the school bus fifteen minutes before it was due, and when it arrived, I rode in the front, egging the bus on, “get there, get there, get there.” Never before in my life had I so wanted to get to school.
And all day, that day, I went up to everyone I knew, Irish, Italian and Jew…especially Jew, and I said with a face that couldn’t stop smiling, “I’m Jewish. I’m Jewish. I’m a Jew just like you.”
On Sunday mornings, when my family drove to church, it seemed as if ours was the only car driving out of town, past the Catholic churches and the Chinese restaurants all the way into Ridgewood– where the Christian Scientists went, where for an hour each week, Christian Science was normal, until we climbed back into our car and drove back to our town.
Then, one day, driving home from church, driving from the place where I had my hour of normalcy to the place where I was "that Christian Science kid" that my dad started talking about one of the families in our church… a family that had a son my age, and my father said that the family changed their name so that people wouldn’t know that they were Jewish.
This conversation went on to include all the Jews in the First Church of Christian Science of Ridgewood, New Jersey. There were the Rosenbergs, the Levins and the Greens. My father was convinced there were probably even more. And as the car rolled down under the Erie Lackawanna tracks, my mom said it’s true of the Englewood Christian Science church too, after all, her mother went there.
Now, you don’t hang around with Jews for twelve years, and not have it pounded into your head that the Jewish religion is passed from mother to child. If your mother is a Jew, you are a Jew. And my mother was saying, out loud, that here mother was a Jew, which meant that I was a... ohymgod... could it be true?
I did the math instantaneously.
“WE’RE JEWISH?,” I screamed in delight.
"Well, sort of... but we're Christian Scientists..." my mom answered.
Sort of was good enough.
No words had ever been spoken before as wonderful as these. I was sort of a Jew.
My mom tried to stem the damage… explaining that yes, we were a little Jewish, but we were not allowed to tell anyone…because of the terrible things that had happend in the past to Jews… but that she guessed it was okay that I knew I was a Jew as long as I never told anyone.
I nodded my head and promised; no one would ever know that I was a Jew.
Monday morning, I got early and dressed in my best Lee jeans and Sears t-shirt with the Triumph motorcycle iron-on decal on the front. I ran down to the school bus fifteen minutes before it was due, and when it arrived, I rode in the front, egging the bus on, “get there, get there, get there.” Never before in my life had I so wanted to get to school.
And all day, that day, I went up to everyone I knew, Irish, Italian and Jew…especially Jew, and I said with a face that couldn’t stop smiling, “I’m Jewish. I’m Jewish. I’m a Jew just like you.”
And of course... now I've just told you too.
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