If I prayed...

Or if I even truly believed in a higher power, I hope I could be as eloquent and funny as the glorious Ms. Tina Fey.  I'm not usually one to cut and paste like this, but there's no way I could write anything nearly as fabulous as this:


First, Lord: No tattoos. May neither Chinese symbol for truth nor Winnie-the-Pooh holding the FSU logo stain her tender haunches. (OK, as someone with her fair share of ink, I cannot judge and will not hold tattoos against my daughter. But I do hope that if she chooses to tat herself up, that she puts lots of thought into what she wants permanently emblazoned on her person).

May she be Beautiful but not Damaged, for it’s the Damage that draws the creepy soccer coach’s eye, not the Beauty.

When the Crystal Meth is offered, May she remember the parents who cut her grapes in half And stick with Beer.

Guide her, protect her
When crossing the street, stepping onto boats, swimming in the ocean, swimming in pools, walking near pools, standing on the subway platform, crossing 86th Street, stepping off of boats, using mall restrooms, getting on and off escalators, driving on country roads while arguing, leaning on large windows, walking in parking lots, riding Ferris wheels, roller-coasters, log flumes, or anything called “Hell Drop,” “Tower of Torture,” or “The Death Spiral Rock ‘N Zero G Roll featuring Aerosmith,” and standing on any kind of balcony ever, anywhere, at any age.

Lead her away from Acting but not all the way to Finance. Something where she can make her own hours but still feel intellectually fulfilled and get outside sometimes And not have to wear high heels.

What would that be, Lord? Architecture? Midwifery? Golf course design? I’m asking You, because if I knew, I’d be doing it, Youdammit.

May she play the Drums to the fiery rhythm of her Own Heart with the sinewy strength of her Own Arms, so she need Not Lie With Drummers.

Grant her a Rough Patch from twelve to seventeen. Let her draw horses and be interested in Barbies for much too long, For childhood is short - a Tiger Flower blooming Magenta for one day - And adulthood is long and dry-humping in cars will wait.

O Lord, break the Internet forever, That she may be spared the misspelled invective of her peers And the online marketing campaign for Rape Hostel V: Girls Just Wanna Get Stabbed.

And when she one day turns on me and calls me a B.itch in front of Hollister, Give me the strength, Lord, to yank her directly into a cab in front of her friends, For I will not have that S.hit. I will not have it.

And should she choose to be a Mother one day, be my eyes, Lord, that I may see her, lying on a blanket on the floor at 4:50 A.M., all-at-once exhausted, bored, and in love with the little creature whose poop is leaking up its back.

“My mother did this for me once,” she will realize as she cleans feces off her baby’s neck. “My mother did this for me.” And the delayed gratitude will wash over her as it does each generation and she will make a Mental Note to call me. And she will forget. But I’ll know, because I peeped it with Your God eyes.

Amen.

-An excerpt from Tina Fey's new book -Bossypants, 2011

Growing up Jewish

One of my best friends, Julie, sent me a goofy email about growing up Jewish, and I figured I'd cut and paste with comments...some of this stuff doesn't apply, but some of it does, and I figure it'll give me a chance to see what chords it strikes with regards to raising Eleanor.  It's a bit on the long side, so I'm thinking i might stretch it into a few posts...

Growing up Jewish:

If you are Jewish, and grew up in city with a large Jewish population, or are gentile with Jewish friends or associates, the following will invoke heartfelt memories, so read on.........

The only good advice that your Jewish mother gave you was:"Go! You might meet somebody!"

    I never dated Jewish boys. Seriously. I had a 2 week 'relationship' with a boy with a green mohawk my Sophomore year in college, but he was allergic to my sweaters that my mom made. Destined for failure. The only good thing that came of it, honestly, was that I was able to tell my family "Hey, I tried".

