Larry is a friend of mine from New York - famous in his own right as editor of the infinitely wonderful "Six Word Memoir" series (although right now he's probably best known as Mr. Piper Kerman - husband to the author of Orange is the New Black which is taking over the world. Okay, enough name dropping. Back to vacation.)
The latest in Larry's series was a small book entitled Six-Word Memoirs on Jewish Life. (I know you're all dying to know how this ties into my beach vacation, which last year didn't go any deeper than tan lines on my elbows. Stick with me.) To promote it, he did an incredibly glamorous book tour to glamorous places like Bexley, Ohio. Since that's near me these days, he called me up, said come sit in the audience and ooh and ahh and encourage book buying and I'll treat you to a beer. Deal.
Hopefully nearly all of you have read at least one of Larry's wonderful books. If you haven't, shame on you, and I'm not going to waste everyone's time explaining them to you. When you finish reading this, go buy that. But for those of you who have read them, you know they're poignant, hysterically funny, heartbreakingly touching glimpses into the lives of our friends and neighbors and idols and future exes, six words at a time. Jewish Life is no different. Full of gems. Larry deftly walked his audience (me, his other glaringly non-Jewish Ohio friend, and about 50 middle-aged to senior citizen Jewish ladies who eyed me openly and sized me up suspiciously) through the six-word story's legend-has-it beginning with Hemingway, up to its most recent rendition. He flashed some of the best excerpts on the screen, and they all oohed in all the right places ("Wait, you've got a little schmutz.") and ahhed in all the right places ("Chosen for something. Not sure what.") and nodded knowingly in all the right places ("Is he Jewish?! Is he Jewish?!") I did my best to hang in there, I really did. I have Jewish friends. I know the jokes, the stereotypes, the history. But I'm also a WASPy little mutt from Ohio, so I come into life - as I came into that room - with my own history, my own family, my own background. So when it popped up on the screen, my eyes rolled back, my mouth opened, and out popped that loud, obnoxious, Jessica laugh (you know it. I know you do.).
My grandmother's tattoo still haunts me.
Six words that silenced that room, until the damn Gentile broke the stillness with her cackle.
The minute it came out of my mouth, I knew.
I couldn't explain - I couldn't start running my mouth about my crazy, wonderful, stubbornly willful, free-spirited grandmother who has for years - YEARS - threatened to get a tattoo simply because the joy of picturing some brand new doctor discovering brand new ink on a not-so-brand new body would bend her over with giggles. I couldn't take the time to tell them about the time she backpacked across France by herself in her seventies. Or the "renovated" RV she bought, dreaming of the open road, but that wasn't put together right so all the drawers flew open and forks went flying as she curved around the exit ramp onto the highway, making her first road trip nearly fatal and her last.
The little old lady sitting behind me leaned forward, put her arm on my shoulder, and said, not quietly but not unkindly, "Honey, I don't think you understand." A six word memoir of her own.
It was mortifying. Truly. I've embarrassed myself pretty much on a daily basis, pretty much since birth. But never, never, never would I want to say or do or, God forbid, laugh at anything that would cause someone discomfort or pain, let alone a whole roomful of people. Larry just stared at me for a second, shook his head to ask me "Seriously?" with his eyes, and then carried on. Oy.
But yes, yes... this is a blog about vacation.
Every year I come to the Outer Banks, and every year on my way, I spend a few days with that aforementioned nutjob of a grandmother.
Her 86th birthday is just a couple of weeks away. Guess what she wanted. How could I say no?
So see, Larry - I wasn't completely making all that up. If you ever get the opportunity to tell those ladies that I come from a crazy Protestant family who does things like multi-generational tattoo outings just for fun, I would so appreciate it.
(yes. multi-generational. the manischewitz made me do it?)
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