International Godwin's Day

Godwin's Law, coined by attorney Mike Godwin in the 1990s states that as any discussion increases in length, the chances of probability bringing up the Holocaust or Nazis becomes closer to 1.  At the time, he was referring to Usenet groups (remember those?).  However, given the proliferation of online discussion forums, the law now applies to all forms of mass online communication forums as well.

The original intention was a lesson in memetics.  However, some have turned Godwin's Law into a meta-fallacy.  The unspoken rule is that as soon as one brings up anything to do with Hitler, the Holocaust, the Nazis, or anything to do with the Third Reich, the discussion immediately ends and whoever made the reference "loses."

Shoah Business

"There's no business like Shoah business," a rabbi of mine once coyly said.  

Shoah, for those unfamiliar, is the Hebrew term for the Holocaust.  

In the years since the Shoah ended in 1945, it has taken a life of its own.

For many years, plenty of survivors were silent about it.  It happened, but many did not want to talk about it.  They had seen as close to hell on this earth.  And they did not want to experience it again.

I have heard many survivor stories over the years.  And so many different ways to approach the horrors that the Jews experienced in those 10 years that the Nazis were in power.  Or even the 6 years that the world was at war.  Or even the 3 years from the Wannsee Conferences to the time that the Americans and Russians liberated the death camps.  

There is much documentation on what really happened in Europe during that period.  Much has been written on why something like the Holocaust was allowed to happen.  Why someone as evil and morally decrepit as Hitler was democratically elected and then allowed to do the things he did.  And why so many people suffered as a result.

As a child, I could never fathom it.  Every year, my school had a vigil for Yom Hashoah.  They would light candles.  One Rabbi would sing a tearful "El Molai Rachamim" for those who perished.  Those students who lost family in the Holocaust would stand by the candles.  The rest of us would watch.  And we would get a speech.  And another speech.  And then more sad songs.  

One Saturday, we were walking to synagogue.  My sister was insisting that our father tell us about Hitler.  I never heard the name Hitler.  I was 7 years old.  That name was completely new to me.  It sounded like Hillel (common Jewish name, I knew a few).  But my sister said "not Hillel, Hitler."  

So my father, on our 20 minute walk to synagogue, told us in brief about Hitler.  He told us about him taking over Europe.  He told us about the death camps.  He told us about the gas showers.  He told us about the ovens.  But then, he told us something I never expected.

He told us about Savta (our maternal grandmother).

We knew that Savta was from Hungary.  That's why she spoke with an accent.  We didn't know how old Savta was.  Every time we asked, she would say "100".  We could not even fathom her having ever been young.  

But apparently, Savta had something to do with this Hitler person who did all of those bad things.

When my father spoke of the camps and the showers and the trains, I was only lending him half of an ear.  For all I knew, it was some bad fairy tale.  But then when I heard he was talking about Savta, he suddenly had my attention.  This story was not some bad fairy tale.  It really happened.  And it happened to Savta too.

Savta was from Budapest.  Most of the Jews in Budapest thought they were safe.  They did not think Hitler would come after them.  They could understand why he attacked Poland.  But as far as they were concerned, they were safe where they were.

Savta and her family knew it was only a matter of time before Hitler would turn around and attack Hungary.  After all, Hungary was so close to occupied Poland and Austria.  They didn't know how soon.  But they knew they had to get out of Hungary.

Savta and her father managed to get into the United States.  Savta was the third oldest of 9.  But her older brother was in the army and her older sister was not born in Hungary.  So somehow, only Savta was able to get a visa.  I am not completely clear on why the rest of the family was stuck in Europe (I have heard many conflicting stories; and none of them make any sense).  So Savta and her father managed to escape to America.  But the rest of the family was stuck in Europe.

Her mother and one of her brothers died in Auschwitz.  Her youngest sister Edith (who is still alive) survived Auschwitz; she was liberated by the Russians.

Suddenly, my father had my attention.  

I still could not fathom the global enormity of the Shoah.  All I got was a bad guy named Hitler (not Hillel) and something happening to Savta and her family.  At this point, I thought the Holocaust was all about what happened to Savta.  Not until a few weeks later was it explained to me in school the global significance of the Shoah to European Jews.  That many families were torn apart.  It is approximated that 6 million died.  

From here, the Holocaust became the greatest human travesty ever to walk the face of this earth.  This Shoah became living evidence that the Goyyim hate us.  That even if they act nicely toward us, if there was another Shoah they would all jump on the Jew-killing bandwagon.  

Anti-Semitism and Me.

It would be very naive of me to say there's no such thing as anti-Semitism.  Yes, it's out there.  I've gotten beaten up for no reason other than the fact that I am Jewish.  I've been called it all. Kike.  Money-grubber.  Big-nose.  Heeb.  All that lovely stuff.

I remember one time, Savta was taking us on a busride somewhere.  This old Italian man stood in front of me and started commenting on the fact that I was wearing a yarmulke.  This old man looked and sounded a lot like Tony, the head custodian at my school.  Like Tony, he smelled of cigars and he was missing a few teeth.  But Tony was a nice man.  Tony always smiled at the kids (except when they were running in the hall and making noise, in which case he was scary).  Tony used to bring us ice cream from Carvel when we were good.

This man looked and sounded like Tony.  But he was not very nice.  He was ranting and raving about how I should take the yarmulke off.  He pointed around the bus and said "look, no one else is wearing one of those beanies.  Your grandma isn't wearing a beanie.  Why do you wear it?"  And he went on and on and on degrading me, calling me names, saying I'm not human, etc.  I was scared.

I asked Savta "why is he being mean?"

Savta just answered "don't listen to him.  He's crazy."  And there was a finality in her voice that said the discussion was over.  

