Yahrzeit Glasses and Other Stuff
Sun., February 22, 10:30 AM
I was thinking that I ought to look for some old (around 1950-1955) issues of The Ladies Home Journal, just to illustrate how manipulative they were. I remembered a monthly feature called “Can This Marriage Be Saved?” The figures on failed marriages were rapidly approaching 25 per cent, and the point of view was to patch and fix, rather than recognize that some of these marriages never should have happened. I’m a compromiser myself, but even I can see that you can bury yourself for just so long before the real you emerges. It’s a terrible thing to commit a girl to a life-long situation before she knows what she really wants.
Anyhow, I began to wonder just when the marketing world began to enter the arena. Y’know, products tastefully portrayed in the magazine would propel the housewife into buying those same products. Matching china and cutlery, a properly set table. I’m still not comfortable with the concept of encouraging people to own what they couldn’t afford. In a home like ours, where a lot of the dishes had been accumulated piece by piece, we only matched for company. The rest of the time, we were lucky to be able to set up a single setting that went together.
It seemed as if I was the only one who cared about the dishes, and I wanted the “pretty fork and spoon.” But you have to remember, I was the one who was usually responsible for setting the table – every night.
By the time I was in college, I had definite ideas about my kitchen, whenever that might come into being. Amazing, when you realize that I wasn’t taking that kind of course; the Home Economics Department really did offer a course about dishes and flatware! But I was certain I would never use plastic or melamine, and I swore my kids would never drink from jelly glasses. Yahrzeit glasses, on the other hand…
Naturally, I need to explain yahrzeit glasses, and I thought about it a little before I went online. The next thing I knew, I was reading the Purple Chai about her father’s yahrzeit.
In Yiddish, yahrzeit – literally, “time of the year” – refers to the anniversary of someone’s death. Children in particular are supposed to observe their parents’ yahrzeit by burning a candle for twenty-four hours and by reciting a prayer in the synagogue.
You may have noticed “memorial candles” on the market shelves next to the kosher foods. They’re in small glasses or occasionally metal containers, generally considered disposable. But for many years, you went into a Jewish grocery store to buy them. They were eight-ounce tumblers designed for reuse.
There must have been more than one manufacturer, because I remember two distinctively different designs. But you saw them in every Jewish household – matching sets – and you were not surprised to be offered a beverage in a glass just like the ones at home. They were not fancy, but heavy, serviceable glasses. You could even drink tea from them. (If you put a spoon in the glass while you poured a hot liquid, it wouldn’t crack.)
The comic Jackie Mason used to joke, “Are you from the Lower East Side?” (That’s part of New York City.) “I can tell if you are. Did you ever drink tea from a yahrzeit glass?”
Some people use an electric memorial light now, but I still try to light a candle. It’s not easy, when you have a cat. I put the tray with the lighted candle into the sink when I wasn’t in the room, and Husband thought the glass was there to be washed. As an orphan, he should have lit candles for his parents, but who was going to instruct him? He still doesn’t get it.
On occasion I have used a designer candle, since it’s less likely to be mistaken for dishes. But in truth, I remember my parents all the time, as I’m sure you’ve noticed. Their grandchildren remember them too. And as long as someone remembers, they’re not really gone.
