I grew up in New Jersey in the 1950s. Halloween costumes that you could buy at the five and ten were pretty basic, like a spooky skeleton or a scary witch. But not all families had the money to buy ready-made costumes. The white bedsheet or tablecloth with holes cut out for eyes saved the day. 🍭 We carried brown paper grocery bags to collect our…
After my freshman year in college, I was hired as a counselor at an overnight camp in Connecticut. When I went for the interview in a New York City office, I mentioned my skills as a self-taught archer. They didn’t have an archery program but created one on the spot and offered me a fifty dollar premium. I accepted, my summer job secured. What I…
The three assignments I remember most from high school English are the classic short stories by two famous authors you know—The Pit and the Pendulum by Edgar Allan Poe and The Jumping Frog of Calaveras County by Mark Twain—and a third one written in 1948 by 31-year-old Shirley Jackson, The Lottery. I must have been 14 or 15 when I first read The Lottery, the…
My Grandma Gitel was born Gussie Dickstein in Parritz, Russia in 1891. She lost her mom Jennie when she was very young, possibly at childbirth; her father Izzy (Israel) remarried soon as he could in the custom of the day, needing someone to help care for the family. She spoke ill of her stepmother, an unpleasant woman who singled her out for harsh treatment and…
In this year of the pandemic, our younger generations will miss the opportunity to attend school in the ways we took for granted—reporting to homeroom every morning, a classroom for each subject, cafeteria lunch breaks, assemblies, interscholastic sports, debate tournaments, proms, field trips, so much more. In my junior high days in the 1950s, we complained about the red romper suits required for gym. Miss…
July Fourth is the big one — city parades with floats, fireworks and firecrackers, high school bands, barbecues and beaches. Memorial Day, the little sibling, normally warrants a short local parade, flags at automobile dealerships, summer clothing sales at the mall, iffy weather in New England. Like today, overcast, damp, not quite reaching mid-fifties. Not many ventured out for gatherings at home or in the park,…
In pandemic days, I am reminded of what makes me stronger. The only catch is, I need to reach back in time to find it . . . . My grandparents, immigrants from Lemberg, Austria, settled on the north shore of Long Island after they left their first destination, New York City, in the 1930s. They raised seven children, the first two of whom were…
I had a BFF, Phyllis, in my Linden, New Jersey childhood. I grew to 5’ 6” but she leveled off at five feet, if that. We went through elementary, Hebrew School, junior high, and into high school together. I often stayed over at her house, where she shared a bedroom with her younger sister. They had an energetic little brother who we considered a pain,…
My parents went to Havana for their honeymoon in 1943, a popular destination at the time. But there are no photos. That seems odd, because my dad was an accomplished amateur photographer with his own darkroom. They came home early. Something happened. They never talked about it to me or to anyone else. There was vague talk in the family about my mom having some kind…
Dear Readers, I am working on completing my memoir this year. This is a chapter about me at age twenty-two: LIFE STORY DATE I graduated college in 1966 with both a cum laude liberal arts degree and a devastating romantic breakup to my credit. I didn’t want to return home to my parents in Linden, so I stayed in my college town and rented a…
What are you most likely to buy at a sporting goods store? My answer—archery equipment! I never got involved in organized school sports. For girls back in the day, that basically meant cheerleading. I never attended a football game even though our Linden High School team, the Tigers, was wildly popular. Instead, I retired to the town library after school to complete my homework before…
BLOSSOMING In the spring of 1956, when I was eleven years old, my Aunt Jean took me and my younger cousin Donna to Washington, DC. I had been on a big trip before, to a vacation in Florida with my grandparents, but this was on a different level, a mission to see the capitol city of the United States. Dressed in brand new pastel-colored topper jackets,…
The kids’ table was a fixture at family gatherings ever since I can remember, so that is at least seventy-two years. With Thanksgiving the week after next and families traveling around the country to spend the holiday together, you may remember your place at the kids’ table too, and not just for Thanksgiving. MY MOM’S PARENTS: For Passover (the Jewish holiday celebrating the Exodus from slavery…
Celebrity Sightings: I’ve never actually met a celebrity one-on-one. But walking around New York City over the years, I’ve seen a few who live there or stay temporarily while on film sets or in Broadway productions. Sightings are fairly common. But residents respect the privacy of their famous neighbors going about their everyday work and personal business. They don’t crowd around them for questions or…
The summer in Wenham had been uneventful. Hot and humid weather for most of July 2019 slowed down the pace of life. Weeding lagged in the garden. Most summers I have been able to tame the flower beds and spread a handsome layer of dark brown mulch. This year, I couldn’t keep up with the crabgrass and so it spread vigorously after each rain, choking…
HERE, THERE, ANYWHERE I began a somewhat nomadic period in my life when I began college in 1962, living in three different dormitories with three different roommates, an off campus studio apartment, then a gracious Victorian mansion divided into apartments. After my despicable boyfriend cleared out our unit of all significant possessions in a midnight massacre—both his, mine and ours—I traveled to future destinations with nothing…
There is a saying, “If a writer falls in love with you, you can never die.” I do not claim such extraordinary powers, literally or even figuratively. But I do know that I can summon memory to shed light, however briefly, on a person who deserves another look.
My college friend Barbara and I took off to Europe two years after college graduation, in early summer 1968. By then I had moved from New Jersey to Boston but we reunited for the trip. This was my last fling before entering Boston College Law School in the fall. We bought one-way tickets to Amsterdam and checked into a youth hostel on the bank of…
I attended a women’s college—Douglass, part of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey—in the 1960s. We had our own separate campus and a highly regarded, brilliant faculty, with a majority proportion of female professors. We were especially proud of the school policy prohibiting sororities, deemed shallow and silly at best, exclusionary at worst. I sought out Douglass for the excellent liberal arts education at…
My parents lived on a block with four new brick cape houses on quarter acre lots. The kitchens of the two middle houses faced each other, about twelve feet apart, with small double casement windows above the sink. Every morning, after putting the children on the school bus, my mom Rose and her neighbor Madge washed the dishes in full view of each other. Same…