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Thursday October 11, 2007

When did my Jewish mother get so cool?

by carol zimmerman

Life was not always easy for my mom, raising my two brothers and me in a one-bedroom apartment in New York City.

She worked every day plus holidays at a local department store, while my father worked six days a week selling lamps at a neighborhood lighting fixture store. Both my parents came home each day from work hungry and tired. And they still needed to make dinner, do the laundry, clean the kitchen and pay the bills.

My mother got married when she was only 19 years old. My brother was born 10 months later. She graduated from Girls High School in Brooklyn with dreams of becoming a nurse, but that changed in 1942 when she met my father, a soldier, and they decided to marry. Dad never finished high school, but he loved the Army and having the chance to see the world.

All my earliest memories of my mother involve her telling me to start dinner, do my homework or help clean the kitchen. I can’t remember my mom ever having the time to take us to the ballgame or volunteer at school. She was too busy making sure we had food for dinner, the rent was paid and we had new clothes for school every fall. In return, we were expected to get good grades in school and to attend our Hebrew school classes.

When it came to paying for my brothers’ bar mitzvahs, it was my mom who decided to pawn the family jewelry rather than ask for charity. She told us it was just a loan.

When I wanted to run away to join the peace movement, or hitchhike to Wood- stock with my brothers, all she needed to say was, “Your father will kill you.” I learned to respect this command.

My mother turns 83 next week. My father died more than 25 years ago, and when she retired 15 years ago, I urged her to move out to California to be closer to my children and me. She reminded me that “you don’t re-root an old tree.”

Fortunately, she agreed to move when the bat beside her bed got used one too many times.

My kids never knew the mom I knew. By the time she moved to California she had learned to drive, bought her first tennis racket and joined an opera club.

She loves making my son’s favorite matzah ball soup, and my friends think the best part of Chanukah is my mother’s latkes. She loves going shopping with my daughter — after 35 years of working at Macy’s she knows every bargain.

She travels back to New York on the pretense of seeing my brother, but we all know that she needs her annual fix of pastrami, kosher rye bread and black-and-white cookies.

My husband I bought my mom her first computer several years ago. When she needs to get her car or computer fixed, you can usually hear her on the phone asking the customer service rep, “Is this the same advice you would give your own mother?” I guarantee that no one has ever taken advantage of my mom.

When I have a conversation with mom it is about the local theater production she just saw, or the new recipe she just learned, or the political speech she just heard. My kids often call her to talk about school, life or just to talk. She has never told them to do their homework or go to bed. She told my son that he was a genius even before he could talk. She tells my daughter that she is beautiful inside and out. And she reminds me every day that I am indeed lucky.

As a child I often felt embarrassed that my mom had to work instead of staying home and baking cookies like June Cleaver. But despite the fact that we never had money to spend on anything but essentials, we were never made to feel poor. We all knew the power of tradition, the value of education and the importance of family.

Perhaps my mom was always cool, but it took my own kids asking “Mom, why can’t you be as cool as Grandma?” to see the truth.

Carol Zimmerman is a marketing consultant and lives in Mill Valley.

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