The Zeitgeist

      

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY.

I’m having an anniversary. A year ago I found myself ambling out of the Seventh Avenue offices of the Beth Din of America, the rabbinical court that processes many Jewish divorces in New York. The Beth Din (religious court) is located in a very non-descript office building South of Penn Station in an equally non-descript suite of offices in that building. One could just as well be visiting some city agency or mid-level law or accounting firm. Visually, there’s nothing about the place that would indicate the dramatic life changes taking place within its walls.

The overall vanilla drabness there is perhaps a metaphor for the blah-like feelings I had upon emerging after an hour spent with a panel of heretofore unknown (to me) rabbis, quills in hand as they peppered me with no end of questions on my lineage and that of my now former spouse while they wrote a Bill of Divorce (a “get”) which is essentially the opposite of a Jewish marriage certificate (a “ketuba”).

Although the place is very bureaucratic looking, the atmosphere is comparable to that of a funeral parlor (minus the Gothic crenellations and profusion of interior mahogany, suede and flowers) as you’re not the only person having their life unraveled at the time, so the waiting area is an amalgam of grim, teary and moist-eyed people of all ages and genders, some heartbreakingly young and some surprisingly old.

In the space of 60 minutes 14-plus years of my life were consigned to the permanent past in a divorce I didn’t ask for, didn’t want and that I tried real hard to stop. But you can’t control other people and you can’t control the weather, so I found myself as a reluctant over-50 single still living in my same Five Towns home, still going to the same synagogues, still driving the same car, still having the same cleaning lady (nine years now) and same secretary (eight). Unfortunately, my prior business of 18 years was being severely battered by the recession when my ex bolted from our home a year and a half ago so I had to contend with the dual stresses of personal heartache and professional tzurris. I don’t recommend this to anyone. Thankfully, I have a very loving family and some truly amazing friends and neighbors that helped me through.

The last time I was truly single was around 1995-96 which was way before the ubiquity of mobile phones, Blackberrys, i-Phones, internet dating, text messaging, BBM-ing and the like. It’s been kind of a Rip Van Winkle experience learning the new fangled dating etiquette (yes, there has been a dating paradigm-shift in the past 15 years and it’s not like it was “back in the day.”). First and foremost it has been an odyssey of oddity as older members of the opposite sex are not the same at say, 40, as they were at 25. Many of those who never married have frankly spent way too much time “professionally dating” (going on hundreds of first and second dates) so that they could really just send a video and/or they’ve spent so much time living alone that the concept of sharing everyday life is an unfathomable and alien concept.

Then there are those who have sadly become embittered and jaded by past relationships and /or marriages to such an extent that all new men they meet are tainted with “original sin,” i.e., all men are guilty of being dogs until proven otherwise and the burden of proof on any guy can be exhausting and extensive. These women are often the polar opposite of the wide-eyed romantic and willing young woman of 15 years ago. And there are a lot fewer of them because so many ladies between 35-45 are married now with kids.

Manhattan is the center of middle aged (and all ages really) single life, so I’ve put my EZ-pass to work along with my rear “Bumper Buddy,” and trucked a lot into The City to meet and date. The Amex card also has gotten some exercise. Many women find me to be “G.U.” (geographically undesirable) as their world ends at the East or Hudson Rivers but I’m not moving back into some tiny place in Manhattan if I can help it. That’s why God invented cars, EZ-pass and the LIRR. (Well, maybe the Devil invented the LIRR).

So far I’ve not been able to re-create the bright sparks and deep chemistry (both emotional, intellectual and physical) of prior committed relationships but its only been a year now and Spring is finally here, my pink tulips are in full, glorious bloom and I’m thankfully dating. I’ll keep you all periodically posted on my social progress in this second-life quest for middle-aged love. You can read some of my prior blog posts on this subject at Wuugu.com and look in this space for ongoing tales of adventure from the suburban single and fabulous.

The Zeitgeist

        

Scrambled Matza Brei, Shmura Matza whole (hopefully and preferably). The Streit’s factory on Rivington Street and four small cups for the four cups.