     

Every Saturday morning your father went to the neighborhood deli (called an "appetitizing store") for whitefish salad, whitefish "chubs"), lox (nova if you were rich!), herring, corned beef, roast beef, cole slaw, potato salad, a 1/2-dozen huge barrel pickles which you reached into the brine for, a dozen assorted bagels, cream cheese and rye bread (sliced while he waited). All of which would be strictly off-limits until Sunday morning.

Bagels and lox were tradition for sure.  And here in Canada, the bagels aren't the same as what I'm used to. I've been a vegetarian for a long time, so I don't really miss the lox anymore, but I will go so far as to import "real" bagels from NYC.  When living in NC, I did this a few times too. And when in graduate school, with a particularly tough case of TMJ, my doctor told me "avoid bagels", and it just didn't make sense. Bagels are one of the few foods my people do right!! Ellie will be raised with bagels. No doubt about it.  She will probably even be raised with my prejudices regarding what makes for a GOOD bagel (no raisins/blueberries, even in the cream cheese; fluffy, not dense; she will know what a schmear of cream cheese is...)

Every Sunday afternoon was spent visiting your grandparents and/or other relatives.

My grandparents moved down to FL, but not til after my great-grandparents did.  I was lucky enough to know 3 of my great grandparents on my mom's side. Nana Sally lived til I was about 14. Nana Sophie and Grampa Abe (Lipshitz) til I was in my 20s.  There are several stories, but I feel like that belongs in its own post...

You experienced the phenomenon of 50 people fitting into a 10-foot-wide dining room hitting each other with plastic plates trying to get to a deli tray.

Hasn't everyone?

You thought pasta was stuff used exclusively for Kugel and kasha with bowties.

Ugh. I hated kasha. I won't make Ellie eat that, or chopped liver. There are several foods in Jewish culture that are just plain icky.

You were as tall as your grandmother by the age of seven.

This applied to Nana Sally. I think she shrunk to about 4'8"?? But with a rack you could stack encyclopedias on.

You never knew anyone whose last name didn't end in one of 5 standard suffixes (berg, baum , man, stein and witz).  

It still amazes my husband when I tell him a particular actor or actress is Jewish just by their name...or more often but what their name WAS before they changed it <grin> But after my stint in Hebrew school, I knew plenty of non-Jewish folks.  I feel that I might have a hard time finding other Jews to introduce Eleanor to as she grows up, which is odd. I'd like to her to have an idea of some of this stuff without me being the one to instill it...

You were surprised to discover that wine doesn't always taste like cranberry sauce.
Maybe someday we'll do a Seder, just as a kind of sociologic experiment...Hiding matzoh? Well, I think the dog would find it before any children in this house...but the glasses upon glasses of Manischewitz , even when diluted with seltzer...*shiver*...Though I suppose it's the only way to dull the senses enough to get through a 3-4 hour meal with family...

You can look at gefilte fish and not turn green.
I actually used to like gefilte fish, even without the hot pink horseradish (courtesy of some well-placed beets)...But I don't think I like it enough to MAKE it in our vegetarian house, and the stuff that comes in the glass jars in the Kosher section of the market just look nasty...Perhaps Ellie will be spared...

You can understand Yiddish but you can't speak it.
There are some words that, i have to agree, have no good English equivalent.  Though I will make sure Eleanor KNOWS that these words are in a different language.  I grew up with them just as part of my vocabulary and didn't know that not everyone would understand me when using Yiddish in day to day conversation...

You know how to pronounce numerous Yiddish words and use them correctly in context, yet you don't know exactly what they mean. Kaynahurra.

Yea.  Very true. Thank goodness for the internet, and I've been able to look most of them up.

OK I'm going to post and then return to this later to finish up...Must go take advantage of a napping baby. Now that she's walking, I don't get much down time!!  She started officially walking last Monday and has been on the go ever since!

Eleanor walking

Ellie ready to plotz after her photo shoot with her friends

A maidel mit a kleidel (a girl in her new dress)

Music

OK, so we just watched an episode of Mad Men, which I love, and it ended with Peter Paul and Mary's version of Early In The Morning...and I caught myself singing along. Here's the problem. I love me some hippie music.  And some old blues.  Not to mention all the Requiems, Passions and choral classical in my collection. And there's a lot of God in them there lyrics...