Fast forward years later.

I was 20 years old.  It was my first semester in college.  

I got a random e-mail from some guy, screen name AmeriKrap.   How charming.

AmeriKrap wanted to know why we Jews are all so fucking rich.  He started complaining to me about how he and his brothers all work their asses off and don't make much money.  Meanwhile, we Jews are all comfortable, rich, and making him and his brothers miserable.  So the first thing he wanted was for us to "share the wealth" and stop being so greedy.  And he also wanted me to know that if he or one of his brothers from Paterson (the next town over from where I lived, used to be full of Jews, but since the area became dangerous many of them moved out) ever came and robbed us, we would know why.

I wish I saved the e-mail.  As a naive 20 year old, I did not know what to do with it.

But there was one line in that e-mail that really struck my eye.  He ended the e-mail with "don't give me any of this Holocaust bullshit."  Yes, he went there.  He was sick and tired of Jews doing whatever they want and then bleating about how much they suffered during the Holocaust.  He reminded me that his people suffered through hundreds of years of slavery and civil rights.  And so, he is sick and tired of hearing Jews complain about how much they've suffered in light of how much his people suffered.

After giving his e-mail thought, I responded.  Oh yes, I responded.

It was not easy for me.  I had to give it thought.  This was coming from a young, rather privileged white Ashkenazi Jew.  At the time, I could honestly have said I never had a friend in the black community.  I had one biracial friend named Chris in 7th grade.  That was it.  Other than that, I was still extremely sheltered at the time.  So my response back then was slightly different than the one I would give now.

I began by attempting to empathize with his feelings against Jews.  I explained to him that as a young person, I mean no ill will against him or any of his brothers.  I also do not support those who do mean ill will against them.  

I told him that yes, at the time my father was rather well off.  My father was a pretty high paid corporate lawyer who worked hard for his money.  But I asked AmeriKrap to consider one thing before he passed judgement on my father.  I reminded him that Michael Jordan, at the height of his career, was making $44 million plus endorsements.  I also told him that the most underpaid player on the New York Knicks probably makes more money in a year than my father does.  There are a handful of "brothers" out there who are much more well off than my father and do much less work than him--with all due respect to having a killer jumpshot, it is not harder work than corporate law, I said.  So I asked him why not go after these brothers who make all that money?  If Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing, John Starks, et al decided to share the wealth with their brothers in Paterson, there would be more wealth to share.

As for his "don't give me that Holocaust bullshit" remark, I could not leave that one alone.

I asked him to consider this.  To commemorate the Holocaust, we have a day called Yom Hashoah.  My Jewish schools didn't even do much for that--a candlelight vigil, a movie, a lecture....hardly anything.  But in America, February is Black History Month.  Even my Jewish schools observed Black History Month.  Yes, we learned about Sojourner Truth, George Washington Carver, Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Elijah McCoy, Martin Luther King, etc.  We learned that slavery against the Blacks was a bad thing.  And most importantly, a little federal holiday known as MLK Day.  Yes, even my Jewish schools were closed on MLK Day.  And we learned who he was.  We learned why he was such a great man.  We respected him.  

And you do not hear me saying "don't give me any of that 'Black History' bullshit."  Nor will you ever hear those words come out of my mouth.

So he should not be saying "don't give me that Holocaust bullshit."  It is not bullshit to my people.  

He wrote back to me.

In his letter, he apologized for his initial letter.  He was pissed off at his Jewish boss.  He somehow found my profile on AOL.  My profile indicated that I'm Jewish.  So he decided to take out his vitriol at his asshole boss on the next Jew he met.  

I am not sure if he ended up changing the way he looked at Jews or not.  

But he definitely changed the way I look at non-Jews.

Godwin's Day

Today is Yom HaShoah.

And I remember not only the Jews that were lost.

I also remember everyone who was a victim of any kind of genocide.

This is my problem with the way the Holocaust is taught.  To many, the Holocaust is cheapened into something crazy that happened in Europe a few generations ago.  But few really look at the global implications.  

It's not just about the Jews who were killed.  Or the Gypsys, or the homosexuals, or others.

It's not about how many Russians died defending their land against Hitler (and how many more by Stalin during his purges).

It's about genocide in any form being bad.

It's about the Armenians who were slaughtered by the Turks in 1915.

The Tutsis by the Hutus in Rwanda in 1994.

The Khmer Rouge genocide in the 1970s.

Bosnia.  Kashmir.  Congo.

The list goes on and on and on.

This is not to minimize the Holocaust, or the suffering of my people.

This is to not cheapen it.  Not to have us only focus on the bad things that have happened to our people and to completely blank out the bad things that have happened to others.

This is to show that genocides have happened.  And we are not alone.  And let our remembrance of the Holocaust be also used as a springboard to ensure not only that we will no longer be persecuted; but also, that others will not be persecuted as well.

Doing What's Right or Doing What You're Told?

These and these are the words of the living God.   
Within that short epigram is a deceptively simple explanation for the idea of machloket.  That is, how is it that from the time Jews began codifying their laws, there was almost never an unanimous consensus on what the law is.  Famously, Hillel and Shammai.  The idea is that at Sinai, Moses was given two laws; the literal law and the oral law.  But over time the oral law got muddled.  Plus, as local traditions made their way in, individuality became inevitable.

And so, how can both Hillel and Shammai be right?  It seems almost paradoxical.  So instead of figuring out which one is right or wrong, the sages speak of which one we follow.  In fact, it is even said that at Sinai, Moses was given all of those opinions.  Which makes little sense.  After all, did Moses not review the entire law with the Israelites before he died?  And they understood everything.  If he was indeed given the entire corpus of the Talmud, it would take him more time than plausible to complete all of it. 