Tips for a Happy Passover

Passover begins Monday evening and with that the eight day gastrointestinal endurance contest with matza and matza-related products. Matza is called “the bread of affliction,” I think no so much as a metaphor for the oppression endured by the ancient Israelites (what’s an ‘Israelite’ anyway? A slimmer Jew before the invention of Eastern European Jewish cooking?) than for the calcifying and immobilizing effect that matza has on so many of us.

There are some foods I only eat this time of year. To combat the aforementioned matza, I consume copious amounts of dried fruit such as apricots and prunes. There are my two favorite Passover breakfasts – Matza Brei (scrambled, loose – don’t talk to me about pancakes…) and one that must surely have originated in the shtetl – boiled potato and hard boiled egg in water, mashed together. At no other time of the year would I remotely consider such a concoction, yet, at Passover I relish and look forward to it. Oh, and Macaroons. Honey nut, preferably.

In the matza area, I’ve become a convert to Streit’s Whole Wheat. It’s got lots of snap, wheat taste and most importantly, fiber and bran. Streit’s also has spelt matza which has a smooth taste, I’m a Streit’s purist owing to the effect New York City water has on the taste of their matza, much as city water has beneficial effects on bagels and pizza dough. For the Seder, Israeli shmurah hand-made round matza. Why? Less expensive than Brooklyn-baked shmurah and most importantly – the Israelis manage to shrink-wrap these round matzot and ship them 6,000 miles without breaking most of them, whereas the Brooklyn variety are tossed into flimsy boxes and then jostled in trucks by Samsonite Luggage commercial gorillas and then arrive at your Seder with two pieces intact out of a four pound box. Oh, and the Israeli variety costs less generally despite the long journey and you get to help Israel.

Some Seder suggestions – The Four Cups: Most folks break out their fine crystal goblets fit for Henry VIII at Windsor Castle. They look great on the table but when filled with wine, most Seder participants find themselves staring at eight or more daunting ounces, so many people just take a few sips instead of fulfilling the obligation to drink a full cup. Others actually chug the whole thing and end up seriously buzzed way before the second cup comes around. The religious requirement is actually in the area of three to 3.5 ounces. To make the Seder ritual of The Four Cups more meaningful and achievable our family procured a nice set of hand painted ceramic four ounce wine cups that we use for the Seder. This way, people aren’t intimidated or prematurely inebriated and most everyone actually drinks four cups.

Drinking at the Seder is essential to both make the occasion joyous and to make spending many hours with your extended family more palatable. Because the story of Passover goes from slavery to freedom I generally start the first cup with a very dry wine, (also low residual sugar helps retard early intoxication) a semi-dry for the second cup, semi-sweet for the third cup and sweet wine for the fourth and final cup when we delight in our liberation from slavery. Get good wines, treat yourself and your guests. Everything is better with better wines. Would you buy an anorexic brisket? In The Five Towns go down and see Moshe Fink or Fay at Chateau de Vin (www.OnlyKosherWine.com ) on Central Avenue in Cedarhurst. All they do is kosher wine. Moshe has an encyclopedic knowledge of every grape ever pressed into sacramental service and he’ll let you taste just about anything before you buy it.

Some other Seder tips – Because of Daylight Savings Time, most Seders will start pretty late (after sundown). Crankiness can be mitigated mightily by urging one’s guests to have a snack or light meal at 5:30 or 6:00 so they don’t arrive famished and so the Seder meal is not mimicking a post-Ramadan break fast or frat house food fight. Also, inject humor. I love tossing jokes in between segments of the Haggadah. The holiday ought not be dour or dull. Google “Passover Jokes” and print some out. A good place to go is www.Bangitout.com, they’re got a lot of funny stuff. If most of your guests don’t understand Hebrew, do the Seder mostly in English. More important that the evening have meaning than be viewed as mumbo-jumbo or voodoo incantations. Very best wishes for a Sweet and Happy Passover!

