Curl Up With a Book About Organized Crime

I guess it's about time for an update. Life is proceeding apace. Naomi Seidman is my absolute hero and I cannot believe that I have spent the last week and a half listening to her lecture every single day. Sorry, all future faculty of this program, but you simply will not stack up. I want Naomi to come to Hampshire and be on my committee and keep reminding me how much I love Yiddish and everything about it. Ruth Wisse gave a lecture, too, and I know she's legendary (I mean, she pretty much singlehandedly invented the academic study of Yiddish), and I won't admit it to anyone here, but she made me feel outside the field. She gave a great lecture, but at one point, probably without even meaning it, she made an offhand complaint about how the kids who come to study Yiddish these days don't grow up in the Jewishly rich home that speakers of Yiddish did, and how Yiddish teachers want to start at a higher level, but have to go through the basics of the culture first. And I know she's the sort of person who wishes that mainstream Jewish culture was more than a handful of jokes, and I'm with her there. But something about the way that offhand comment immediately excluded non-Jews from ever "getting" Yiddish made me really disinclined to listen to the rest of her lecture, and deeply colored my feelings about her. Fortunately, I have Naomi Seidman, who's used to teaching mixed-religion classes, and has actually spent a lot of time looking at the intersection of Jewish and Christian culture. I mean, she reads Gimpl the Fool as a story about the Holy Family, and not even a necessarily negative portrayal! She's also teaching all sorts of things about the secret things Jews say about Christians, and it is fascinating. I might even tell you these secrets if you ask nicely. Speaking of which, Night in the Yiddish is a very very different and intensely more honest book. I hope to read it entirely in this form one day, and I wish there were some way of transmitting that back to non-Jewish culture. I'm still not sure how I feel about the kinds of secrets that I'm learning about, although I do understand the minority's need to protect themselves.

I had no intention of being so esoteric here, but I really am in love with Naomi Seidman and it is impossible to really transmit why. Outside of class, warehouse work is grimy and sweaty and some people take to it much better than others, but those of us who have fun with it have lots of fun because, let's face it, pallet jacks are so awesome. Our days are really full, and I am trying to keep some balance (and not spend too much money), and I think I'm managing. Rebecca, Jessica, Paul, Jason, Jeremy, Michael and I spent a lot of time playing Paper Pass (as we have dubbed it) this weekend, and it may become a fixture. I've had some amazing discussions with people about so many things, although really just Jews. I'm trying really hard to get some utterly non-Jewish things in my life for balance, and I'm kind of failing. I need to hang out with Gentiles, I think.

In spite of the longness of the days and the nightly homework, I'm getting a lot of pleasure reading done. Something about being so motivated to do so much Yiddish means I'm also motivated to do non-Yiddish things. Maybe because I have to work so hard to read things in Yiddish, so reading in English is such a relaxing break.

I think people want to watch a movie, and my laundry might be done. This was a terrible update on my life. I apologize.