And so, to a certain extent, individual opinions ARE respected even to this day.  Over the years, the rabbis have come up with some pretty ingenious interpretations of the law.  Based on the existing precedent--the Torah, the Talmud, the works of earlier rabbis (Rishonim), the casuistry of the later rabbis (Achronim), etc, they try to figure out what individuals should do.  And if done properly, it is not a cut-and-dry process.  It is quite dynamic!  When reading through the responsa of the great rabbis, one finds that many of the more erudite ones would take into account who was asking the question, the repercussions of each opinion, and even modern understanding of the issues. 

However, there are exceptions.  Most famously, Reform, Conservative, Reconstructionist, and even Modern Orthodoxy.  Plenty of hard-line right wing Jews look with extreme contempt of the liberties they are willing to take with halacha.  And then when you point out that from the time of the second temple (perhaps earlier), rabbis have changed traditions, they start splitting hairs on why what they did was acceptable.

I am reminded of Chaim Potok's The Promise.  The protagonist, Reuven Malter, is studying for his rabbinic ordination.  He is in a school that is very loosely based on Yeshiva University.  Now Reuven's father is a bigshot in a school loosely based on the JTS.  As a result, Malter's method of learning is one that's not approved by tradition.  Now Malter is a bright student and able to keep up with his rabbis.  But not all approve of him.  The highest level shiur is taught by one Rabbi Gershonsen, holocaust survivor with a chip on his shoulder.  He has neither the patience nor the will to indulge Malter.  So Malter asks to transfer into a lower level shiur, one where the Rabbi is more indulgent.

In the end, Malter is taking his ordination exam.  One of the stages is a faher, where he sits in front of three rabbis and is grilled by them.  One of them was Rabbi Gershonsen.  Of course, Rabbi Gershonsen tried to trap Malter.  He presented Malter with a very difficult to understand piece of Talmud, one that makes no sense as it is worded.  He asked Malter how to interpret it.  True to form, Malter does what his father would do and assumes that due to a scribal error, the wording was a mistake and opted to change the wording.  When the Rabbi asked him on what authority he tweaked the words of the Talmud, he quipped back that many Rabbis, from the Tosafists to the Vilna Ga'on did it all the time.  But of course, Gershonsen argued back that there was a difference: when the Tosafists and the Vilna Ga'on did it, they had a text that supported their changed wording...

In the end, Gershonsen actually showed a side of himself that was slightly open-minded.  He agreed to give Malter ordination even though he disagrees with his methodology.  But he did warn Malter that when he gets out there in the world and applies his methodology, Rabbi Gershonsen will vehemently be a thorn in his side.  But at least Gershonsen was willing to ordain Malter.

In recent news, there was word that Yeshiva University was possibly withholding ordination from a student who completed his program of study but was being a bit too brazen for their palates.  He decided to throw a "partnership minyan" in his house, one where a woman is allowed an Aliyah to the torah and then to bentsch gomel.  Because of this one incident, he was no longer welcome in the minyan he usually prayed in, so he started his own private minyan.  He then received a letter from YU asking him, on one foot, if he can agree that when it comes to issues like that he is willing to consult with his superiors first.

But this leads to a problem.  Once you ordain a man, does that not confer upon him the right to decide the law?  Does not the process of ordination mean you think this man is ready to responsibly do his job without needing to consult with his superiors?  And if not, does it not undermine the entire process?

It is irresponsible to assume that the Word is Dead.  After all, if one assumes that there is a living God, then shouldn't one treat his words as the same?  In our ever changing world, there is no room for stagnation.  After all, the people who wrote the sources (Torah and Talmud) were mostly a pastoral society.  Over the years, times have changed.  Still, the Talmud uses plenty of agricultural references because that is what the common people understood back then. So as Jews moved to towns and cities and got into more professions, things had to change.

And so, why the backlash against those who take such drastic steps against tradition?  Why feel so threatened when one comes along and decides to take liberties?  Sure, we are a stiff-necked people.  But it is by being flexible that our people have survived.  Through persecutions we have moved from place to place.  We had to be able to adapt to our new societies.   Why not adapt to the changing times now?

Book Review: "Who Wrote the Bible?" by Richard Elliot Friedman

       In my quest to reconcile the mythos I was fed as a childhood with current known history, I have done a steady reading of alternative views on Jewish History.  Some have been more instructive than others.

       As a rule, when you are trying to discredit a belief, it is good practice to replace it with one that is more plausible.  Plenty of times, this is not done.  For example, many will agree that the Warren Commission has plenty of holes in it; it does not plausibly explain who killed John F. Kennedy.  However, the alternate theories people have come up with are sometimes even more outlandish!  The CIA, KGB, FBI, Military, mob, aliens, citizens of Atlantis, sojourners from planet Nabiru, an underground cabal of Illuminati--the list goes on.  While it is safe to say that if Lee Harvey Oswald was acting alone he must have been damned lucky, more likely it was part of something bigger.  But there is very little out there I have found that is more compelling at all.

       The first foray I took into this was Isaac Asimov's Guide to the Bible.  Yes, the famous sci-fi author.  But he has written so much more than that.  The span of books he has written covers every subject in the Dewey Decimal System.  In his Guide to the Bible, he attempts to reconcile the greatest bestseller in the Western world with contemporary history (or contemporary in the 1960s).

       A little background.  Asimov was an Humanist Jew.  As such, he denies that the stories of the Bible are to be taken literally as History.  However, we can learn much about History by reading it.  Much as we can learn about Sumeria by reading Gilgamesh, the Greeks by Homer, and India by learning the Mahabharta.  The Bible provides us with plenty of insights about the people who eventually became the Jews and later also inspired Christianity, Islam, et al.

