SMELLS LIKE I am Jewish

ISSUE #18: And you can too!

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

• I am Jewish.

• My grandfather was also Jewish.

• Sometimes I question whether I’m really Jewish.

• Once, in the second grade, a non-Jewish boy called me a “dumb Jew”

• This moment actually gave me a stronger sense of identity.

My grandfather was the last member of my family to speak Yiddish. To him, being Jewish meant speaking Yiddish. He once told an interviewer, “The question of identity, how I am a Jew, is closely entwined with Yiddish language and culture. I understand a little, teach a little, I study, and I am proud of it.” 

This interview I only knew about after his death, because it was written in Yiddish. I would have never seen it, I would have never even known it existed, but the editor of a famous Yiddish-language newspaper reached out to my family to tell us about it. Not only that, but he happily translated the entire interview from Yiddish. 

I am Jewish. One of my favorite things about being Jewish, if not my *favorite* thing, is that it takes very little to get in. It’s like an exclusive club that doesn’t check IDs and offers free trips to Israel. 

Although reading this interview, I do start to question: Is it bullshit to call myself Jewish?

Since my grandfather’s passing last month, I’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about it.

By comparison, I speak no Yiddish, except for the cute little phrases I teach my *goyishe* gf. *Goyishe* is a Yiddish word for “non-Jewish,” and one of the Yiddish words I taught to her, as well as other words like *chutzpah* and *meshuggeneh*. I taught her *shiksa* and she told her parents that she is one. Her parents told their friends and, for her birthday, they mailed her a Jewish cookbook.

This is hilarious I am disgusted by most Jewish food.

I don’t believe in God, I don’t go to temple, and I think of Israel as a Jewish Disney World, in that I think it’s a nice place to visit, but it’s a pain in the ass to get there and the churros aren’t worth the hype.

In fact, I barely even knew what being Jewish was until first grade when my dad handed me a note to give to the teacher explaining I would be absent two days in the fall for Jewish holidays. I was so embarrassed by this that I didn’t tell anyone else why I was out of school.  I didn’t like that extra attention.

To me, being Jewish was embarrassing.

There were no other Jews in my small town in Massachusetts, and I guess word got around somehow. There was a boy in my class named George Clank. I remember he loved the Atlanta Braves and that his father had been a chaperone on a field trip.

I was never close with George and I wonder in part if maybe I did something to offend him. Because later that year, during recess, I ran into him on the playground.

"Get out of my way, you dumb Jew," he said.

It barely registered with me. Honestly, it was a great excuse for me to stop pretending I liked those other kids and go back to my favorite outside activity: leaning against the wall. Right before recess ended, a gossippy girl in my class asked me why I was humping the side of the school.

I told her what happened, and she told me to tell the principal. I told her I didn’t want to make a fuss over it.

I must have told my mom — or maybe the gossippy girl shared her update with an authority figure — because the next day I was called into the principal’s office for the first time ever. When I got there, George was already seated opposite me, and he didn’t want to make eye contact.

He apologized. I forgave him. The whole thing still feels silly to me. I understood then, as I surely do now, that George had no idea what those words meant, and — perhaps wrongly — I still feel embarrassed about making such a fuss.

In that same interview, my grandfather said, “I am a Jew, not religious, although I am a member of a synagogue.”

I’m even less religious than my grandfather, as I don’t belong to a synagogue. I haven’t since my bar mitzvah. But I still feel part of the Jewish community.

In some ways, I’m grateful to George. When I think of the moments in my life when I’ve felt the most Jewish, being called a “dumb Jew” is at the top of the list. More importantly, that I was called a “dumb Jew” and, instead of acting immediately to tattle on him, I thought it over.

It’s another of my favorite things about being Jewish, that we overthink everything. It’s excruciating a lot of the time, but what’s the alternative? Accepting everything at face value?

That’s a *goyishe* game.