Becoming a man

Steve with mom, brother and sister on his bar mitzah

Here he is with all the accouterments of manhood: glasses, wine and a cigarette

Standing in front of the synagogue on the day of the event.

Recently Steve opened his childhood safe (I am amazed he remembered the combination). Amongst the baseball and basketball ticket stubs were some negatives from his bar mitzah which he now can print out. Thirteen seems young to become a man but that is tradition for you. He is standing in front of the Seabreeze Synagogue, a name I would think more appropriate for a motel. The D train (now a different letter) is behind him. Behind the train, is Trump Village where he lived. Named for Fred Trump, a developer of middle class housing, not to be confused with his more glamorous son The Donald.

The other day, Naomi asked why Indians hate Jews so much.

Huh?

She is friends with two Indian American sisters. In their house, there are paintings of what appeared to her to be swastikas, lots of them. Were her friends closet Nazis? Do they know that she is part Jewish?

I told her that her friends were probably Hindu. This 'swastika' symbol  was co-opted from them.