       So in his book, he attempts to reconcile the biblical narrative (both testaments) with history.  In many cases, he tries his best to take the Bible seriously when he can.  For example, the story of Exodus does not have a lot of support amongst plenty of secular historians I've read.  Asimov at the very least attempts to explain it as if it happened and how it probably came about.  Of course, he might be speculating.  Without extra-Biblical evidence, it is extremely hard to prove.  But he does give us a paradigm as to how it may have happened.

        However, there are times where he throws his hands in the air and says that certain narratives are clearly fiction.  E.g. Jonah, Job, Esther, Daniel, and Samson.  He does not even look for a way to reconcile them.  Jonah and Samson both read way too much like fairy tales for his pallet (and Samson even sounds Hellenistic, kind of like Hercules).  Whoever wrote Esther was clearly intimately familiar with the Persian Empire and their Court; but it also reads too much like a fantasy.  And no coincidence that Mordechai and Esther sound like Marduk and Ishtar (Babylonian deities) while Vashti and Haman share names with Elamite deities (an empire conquered by Persia).  But if Ahaseurus was indeed Xerxes (of The 300 fame), when did he have time to throw all those parties or get involved in such drama as explained by the Megillah?  In between fighting Sparta and ruling a vast empire, not a whole lot.  And Daniel is written in a dialect of Aramaic that is later than the period it speaks of; and this is a period of over 200 years, longer than the life span of any man!

       So reading Asimov, I got a good sense of secular history and how the Bible fits in.  He even filled in some gaps I had.  One example is the Hittites.  They are mentioned in the Bible as one of the groups who inhabited the Promised Land.  We know that Abraham purchased a parcel of land from one Ephron the Hittite.  But if the Bible is our main source of history, we would not know that once upon a time they were a mighty empire that once ruled an empire spanning the Levant and Asia Minor even cutting into Egypt at some point.  In fact, Ramses II (who Asimov alleges may have been the Pharaoh of enslavement) drove their empire back into Asia Minor and even seriously weakened them.  So how come the Bible doesn't mention how great they were?  He surmises that at the time the Bible was written they were no longer a threat, and during the period that the Hebrews were allegedly in Egypt, they were their biggest; so the Hebrews never really dealt with them at their apex.

       But Asimov is not a Biblical scholar.  Alas, he is a man who loves knowledge.  But I wanted more.  I wanted something from an actual biblical scholar.  So I read a few interesting ones.  "A History of God" by Karen Armstrong and "How to Read the Bible: Then and Now" by James Kugel opened doors for me.  Both are great surveys into how people have viewed God and his Word over the years.  Kugel provided a nice survey into biblical criticism, including Documentary Hypotheses.

Documentary Hypothesis, for those unaware, is the Golden Calf of many modern Bible critics:
For many years, religious Jews (and perhaps others) have assumed that the Torah was a monolithic work, the word of God and transcribed by Moses.  The book is divine, cannot be split, not even a word or letter omitted or added.  Of course, those more educated know this is not completely true.  Some early Biblical commentators allude to the Bible having been edited somewhat.  Perhaps Moses did not actually write about his own death.  Perhaps certain editorial information (and this place is called XYZ until this day) was inserted by a redactor.  Most of the time, such controversial subjects were written about in disguised language.  But alas, there are those more learned than me who would better explain this.

Documentarians do not labor under the assumption that there was one author or that the Bible is divine. The theory states that the Bible as we have it today is like a patchwork quilt, woven together from multiple sources.  One redactor had several sources and put them together to form one unity.  The four that are traditionally named are

E:  Refers to God as "Elohim", written by an author from the Northern Israelite Kingdom, worshiped the chief Canaanite deity, El.  Not strictly monotheistic, possibly henotheistic (many deities exist but only one is fit to worship).
J:  Refers to God as YHWH or JHVH, the unpronounceable tetragrammaton.  Written in the Southern Judean Kingdom.  No one knows who YHWH originally was (possibly a storm deity from the desert folk).  But eventually he was conflated with El.  Whoever He is, He tells Moses that the forefathers did not know His name.   Eventually, E and J were combined.  Both imagined a deity who was personally involved with earthly matters.  He walked in the Garden of Eden, He sent down Fire and Brimstone, He sent angels and messengers, and He was pretty bipolar.

P:  Written later by a Priest.  The God of this source is more aloof.  He speaks and things are done.  He is more impersonal.  He says let there be light, and there is light.  Most of his source is lists, rules, and things to do with priestly duties.  He goes into great detail about how to build a tabernacle, what kinds of sacrifices are allowed and how to offer them, etc.  He is pretty much rules rules rules and lists.  Considered more dry and less literary than the other two sources.

D:  Deuteronomy.   The entire last book of the Torah and parts of Numbers.  The literary style here is completely different.  Whoever wrote this book was clearly sympathetic to the monarchy and less to the priests.  This book is mostly Moses reviewing the events that led up to the entry into the Promised Land but also reiterating the law.  

Many also add an R:  Redactor, editorial notes.  Information added by whoever put it all together.

Richard Elliot Friedman's book finally presented me firsthand with a proponent of DH.  Now I do deny the divinity of the Torah.  And I am not a believer in a personal higher being.  But as stated above, it would be good to have a replacement.  If the Torah was not a divinely written book by God and transcribed by Moses, then what is it?

Reading his book, I am actually now dubious about DH:

For one thing, when presented with a breakdown of verses and which author wrote each, I see that sometimes one verse has two different authors.  And he even admits that the styles of E and J are actually quite alike.  Although he does finally get around to explaining how he knows they are different sources, I don't feel as if he's actually replaces one nonsense with something more plausible.

The way it looks, our redactor may have been a sloppy editor!