Do athiests/agnostics have ANY good music???

There are no athiests in a foxhole...

Hmmm, perhaps my blogging about athiesm, etc, has pissed off some higher power, as our family has been smote (am I using that word correctly?) with a cold/cough that never goes away.  Ellie started off with a cold 3 weeks ago, which lingered with runny nose and then moved into a cough. Then I got it. Then my husband got it even worse. And we're all still coughing at nighttime...sigh...so that's my excuse for the time being as to why I haven't caught up with this blog...

In other news, Eleanor is now officially a one-year old.  We chose not to do a party, as...well...as she's 1, and doesn't know any different.  Her friend, whose birthday is 1 day after hers, had a party and we just went there. All the cake, none of the work :)

I never really thought of myself, or of Trent, as non-traditional, but there seems to be such a common thread of going "keeping up with the Joneses", even when kids are this young.  I don't just get it. But I'm learning to just keep quiet, and I have a feeling this end up being a running theme throughout Ellie's life.

Judge not lest thou be judged, right? Pretty basic Christian tenant. An oldie but a goodie, and I'm fine with this premise, really.  So on the topic of birthday parties and going over the top, I think I'm going to take a page from Barbara Kingsolver. She talks about (in Animal Vegetable Miracle) how her family has the tradition of allowing the children to celebrate their birthdays with as many children/friends as their age--so a 3 year old gets to have 3 friends over for a tea party or something...a 10 year old can have 10...seems pretty reasonable to me.

I remember for my Bat Mitzvah (I was 13), it ended up being a party for about 250 people. Essentially a business party/see and be seen for my father.  I was told I could invite 30 kids.  The thing is, I was painfully shy. I didn't HAVE 30 friends. And in middle school, where everything is so important, and heaven forbid someone more popular than I was having a party the same weekend...the pressure was actually really crappy. And I didn't feel comfortable telling my parents why this was stressing me out. Who wants to tell their parents that they don't have many friends??  Especially when appearances mean so much...anyway, just food (birthday cake?)  for thought on a late Friday night.

Baby names

So one of the Jewish traditions we chose to modify to our liking was in naming Eleanor.  Jewish tradition is to take the first letter of the name of someone who has passed away (it's considered bad luck to name a child after someone still living, hence no Jr's or IIIs).  So when Trent and I were trying to narrow down our options, I had a few letters in mind.  S for my great grandmothers Sally and Sophie. Ah, how I love the name Sophie...but SO COMMON now!!! A for my great grandpa Abe. J for my dear friend, Jimmy, whom I lost to ALS 5 years ago now...then we figured out that both of Trent's grandparent's names started with E (Elizabeth and Edward) and, though neither of them was Jewish, Trent liked the idea. His only stipulation was that our daughter's name couldn't be something that would go well with pole-dancing.  So we went with E(leanor) J(osephine).  Simple. Understated. A bit serious. Eleanor of Acquitaine. Eleanor Roosevelt. Josephine Baker...Done.

Then Trent made the mistake of telling his family before she was born.  And they hated the name Eleanor.  Which is why, no matter WHAT your religious leanings, you should keep your mouth shut, because goodness knows, other people don't seem to.  So Ellie was nameless for the first 36 hours or so while Trent decided if he was OK with moving forward with the name we had chosen.  She was very almost Sydney, after Crosby, since a) he's from Pittsburgh and b) she was born the night before the gold medal game of the Olympics...and c) it fit the S option...

So yea, he got over it, and now everyone seems OK with her name...though every now and again, my folks try for EJ or someone tries out Ellie Jo...luckily, it hasn't stuck. I'm fine with Ellie. Might even like Nora as a nickname...but to me, most of the time, she's Eleanor.

So again, what's in a name? 

