I Married a Jew and You Can Too, Part 2

OK. A note to all writers and creative people out there:  Never promise a Part II.  Obligating one's self to a sequel is absolutely stifling.  So I am going to wrap this up like Hanukah gelt, just in time for the holidays.  I'll start with an inappropriate joke to purge my writer's block.  A Milanese woman living in the United States shared this with me last week:  "What is the difference between a Catholic mother and a Jewish mother?  The Catholic mother thinks her son is a human being from the moment of conception and the Jewish mother thinks her son is fetus until he graduates from high school."  I laughed, of course, because there was a cultural truth there that resonated with me.  My upbringing was anything but cautious.  There were expectations of behavior certainly, but there was a groundedness and heavenliness to everything.  I'm splicing religion and culture here, but the intellectual nature of Judaism seems to always ask the why, while the Irish sensibility seems to ask why not.  Well, for one thing, I function on instinct, my husband on reason (perhaps influenced by gender too, hmm...).  I just do; I react; I yell; I move on.  He ponders, he broods, he gets wounded. This explains why in "Good Will Hunting" Matt Damon tells co-star Minnie Driver that "I'm Irish; I can deal with something being fucked up forever." (Or was that from "The Departed?") I'd bet that there are more Jews  in therapy than there are Irishmen.  Just a guess.  And there are probably more Paddys at the pub.  

Our different cultural landscapes inform how we parent.  I may allow the kids to eat a pixie stick for the sheer fun of it.  My husband examines the consequences of such an indulgence and  rarely sides with the depravity of the cheap thrill.  I love cheap thrills and depravity. These contrary attitudes manifest themselves in two areas of our lives: guilt and Christmas.  

One of Peter's most winning statements when we were dating was when he enlightened me on the difference between Jewish guilt and Catholic guilt.  He shared that, "Jewish guilt is more, 'Oy, did I hurt you?', and Catholic guilt is 'Shit, did God see me do that?' "  Each perspective represents a different way of being in the world. 

 

And then there's Christmas.  Really, who can resist the pageantry of Christmas in the Catholic Church?  The advent candles and calendars, the manger, the statuary, the peace and goodwill, the birthday baby.  The first Christmas after my daughter was born, I displayed the nativity scene.  "What's with the Jesus stuff?" Peter asked.  I explained that it was important that she understood the story of the holiday.  His logical mind agreed and accepted the tiny, ceramic savior in our home. This Christmas season, Peter even agreed to abandon our "religious lite" Protestant/Vermonty feel-good Sunday church service for Catholic Mass; I think the infectious spirit of Christmas got to him too.  

But Hanukah is also on its way and my daughter came home and declared that she was the "only one" in her class that celebrated Hanukah.  Great.  The only one. Her teacher even asked me if we celebrated the Jewish holidays, because, if we didn't, she "doesn't bother including them because it seems irrelevant to the class." Great.  How diverse. I suddenly felt very Jewish.  So, next week I'm going to class to read some Hanukah books from the PJ Library (the most amazing Jewish organization that sends children's books to your house every month, complete with basic information about holidays and traditions.  Perfect for lapsed, secular, and progressive Jewish families).  I'll make latkes and applesauce (local and organic!) for the class and spin some dreidels (which are pretty hard to come by in Vermont) with the kids.  I wonder how I, a recovering Catholic, ended up as the token Jew in a small Vermont town. But if I don't do it, who will?  How can a whole class of kindergardeners not learn that there are so many beautiful traditions in the world? How can my daughter believe that being the "only one" means she is something "other", someone marginalized?  One only needs to watch "Borat" to see how widespread anti-semitism is in the U.S. I might as well start with the five year olds in Vermont.  They should know some Jewish folks.  Don't ya think? 