Okay, he does say that there was no project like the Bible in its time.  No collaboration of sources in its time was as ambitious.  Our redactor (he believes it was Ezra) was not being sloppy at all.  He was in fact trying to satisfy all different streams.

D, for example, was written by descendants of Moses ("Mushites") who were estranged by Solomon but then got back into the fold during the time of Josiah.  And P was by Aaronid priests who were popular during the time of Solomon.  By the time of Ezra, both myths had permeated.  So he could not completely ignore them.  And not to mention that E and J were also popularly told by the people, so nobody would accept Ezra's torah as authentic if it left out those narratives.  So Ezra was trying to be cautious.  Sometimes, he could simply use doublets to tell the same story twice.  It's a style of poetry.  But sometimes, it was easier just to have a verse splice two different sources.  Why he didn't clean up the language and make it look like one source is not clear.

Still, now that I've read a serious attempt to explain DH, I find that as it stands it's an overelaborate scheme that makes Biblical study even more spaghettilike than it is to begin with.  Though it does raise some great points, like the different literary styles used in the Bible, I'm still not sold that it is THE answer to who wrote the Bible and how.

And so, the quest to find alternatives has begun.

End of Year Thoughts

Another year ends.  This year, many things changed for me.  If I had to break my life into sections, it would read like this:

- (age 0-4) The Brooklyn Years
- (age 4-14) The Early Fair Lawn Years
- (age 14-18) The Adolescent Fair Lawn Years
- (age 18-20) Shana Ba'Aretz (Abroad in Israel)
- (age 20-21) The Early YU Years, or End of Innocence
- (age 21-23) A Brief Interlude: From Yeshiva Boy to Unemployed Loadie
- (age 23-25) The Year I was Really Born: Early Starbucks Years
- (age 25-28) Finishing College and Middle Starbucks Years
- (age 28-30) Moratorium:  Out of College and Getting Nowhere
- (age 30-33) Graduate School and Late Starbucks Years

And so, begins my actual transition into adulthood,

- (age 34-present) Teaching and Making a Mark

After years of peaks and valleys, strikes and gutterballs, and plenty of in-between, I finally have entered a world where I am doing something career oriented.  It took me many years of soul searching, bad decisions, and plenty of battles with depression and bad relationships that I can finally say that I have a) experience as a teacher and b) a serious relationship with another human being.

The latter, I haven't fully addressed much.  I have in my draft folder plenty of slightly erotic posts in which I describe how we got together.  I think I shall in the near future devote a post on how we actually met.  We've been close friends for over 8 years now.  But until last summer, it was a Three's Company type thing (except we weren't lying to Mr. Furley or Mr. Roper about my sexual orientation).  The transition was smoother than I thought it would be.  It's kind of like for years we were ready for it, but we were waiting for the opportune moment to come out to each other.  But this shall be addressed in another post.

Teaching.  Nobody goes into this field because it is easy.  I've always loved a challenge.  But only if the challenge is one with attainable goals.  In order to get here, I've had to work plenty of bad jobs.  Thankfully, few of them were minimum-wage McJobs.  People ask how teaching compares to years of working at Starbucks.  I like it better because I am making a bigger impact on the world.  But working in Starbucks for years definitely shaped the way I approach pedagogy in a major way.

For one thing, I have learned how to deal with high-pressure situations.  The store I worked at was extremely high-volume, and there was never a shortage of drama.  Sure, I may not have been model employee all the time, but I was reminded of what a good experience it was when I was invited to the holiday party.  And the way everyone looked happy to see me even though I was no longer with the company.  I made a point of telling many people that Starbucks did save my life.  When I first got that job, I was at the end of my rope.  It was there when I needed it.  I may have held onto it longer than I needed to.  But it saved my life, and I am grateful for that.

Growing up in an upper-middle class suburban Jewish household, I did not get a very good education in the school-of-hard-knocks.  If I became a teacher without having worked at Starbucks, I would not be able to relate to my students as it stands now.  I would probably still have many of the prejudices against minorities that I was raised with.  The combination of City College and Starbucks opened my mind to the way people from other cultures behave.  I know, I still carry myself like a sheltered "white guy" sometimes.  This does cause plenty of people to raise their eyebrows when they see me.  And sometimes when I visit my friends in less-savory neighborhoods, they think that because I'm a White person walking down their streets, I am either a) a cop, b) crazy, or c) both.  But now, I am a citizen of the world who is only lacking experience in traveling.

And so, my friends, I bid you all a Happy New Years.  Be Safe.  Be Happy.  Don't make any stupid resolutions you can't keep.  And don't lick the yellow snow.

For Deb: A Very Special Eulogy

The following post is going to be a different kind of eulogy.  Usually, a eulogy is delivered by those who knew the deceased best.  However, the circumstances behind the expiry of Deb Tambor deserve attention of even those who knew of her, or barely knew her at all.

I only met Deb Tambor in person once.  I knew her mostly from Facebook.  She and I were part of several groups that are for formerly religious Jews.  From her posts, I could tell that she was a kind, sensitive, and thoughtful person.  She clearly suffered much in her life.  Whenever others were suffering, she would offer kind words of sympathy.  She even would try to help them through with it.  She was a very special kind of friend.

The one time I did meet her in person was at a Vietnamese restaurant.  The occasion of this rendezvous was also bittersweet.  Another member of my Facebook circle had just gotten out of the hospital.  He was visiting his parents in New Jersey.  After that visit, he was planning to move to Vietnam.  But those plans were delayed due to a reckless driver.  He and his parents were walking home from synagogue, and this car hit him and his parents.  He was severely injured, and his parents were killed.  So the circumstances of this meeting were celebrating said friend's recovery, but also sad that he now had to live the rest of his life an orphan.

