Something Off the Back Burner
Sat., February 23, 01:29 PM
It doesn’t often happen that I have absolutely no idea what I want to write. Sometimes I have composed whole entries while I’m waiting to fall asleep, so that all I have to do is type it up when I’m ready. But for the past week or so, I got nothin’. Wait a minute — what about all those snippets I saved when I had part of an idea? There must be a dozen or so in my writing folder. Let’s try this one.
Autobiographies, a kind of writing I love, are often filled with wistful memories of “being different,” not like the other kids. I’m not sure I see the significance; isn’t that just a fact of life? You just deal with it.
Whenever I told my mother something about what some other kid had or was allowed to do, she would simply say “you’re different.” It was said in a good way; being different was something to be proud of, even if it was hard to live with. “We don’t do Christmas because we’re Jewish.” “That child gets more toys than you because she has no daddy.” (Her daddy had died, a really scary thought. My daddy was better than any toys I might have had.)
So there were no children in the neighborhood like me. So what? One day there would be, right? Like when I started school. Unfortunately, my classmates had not grown with parents like mine, so I was ahead of them. In first grade reading, I was surprised that other kids didn’t know how to sound out words. The more clever ones would recognize a word once they’d been told what it was, but they never figured out a word letter by letter. At the same time, if I said much about it, the teachers would scold, probably afraid I would get a swelled head.
What about Sunday School? I had something more in common with those children, although — surprisingly enough — the Jewish kids I knew from school went to a different temple and Sunday School. The disparity there, incidentally, was not so much religious practice as it was income. I was acquainted with those children, but I wasn’t part of their “set.” I went to Hebrew classes too, which most girls did not do. It was my first experience with another language, and I loved it. (The only other girl in the school was the daughter of a board member, and she hardly ever attended anyhow.)
I went from kindergarten through sixth grade that way. There was no hiding the fact that I always got good marks, but it was hard to find anyone who understood me enough to be a close friend. By sixth grade, however, I had more; I not only had all kinds of books, I also helped out in the library, which meant I had access to lots of books.
In junior high school my guardian angel stepped in. There’s no other explanation; we couldn’t have planned it better. I just happened to sit down next to “Bunny,” who has been my friend now for more than fifty-five years. According to the guidelines of the school system, she should have been a year ahead of me; but her father thought she would benefit by starting later. (I don’t know whether he was right; she has always been one of the brightest people I know.) At the same time, my mother had suggested that perhaps I should skip a grade, but the school system didn’t skip students at that time. “It would separate them from their friends?” What friends? But it worked out just fine.
Through the toughest part of our teen years, Bunny and I were there for each other. She was my support when I thought I couldn’t bear school any more. I did the same for her the year she thought she would flunk out. (That was all psychological, you realize; neither of us was dumb.)
In high school, where students from three junior highs came together, we expanded our group of friends. There were faces I recognized from years before — the old neighborhood, elementary school, Sunday School — but they were acquaintances rather than friends. My friends were part of Bunny’s and my group, and we were all different. We were all Americans, but we all had parents or grandparents who were immigrants. We were Catholic, Protestant, Jewish — there’s some distance between French and Italian Catholics, but I’m not going there. We came from different parts of our city, which implied different income levels or standards of living. Somehow, it didn’t matter.
I think we were beginning to learn, though it was years before I heard it expressed this way, is that friendship does not require oneness of opinion. Your camaraderie is based on what you have in common, not on your disagreements. A Jew can be friends with a Catholic, and a Dodgers fan can still be friends with a Giants fan. A Democrat can be friends with a Republican. All you need is enough consideration for the other guy that you will listen to what he has to say.
Yes, we had friends outside of our own circle. Friends from work, or church, or from other classes. We would all go on to college, but only three or four went to the same one I did. Eventually you learn something else: not all friends are forever. People come into your life for a reason, a season or a lifetime. You understand that they are not there forever, and you are grateful for the time you have together. Your needs may not be the same — you are different, after all — but you provide what the other requires. Maybe it’s just a hug. Maybe it’s the knowledge that someone cares about you.
Sometimes a friend is for life. Consider my friend Bunny. After all these years, what can we have in common? Different lifestyles, different religions, different careers. She had two babies before I got married. Yet her marriage did not last as mine did. (Another kind of friendship: she and her ex are better friends than they ever were spouses.) She travels a great deal, and not just to visit her grandbabies. One of the things we have in common is shared memories, even of things we didn’t experience at the same time. Above all, the experience that tells both of us, each of us would still be there for the other if she needed it.
Well, I’m not thrilled with this, but it was a good exercise. I made myself write when I thought I couldn’t. I guess there’s life in the old girl yet.