I Married a Jew and You Can Too, Part I

As an Irish-Catholic girl growing up just outside Boston, I did something not one of my thirty-two cousins did: I married a Jew.  From a young age, I was quite familiar with and awe-struck by Judaism.  I had many Jewish friends and the bar and bat mitzvahs I attended during my middle-school years set many party benchmarks for our regional, adolescent society.  The Jewish kids in town had serious social capital.  Though most people I knew had cousins in Southie and the popular boys in school started dressing like New Kids on the Block, our school was racially, economically, and religiously mixed.  And everyone was more or less friends, or at least friendly.  So I was shocked, after a few years into my marriage, when my husband declared "You're such an anti-Semite!"  

What?  How could that be possible?  Two of my best friends are Jewish.  I love Jews.  Ben Stiller, Adam Sandler, Barbara Streisand, Neil Diamond, Jon Stewart, Matisyahu, Goldie Hawn, Sarah Jessica Parker and I LOVE Ari Gold (fictional Jew, but still)----OK.  I know that sounds like I like Jews when they shuck and jive for the Gentiles but I married a Jew.  Actually, I married  a New York Jew, which represents an entirely different cultural group than the somewhat religious, Bostonian Jews I knew growing up. To get even more specific, my husband was a progressive, political, agnostic Jew (think: Woody Allen taking Golda Meir to see "A Mighty Wind" and running into Mollie Katzen and Jerry Sienfeld at the theater.)  To be sure, my husband and I (like any new couple) had some cultural territory to explore.  My husband had a few odd behaviors that perplexed me.  When I questioned them, he always offered the same answer:  "Because I'm a Jew."  There was one saving grace in our rivaling, interfaith partnership: he was a Mets fan. 

No matter where we were or in what company, somehow my husband always connected the conversation to politics, social justice, or equity.  The Irish might bitch about the "feckin' POMS", but we don't go on and on about oppression.  Life's just too bloody short.  Also, I have never seen him hungover.  I've never really seen him drunk, like stumbling, not-able-to-drive, drunk.  He also has a taste for things that I would only feed to a cat, like pickled herring.  His mother does not use candles in her house for fear of burning it down and when family members die, you might inherit their musical instruments.  He knows specifics about Russian and Eastern European History. Somehow these details were part of his identity.  My family was uber-religious so it was hard for me to accept my husband's non-practicing  form of Judaism as valid.  "But you're not even Jewish." I'd say.   I confused religion and culture. 

We found humor in our differences. My husband found my eccentricities amusing.  On the way to a friend's party I asked him, "What are you drinking tonight?" He looked at me as if I had suggested we drive around the block until we ran out of gas.  He was as amazed at how I planned my liquor for the night as he was that I said a prayer to Saint Anthony anytime I lost something.  He thought it a bit queer and superstitious that I had Saints medals and rosaries around our statue of the Buddha.  None of this mattered until we had kids. Or maybe it mattered, but like an early period, we didn't see it coming.  

It's true, what they say, marrying your own kind is easier.  There is so much that you don't need to explain.  But, once we had kids and the holidays rolled around, it seemed there was a lot of explaining to do, to the kids and to each other.  Suddenly being Irish Catholic seemed to matter.  Just being from Boston seemed to matter.  And my husband felt the same way about being Jewish and being from New York.  Oy vey.

"What's with the Jesus stuff?", he asked.  

"Well, it's a manger and it's Christmas and the kids need to know the story of Christmas." 

"Well, what about Hannukah?" 

"If you want to do Hannukah, go ahead." 

My preparation became my power.  I knew he didn't even have a menorah, let alone know the story of the Maccabees well enough to share it with the kids.  I knew the Old Testament.  I knew more about Judaism than he did.  I felt righteous.  I would win our little, homegrown religious war...

  

Dear reader, you will have to wait for this story's lessing.  It is a two-parter.  Will Michelle and Peter find common ground?  Will they embrace tolerance and diversity?  Will Michelle recognize her anti-Semitism?  Will Michelle ever get Peter drunk?  Stay tuned....