Deb showed up toward the end of the meetup.  We did not really speak much.  I'm pretty sure I introduced myself to her.  But one thing about her did stick out--her smile.  She had these dimples, and they made her smile very contagious.  She spoke rather quietly, but there was a certain impact to her words.  I could see that she was a very gentle person, but could be tough when she needed to be.  I regret now that I did not get to know her better.

When I heard the news last night that she passed away, my heart sank.  Although I barely knew her, I still felt very saddened.  But then, little by little, the circumstances behind her death became known:
While I do not know all the details
While most of what I know is heresay
this much is known

She had been fighting a very harsh custody battle with her ex-husband and losing.

Now I understand a mother being barred from ever seeing her children if she was abusive.  I understand if she is seriously mentally ill.  I understand if she is unable to care for herself or her children.  And I especially understand if she is a criminal.  These are good reasons for a child to be barred from seeing their mother.

But to the best of my knowledge, DEB TAMBOR WAS NONE OF THE ABOVE!

It is my understanding that Deb Tambor's only crime was that she is no longer a religious Jew.  And this crime was so egregious, that her own FATHER testified against her in custody court!  And the community that her ex-husband lives in all ganged up on her.  They arranged for legal fees, they did everything they could to make sure that these children would never know their mother again.

And even worse.  They vilified her.  That's right, her kids were told that their mother was evil.  They were told to hate their mother.  Their mother, who carried them for 9 months.  Their mother, who loved them.  Their mother, who wanted nothing more than to be a good mother.  To fulfill her biological matriarchal role.  But because she turned away from her faith, she was robbed of this opportunity.

She, a person whose only crime was losing faith in the religion she was raised with--TREATED AS IF SHE WAS A HARDENED CRIMINAL!  

I feel thus compelled to speak out for her, as her own voice will never be heard again.

To those who feel alone in this world.  To those who feel as if they have no companion.  You are not alone.  There are numbers you can call, people you can see, and plenty of help you can receive.  Some of it may even be cheap, if not free.  I may post in the comments (if anyone here is interested).

To anyone who thinks a friend is suffering silently.  BE THAT FRIEND.  Sometimes a simple hug may do it.  But if you know someone who needs help and they're not reaching out themselves, be that friend that reaches out for them.  They may hate you at first.  They may even decide they don't want to be your friend.  But trust me.  Better to be hated for being a good friend than being liked for being a bad friend.

And most importantly, let Deb Tambor not have passed on in vain.  Let us spread the word of why Deb felt compelled to prematurely end her life.  Let the whole world know about the scourge going on in this community she was raised in.  And let us band together and try to end this injustice once and for all.

For Deb Tambor.  For her family.  For her friends.  For everyone that loved her.

And for all the other men and women out there who have wrongfully lost custody of their children.

This post is for you.  All of you.

One member of the group I'm in was very close with her.  He has said that Deb only wanted to help others.  She wanted to make others happy.  Although she was dealt a bad hand by this world, she did not take it out on others.  Let us all follow in her example.  Let us make the world a better place in her memory.

For Deb Tambor.

All my love,
   L'etranger Acher.

Tip of the Mountain, pt. 2 (caution, NSFW, you have been warned)

When I first met her, her screen name was Juliet4u.  I may as well have been Montague.  I was no Romeo.  But we definitely were from opposite sides of the tracks.  I'm pretty sure my parents would have hated hers.  And if anything, hers would not have much use for mine.

I did tell my father that I have a non-Jewish girlfriend.  I knew he'd be congenial  Actually, he'd be happy it was a girl.  What surprised me was that my mother was okay with it as well.  I'm not sure how okay she was.  But she told me she knew about the "shiksa" I was dating.  And she didn't disapprove.

At least they never met her in person.  Then they would have disapproved.  Not because of her religion; but because she was a bit--to put it mildly--low class.  She was the type that I would take to nice restaurants, she wanted Burger King or  McDonalds.  I wanted to see a nice art flick, she'd rather see "Win a Date with Tad Hamilton."  I was listening to Grateful Dead, Led Zeppelin, Phish, and Bob Dylan; she wanted Something Corporate, Gwen Stefani, Fall Out Boy, and all these Emo bands I can't possibly remember the names of.  I think it's safe to say that whatever we had in common when I was 17 had ended; at this point, it was only a physical relationship.

And this is why it hurt when she told me I hadn't changed in the slightest bit since I was 18.

She had no idea what kind of shit I went through in those 6 short years.
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It was the day before St. Paddy's.  The day before I was supposed to have my fateful meetup that didn't happen.

I was living in a run-down apartment in Washington Heights.  I shared it with 2 Yeshiva University students.  They didn't like each other.  But they were my friends.  We had our good times.  Under better circumstances, that apartment could have worked out.

On that night, something dragged me down to the crossroads.

I'm not sure what black magic was working that night.

But when you were on the amount of weed and alcohol that I was, even she seemed attractive.

She was missing a few teeth, wore too much makeup, and wore fake jewelry.  She was wearing too much of some sort of perfume I can't identify.  But whatever it was, it had some sort of pheromone or other.  Because it made her seem sexier than she really was.

Next thing I knew, I was buying her a drink.  We were sitting in a booth in the bar.  I was trying to chat her up.  She was chattier than I was.  But there was very little up there.  Kind of a busy signal where her EEG patterns should be.  She was a bit high also.  And before I knew it, small talk was over and she was giving me a handjob underneath the table.  She also flashed me her tits twice.  Anything she could do to absolutely entice me.

In the end, she succeeded.

They say your first time should be special.  It should be with someone you like.  It should be with someone you trust.  It should not be some random loudmouthed condescending MILF.