Home from Boca

Sorry ya'all. Just home from a visit to Florida with the little one to see my parents. In Boca Raton, where all good Jews go to retire.

So back to the whole "Jewish mother" thing...this is the part of Sachs' article that caught my attention.
...Somehow throughout the millennia, whether we were living in the desert, the shtetl, the ghetto or the Upper West Side, Jewish moms have also turned out successful progeny, despite all the kvetching.
Perhaps that's why there are so many Jewish lawyers. Jewish kids debate at home. They speak back to their elders. They argue while practicing their powers of persuasion on their exhausted parents. And we moms, well, we at least subliminally encourage it -- after all, we love a good argument almost as much as we love kibbitzing. And after centuries of persecution and existing on the fringes of nearly every society from Egypt to Eastern Europe, either fighting for entry or thriving in spite of it, Jews are hardwired for resistance...

Well, resistance is a strong point for me. And I think it's gonna have to be, in order to resist buying into all the hype around easy answers for questioning little ones. I didn't get up the nerve to ask my folks about the whole Death and Dying topic, too busy chasing around the little monkey and keeping her out of trouble.

Grandma and Grandpa didn't get mad about the avocado on the wall...

Hula hoops? Really??

Everything must come out of all boxes. Period.

This includes suitcases.

What I have noticed recently, is several of my bad habits:

• Saying "Bless you" whenever someone sneezes. Honestly, I can't seem to stop.  It's great that my folks ingrained manners in me and all, but a bit hypocritical, no?
• Cursing, with "goddammit" and "Jesus Christ" being some of the most common.  
• Using the phrase "Oh My God"
• Saying "Thank God" instead of "Thank goodness"...

Seriously. At one point in time, I remember having to stop myself as a teenager from overuse of the word, "like".  I know it is possible to do (though I can't seem to get away from using "Dude"...). But if I'm going to try to walk the walk, I gotta break myself of these phrases...


But back to that paragraph. I actually wasn't raised by the stereotypical Jewish mother [The stereotype generally involves a nagging, overprotective, manipulative, controlling, smothering, and overbearing mother or wife, one who persists in interfering in her children's lives long after they have become adults--Thank you, Wikipedia!!].  I think my father was...and perhaps even my mother was. Overbearing? Perhaps...but they're very non-confrontational. To a fault, perhaps.  Kinda like pulling teeth to actually get them to talk about anything serious. But somehow,  there is still this hardwired thread of staunch resistance within me, which I think was brought out even more by living in places where being Jewish wasn't common. Especially around the winter holidays.  The start of Christmas carols in Oct/Nov makes me tense, and suddenly quite aware of not being a part of the majority.  Living in North Carolina for 4 years might have made me feel more "Jewish" than my upbringing (after Hebrew school was over and done, that is...).  And it's been a bit perpetuated living here in Ottawa now.  At least Seinfeld helped others get my sense of humour...


As for turning out successful progeny...now THAT is something I can get behind. Trent (husband) and I have talked about this as one of the best parts of Jewish culture--the importance of academics.  We were both geeks growing up. And my parents never had to push me regarding grades, I was a good student.  Mind you, I was lazy until grad school, because I KNEW I was smart, and didn't have to work too hard to pull As and Bs.  {Had I actually put my mind to it or been pushed a bit more,  I may have done even better, but it's not like it is today for kids applying to college.  Anyway, tangent. Sorry. }  So is that what I want Ellie to get from my heritage? "Study hard, kid, this is how our people survived the pyramids, the Pharoahs, the holocaust, the blacklisting, ..."

OK  I am most certainly rambling. It's late and the little darling has been asleep for 3 hours. I'm off to join her.

parenting styles

There was this article in the WSJ last week that my  husband passed on to me for the sake of discussion, and the responses on Huffington post were too numerous to even follow. This, of course, was the article that caught my attention
Chinese Moms v. Jewish mothers

Sigh...once again, I started this post a week ago...am just going to post and start over.