Melissa Mosley/Columbia Pictures From left, Jonah Hill and Michael Cera in Superbad. I try to watch everything. I have always been a pop culture junkie. Looking for my next escapist fix. In junior high school, I created a giant binder devoted to my addiction. My friends would pass it around, “ooohing” and “ahhhing” over the… Continue reading Surviving Superbad
The New York magazine feature, “Escape from the Holy Shtetel” chronicles the sad story of an American Jewish Family. The would-be heroine of the tale is Gitty. Gitty escaped from her Satmar town only to have her daughter kidnapped and taken back to the town by her ex-husband. The tale paints a picture of two… Continue reading Escape from the Holy Shtetel
I always got confused when a paper asked, “What was your first language?” I didn’t have one language, I had two. For as long as I could remember, I was spoken to in English and in Spanish. My parents had immigrated in their teens with my grandparents to the United States. By the time their… Continue reading Losing the Language
Rich Addicks/AJCPamela Harris, and her husband, Jimmy, are part of a growing a trend in the US, blacks converting to Judaism. I’m black, Jewish and I’m proud! Okay, I’m not but this article, “Judaism drawing more blacks” takes a look at the African-Americans learning Judaism in Atlanta. Correction: Oy vey, I stand corrected. According to… Continue reading Say it loud!
Junot Diaz with his little book. I called my father to tell him about Junot Diaz’s new book, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. I’m not sure which was stranger, the fact that I was calling my father (a rare occurrence) or the fact that I was talking to him about literature (he prefers… Continue reading Calls to the Platano Mainland
The latest newsletter from Bechol Lashon (In Every Tongue), an organization that asks us to “imagine a new global Judaism that transcends differences in geography, ethnicity, class, race, ritual practice, and beliefs,” introduced me to Lacey Schwartz. Lacey’s parents were good at keeping secrets. They didn’t reveal that her biological father was black until Lacey… Continue reading Outside the box
Bess Greenberg/New York TimesYosef Abrahamson, 16, right, with his mother, Dinah, and his sister, Sarah, near their home in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. An recent article, “A Young Man From Omaha, Who May Perfectly Represent Brooklyn,” by Susan Dominus for the New York Times Big City section portrays an interesting picture of some Jews of Color… Continue reading Representing…
Inspired by a line from Juno where the main character, a pregnant teen, refers to herself as a “cautionary whale.” Available at http://teewit.com. Motherhood is hard. And I don’t just mean raising the babies. I mean having them. I mean trying to have them. And yes, raising them is hard, too. After finishing up a… Continue reading Making a baby?
Red Canna by Georgia O’Keeffe An article in today’s New York Times, In Europe, Debate Over Islam and Virginity, explores a debate over Islam and virginity that has broken out in Europe recently. In France, a Muslim man asked to have his marriage annulled when it came to light on his wedding night that his… Continue reading Getting my virginity back
I spent my three-day weekend doing my part to help movie theaters stay open. I’ve been ignoring my Netflix DVDs in favor of hunkering down at my favorite air-conditioned and crowded theater in Manhattan to celebrate the new summer movie season. Did I mention that I’ve always been obsessed with movies? In junior high, I… Continue reading Back on my movie fix
Memoirs of a Jewminicana 