She made us stop by the bodega so I could by her some cheep bodega cheese and some rubbers.  She would not seal the deal without it.  She kept repeating over and over that she was serious about not wanting to catch some STD.  I mean luckily, I didn't catch any from her.  But no matter how many times I agreed to use protection, she still kept carrying on about it.  And even after I had bought them, she was nagging on and on about it.  I didn't like it.  But I was that desperate to finally get it on with a woman.

The only good thing that came out of that night was that I could no longer say I was a cherry.  The other good thing that came out of that night was that she gave a nice blowjob.  I mean she was good.  But I could not return the favor for her.  And she was very cruel and condescending about how terrible I was at pleasing her.

Lesson learned:  don't try muff spelunking when drunk and high when it's your first time and you honestly have no idea what you're doing.  Once you develop some sort of routine or rhythm, perhaps.  Perhaps if I had watched a bit of porn before those days, I would at least have had some inkling of what to do.  But I was boldly going where many men have gone before while wearing blinders and bourbon goggles.  Not a good idea.
_________________________________________________________________________________

We sat in my backyard.  I had the house to myself.  Well, mostly.  My parents were not going to be home until the next day,.  She asked if she could drive over.  I said yes.

Ever have one of those nights you should have been more prepared for what was obviously to come?  That night was one of those nights.

Why else did she invite herself over?

With very little fanfare, she asked me if I wanted to kiss her.  She knew from that time we hung out in the city that I wanted to.  And she was perturbed by the fact that I didn't make my move.  So she told me straight then and there to kiss her.

How could I say no?  I moved in.  But I moved in too fast.

And here comes the lack of experience,  The girls I had kissed before that surely did not enjoy the way I kissed them.  I was too aggressive, they said.  But she actually pulled back and told me very bluntly that she doesn't like being kissed like that.  Less tongue and more lips, she said.  And she demonstrated slowly what she likes.  So after a few minutes, we had a rhythm going.  Sure, it wasn't exactly what she wanted.  She still rubs in my face to this day what a horrible kisser I was back then.  But at least we had fallen into a comfort zone.

And so, we continued to make out.  Not the first time I made out with a girl.  But definitely the longest sustained one I had at the time.  It made me forget just about everything else that was going on at the time.

Eventually, we moved from my backyard to the basement, where we had a fold-out couch.  We were lying there, continuing what we started.  I'm not sure how we got from point A to point B.  All I know is we got there.

Next thing I knew, she was reaching under my shirt and tickling me.  I am very tickling.  And she had nails.  So it was hurting me.  I told her that.  She purred at me "what you gonna do about that?"
_________________________________________________________________________________

Some 4 or so months later, we were sitting together in the basement of the Port Authority waiting for her bus home.  It was 2 in the morning.

And I still couldn't fathom why she was being so distant.

"Figure it out."

If I could figure it out, I wouldn't have been asking her.

"Are you really that clueless?  Ask any girl here.  Any girl here knows the answer."

News flash, I'm not a girl.

We ended up having a pretty animated argument.  The female bystanders were looking at me with half-apprehension and half-pity.  They knew what she was talking about.  They could tell that obviously, I couldn't know.

It was the usual.  I ruined the moment.  I had my chances, I blew it.  I was too indecisive.  She was looking for a man she could hold on to.  Had we met as teenagers, she would have given me all the meaningless sex I wanted.  She's given plenty of that.  Her days of having meaningless sex were over.  Mine were only beginning.  It's really too bad we never hooked up back then, she pointed out.

She also threw in that another reason we're so incompatible is that I'm a Libra.  Now I'm the type who thinks astrology is bullshit to begin with.  So naturally I didn't buy it.  "Uh no, it has nothing to do with our astrological signs being incompatible..."  Funny thing is she's not the first girl to bring that up.  I've had girls call it off once they found out I was a Libra just because our signs didn't match.  Though I'm sure it was more than just the astrological bullshit.

She caught me at a time when I was beginning to break out of the religious confines and I was looking for unbridled hedonistic pleasure.  Her days of hedonism were over and she was looking to settle down.

Either way, good thing we didn't work out.  We would have made each other miserable.

Sadly, she still claims I'm the nicest that any man has ever been to her.  And I'm the only guy she's ever dated that her mother did not completely hate.  Hell, her mother even hated her now ex-husband!  Her mother wished she'd married me.

Why is it that the girl's mother always likes me more than the girl does?  Oh well, at least I know that if and when I ever get married, I don't have to worry about pissing off my in-laws too much.

To Be Concluded...........

The Tip of the Mountain, part 1 (NSFW, you have been warned)

          I never saw her before.  But she was no stranger.

          Thanks to the Information Superhighway, I now had the ability to meet random people from anywhere in the world.  For all they cared, I could be President Clinton.  I could be some creepy stalker looking for his next kill.  Or I could actually be a 17 year old virgin who was looking for an escape from the doldrums of suburbia.

           AOL Chat was the place to be when you weren't doing real life socializing.  Before there was Friendster, Myspace, or Facebook, there was AOL.  And this before Skype, Google+, Twitter, and whatever else kids use these days.

            She might as well have been a creeper as well.  I don't know why we started talking.  Her BFF at the time was one of the people I regularly chatted with.  The two of them had been friends since childhood.  Little did either of them realize what can of worms she was about to open for me.

             I don't know why I gave her my phone number.  Or did she give me hers.  Either way, she wouldn't be the first person I tried befriending from the Internet.  She wouldn't be the first girl I had a thing for.  And she most certainly would not be the first girl I messed things up with.

              She was the first one who said the words "you have a sexy voice".  We had barely even said anything to each other.  She told me I have a sexy voice.  I always hated the sound of my voice.  Hell, out of the few things about me people have complimented, it was never my voice.

