I didn't begin eating the leftover Christmas ham until I worked up a big appetite after swimming today. First I asked myself, Can you go swimming, Ruthie, with only two slices of bread and butter in your belly, and a couple squirts of tonic water?
Gee, I think so, I answered.
I swam a good half hour. Had my own lane. You bring your own thoughts with you. That's all you have when you swim. Your thoughts and the water and the other swimmers and the light coming in from the windows. When I pulled myself out of the pool, took off my bathing cap & shook the water from my ears I heard the sound of Russian men in the Jacuzzi. "It's like the bath houses," I thought. The bath houses of eastern Europe. How I wished I knew what they were talking about. Probably business. But they could've been talking about anything.... constipation, plantar's warts, hair loss. Four of them right there in the Jacuzzi far from the motherland.
When I got home I was famished. I pulled out the leftover ham from Christmas and made up a plate. This ham is so good it's like eating chocolates. You just can't stop. I spread some Grey Poupon off to the side to dip the ham into and discovered that I prefer Dietz n Watson mustard.
When we were kids we lived on possibly the smallest street in Shaker Heights. Glenmore Road. All the streets had English names to impress people. There was Westchester Road off to the right, Byron Road straight down the middle, and Rye Road on the left. We knew 80 percent of the residents on all those streets. That's the way it was in the 1950s. Know thy neighbor!
Right next door lived The Turnocks. My dad captured them and us in reels and reels of home movies. My mom and grandmom were constantly comparing us - and particularly me as the oldest kid - with the The Turnocks. Why can't you be like the Turnocks? They were the perfect Leave it to Beaver family.
But guess what? Later on we learned that the 4 Turnock Girls were always being compared to the 5 Greenwold Girls!
Some things never change.
Jews were just making their way into the Cleveland suburbs back then just as different ethnic groups are making their way into the Philly burbs today. The Turnocks had undoubtedly never been intimate with a Jewish family before. What were Jews really like? Was it true they had horns? Were they the Christkillers that many Christian religions actively taught?
The number one thing about the Greenwold Girls is we loved to play. We were always outside playing baseball in the empty field across the street, playing badminton out back, catch on the front lawn. We had a swing set & sliding board out back we used like monkeys in the zoo.
And the smells of food emanating from our house! Mom made sure we were well-fed. And well-dressed. Maybe one reason I love casual clothes today is that we all had to look immaculate. Perhaps this is the immigrant mindset... if they look good, they can't be that bad.
Anti-semitism did exist back then. The first Jews on Westchester Road got eggs spattered onto their windows with some Jew-hating words written on their mailbox. My dad however taught us to be proud of our ancient heritage. "See Georgie Jessel on TV?" He's Jewish. "Groucho Marx? He's a Jew."
My best friends were gentile. Whatever's the opposite of xenophobe, that's me. People like me enrich the gene pool. I'm attracted to people that are very different from myself. My ex certainly fit that description. I introduced Judaism to a whole group of his farm-stock people in East Texas.
After swimming, I came home and started cutting up the ham in thin slices. Suddenly a buried memory resurfaced. The Turnocks ate wonderful sandwiches made from 'shaved ham' or thinly sliced ham from the deli. I had never tasted anything so delicious. Our family did indeed eat pork. As you know, each immigrant generation in America becomes more and more integrated so that the Kosher-keeping among us gave birth to non-Kosher kids.
Most Jews my age remember their Kosher grandparents and the phenomenon of keeping kosher which once served a practical purpose. Thank goodness modern science has proven that eating shrimp is actually healthy.
Please pass the Kelchner's cocktail sauce.