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The Zeitgeist

               

Ah, Spring Daffodils! And the weather will break 60 finally on Sunday! One of my favorite movies, “Dr. Zhivago,” and the Route of the Dashing Dan, the LIRR.

Morphing Into Daffodils and Slogging Through the LIRR

The weather people are forecasting temperatures finally, finally hitting the low 60’s on Sunday and staying that way at least through mid-week. Can’t come a moment too soon as I’m scheduled to attend my first Mets home game on Monday evening and there’s nothing quite as uncomfortable as watching baseball as though it were November football – that is, in the freezing cold. Also, as I wrote last week, my tulips are is desperate need of solar radiation. Thankfully, as you read this, the daffodils are in bloom throughout the neighborhood.

The Mets, I’m happy (and relieved) to say have acquitted themselves somewhat respectably in their first week of play on the road against some very good competition, so its not an embarrassment of any kind for people hither and yon to be publicly informed of my Monday evening plans. As long as they play .500 ball or better, all will be good with the world.

The other night Channel 13 aired Dr. Zhivago, the classic, epic 60’s  film starring Omar Sharif along with the luminous Julie Christie and Geraldine Chaplin and directed by David Lean. My favorite scene in the movie is when the Zhivagos are snowed-in at Verikeno and we see a slow dissolve through the window of ice crystals morphing into bright yellow daffodils as Winter turns to Spring. Amazing cinematography for its time. This time of year reminds me of that cinematic moment as I’m highly partial to flowers of any and every kind.

One of the reasons I so enjoy living here in the suburbs is because of  our bucolic surroundings (except for January through March) and I’m one of those people with no hankering for Manhattan, finding it dirty, claustrophobia-educing, cramped, crowded and expensive. I’m also hardly enamored of the Long Island Rail Road, which I try to avoid.

So, unfortunately, on Monday afternoon I had some meetings in Midtown and Midtown means the LIRR as parking there is something like $200 an hour. Newsday recently reported what we all probably already intuitively know: A recent study by the Citizens Budget Commission of the nation’s Top 10 commuter railroads rates the LIRR as one of the most inefficient commuter railroads in the country.  Quoting Newsday: “The LIRR pays 57 cents for each mile that a passenger travels, the highest of all the railroads included in the study and well above the 37-cent average. The LIRR also ranked ninth worst out of 10 in cost per active vehicle, and eighth in cost per mile of service. It was seventh in cost per passenger trip and sixth in cost per hour of service.”

Now, the LIRR is blaming some of this on “unfunded pension liabilities” that the MTA inherited from the formerly independent LIRR back in 1965! The railroad is saying that very soon there will be more people drawing pension benefits than actually working!

The bane of virtually every governmental institution in the New York area (and much of the country) are pension mandates and lifetime benefit entitlements after as little as 20 years on the job in an era when people (thankfully) live into their 90s. Many of these pension schemes were devised when the average life expectancy was 67, so the actuaries who concocted these plans thought only a few people would live long enough to seriously collect on them. As we’re seeing, this is unsustainable from a financial standpoint. The solution will bedevil and encumber us for years to come.

There are other quality issues plaguing the LIRR as well, such as why on an 8:08 p.m. Babylon Branch train from Penn Station there were no seats available and tons of people were jammed-in standing with an off-peak roundtrip ticket price of $14.50? (I often use the Lynbrook Station because there’s a train every 20 minutes in the evening, as opposed to the one train every two hours on the Far Rockaway branch and because said Lynbrook bound train generally makes the trip in under 35 minutes without changing in Jamaica).

Commuters know of the LIRR’s manifest shortcoming far more than I and deserve medals for bravery above and beyond the call of family duty for slogging into Manhattan on a daily basis on this unnerving of conveyances. Listen-up wives and kids – show some love and appreciation for all the guys scrambling to catch the pre-8:00 a.m. express – it’s an amazing sacrifice made to give you all an idyllic life in the country that they basically see only on weekends.

As for me, I live my live within a few square miles of The Five Towns and am grateful for it each and every day.

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