               And thus began my first phone-sex relationship with a girl.  Although we never actually saw each other, it was as if this relationship was past PG-13.  We planned a-plenty of sexual trysts for if and when we ever met in person.

                Unlike me, she had been around the bend by then.  She was only a year older than me and already had a pregnancy scare or two.  She definitely knew how to talk dirty a lot better than I did.  I could reach around in the dark and imagine what sort of deeds would turn her on.  Perhaps she was moaning in response to my scenarios to please me.  Or perhaps I imagined I knew my way around a woman's body.  Having only seen a couple of dirty magazines, I knew very little about what women like.

                But she, oh yeah, she was quite good at enticing me.  Perhaps men are easier to please.  Perhaps I in my inexperience would have taken anything.

                The biggest problem with this relationship:  it was forbidden.  You see, she was not Jewish.  She was Catholic, half-Italian, half-Irish.  At the time, this was extremely important to me.  I was not very religious at the time.  But dating Jewish was still something important to me...
_________________________________________________________________________________

Fast-forward 5 or 6 years later.

High school was long gone.  A year and a half abroad in Israel.  Dropped out of college my second time.  I was now in perhaps the lowest point of my career.  No school, no job.  A high regimen of weed, alcohol, music, TV, and junk food.

In a haze of chemicals and emptiness, she reappeared in my life.  Somehow, she hadn't forgotten me.  Said I was the only guy who was ever nice to her.  She had a thing for going for the wrong guy.  They used her.  By now, she was much more jaded.

We sparked up a relationship on AIM Chat, which I still used.  She wanted to meet me in person for the first time.  I agreed.  She and her mother always came to NYC for St. Paddy's Day.  She wanted to meet me.  She told me what time she and her mother expected to arrive in Port Authority.  So I arrived in Port Authority.  The only problem is that this was during a period where my cellphone was lost.  So I had no way of tracking her down.  She later said she tried having me paged.  But I missed it.  We missed each other that day.
_________________________________________________________________________________

4 months later.  I had come as close as I had to hitting rock bottom.  I was now living with the folks in NJ again.  They agreed to take me in so long as I agreed to quit smoking, drinking, and other destructive behavior.  I also had to find a job.

And so, I was forced to abandon that old lifestyle cold turkey.  I'm not going to lie, it was a bitch.  I had support.  But it was a rocky start.  Who wants to hire a recovering stoner college dropout with no marketable skills and very little actual experience?

At this point, I was working a few shit jobs.  One of them was hawking at the Meadowlands.  It was through an agency.  After two days of that, they cut me.  I just wasn't what they were looking for.  On the train ride back, I met Edna.  Edna would later become one of my closest friends.  But that's another story for another time.  Edna and I just happened to be taking the A train together uptown. I  told her I got cut.  She told me to go back to the agency and apply as a cashier.  So I did.

As I was applying for the cashier position, the boss asked to see my resume.  He noticed there was an item about me working at some local bakery for 2 weeks.  He asked if I had any barista experience.  I said that when I worked the bakery, I had to make coffee.  He said "close enough.  Would you like a full time job with benefits that pays $10 an hour?"  How could I say no?

Little did I realize that would shape the next 9 years of my life.
_________________________________________________________________________________
I was scheduled to interview for a random coffee shop at NYU.  The night before that, she wanted to meet me for the first time.

She had tickets to the Carson Daly show.  Alyson Hannigan was going to be the guest that night.  She wanted to take me to see the show.

At this time, she had given up on men.  She was in a lesbian relationship.  That was cool with me.

I stood in that Port Authority.  This time, cellphone in hand.  I was on the second floor, close to the bowling alley.  My phone rang.  It was her.  I asked her where she is.  She said "I'm near the bowling alley."  I shouted "where are you?"  And she shouted back "over here!"  And so, we met for the first time.

She was by no means attractive.  Not by conventional standards.  She had a bit of an overbite and her teeth were a bit crooked.  Her dark brown hair was kind of thin and clipped back.  Her heart shaped face was a bit heavy, but her cheekbones definitely added character to her face.  And her eyes, kind of large and brown, I would call them puppy dog eyes.  And her figure, she was slightly plus-sized.  But not by much.

And of course, as she later made a point of, I could not take my eyes off her tits.  She found that rather endearing.  She even pointed out at some point that night that one boob was slightly larger than the other.  As I later found out, oh yeah, they were a nice pair.

We held hands as we walked down the streets of Midtown Manhattan together.  Nothing awkward about it.  I've been on holding hands relationships with girls before.  I should have known that she was daring me to make a move on her.

We ended up missing Carson Daly.  We arrived too late to be admitted.  Oh well, it wasn't like she paid for those tickets.

The highlight of that night, believe it or not, was when she forced me to accompany her into a Starbucks.  Now back then, I couldn't see the draw of Starbucks.   To me, Starbucks was some jappy corporate franchise that was slowly brainwashing us into uniformity.  Or something like that.  Either way, Starbucks id not attract me in the slightest bit.

I don't remember much else from that night.  I remember we walked to Madison Square Park.  We were lying down and staring at the clouds for a long time.  We were making small talk.  I was still too dense to make a move.

I made her walk back to Port Authority because I was too cheap to pay the Metrocard fare.  This pissed her off.  As a Jersey girl, she never walked where she could drive.  And I was forcing her to get some exercise.

I don't remember much else.  Except she later admonished me for not kissing her good night when she knew I wanted to.
_________________________________________________________________________________

The next day, I had that interview.  Little did I realize this would be the place I'd be employed for the next 9 years of my life.

And the bigger irony.  It was a Starbucks.  The night before, I had half refused to walk into a Starbucks with a girl.  Now, here I was, about to be employed by one.  And thus ended my belated adolescence and began my young adulthood.

To be continued.....