Grace Paley (a"h)

I heard Grace Paley read a story (I forget which) at a conference on Women and Judaism at Yale when I was a senior in High School. I bought her book. (or maybe two of them) I became something of a fan, though I had sort of forgotten about that until I read that she died.

...In a sense, her work was about what happened to the women that Roth and Bellow and Malamud’s men had loved and left behind.
To read Ms. Paley’s fiction is to be awash in the shouts and murmurs of secular Yiddishkeit, with its wild joy and twilight melancholy. For her, cadence and character went hand in hand: her stories are marked by their minute attention to language, with its tonal rise and fall, hairpin rhetorical reversals and capacity for delicious hyperbolic understatement. Her stories, many of which are written in the first person and seem to start in mid-conversation, beg to be read aloud.

So go read some, perhaps...

on head coverings

In that wonderful sourceof news, AM New York, I learned that the TSA has a new policy on headgear.

Acc to the TSA:

Head Coverings
On August 4th 2007, TSA implemented revisions to its screening procedures for head coverings. TSA does not conduct ethnic or religious profiling, and employs multiple checks and balances to ensure profiling does not happen.

All members of the traveling public are permitted to wear head coverings (whether religious or not) through the security checkpoints. The new standard procedures subject all persons wearing head coverings to the possibility of additional security screening, which may include a pat-down search of the head covering. Individuals may be referred for additional screening if the security officer cannot reasonably determine that the head area is free of a detectable threat item. If the issue cannot be resolved through a pat-down search, the individual will be offered the opportunity to remove the head covering in a private screening area.

TSA's security procedures, including the procedures for screening head coverings, are designed to ensure the security of the traveling public. These procedures are part of TSA's multi-layered approach to security screening.

On my way to Chicago last spring, as I was waiting to collect my shoes at the end of the screening process, the TSA employee asked (in a voice worthy of a meddling grandmother) "so, what religion is this?"
I though about getting offended, then I glanced over at the two women in headscarfs (one also in a wheelchair) waiting for special screening, thought about the time, and said "oh, Judaism."

I'm told sheitels are good for flying (or at least for passing security) for this reason. But I'm not quite there yet...

Early Interview Week

It feels like this.

Moment:

Interviewing (Tax) Partner: "So, people with a background in Talmudic Law often have an interest in Tax law. Why do you think that is?

of missions, statements

I've been meaning to blog about some absurdities of recently notorious alumni newsletter of my esteemed alma mater. Particularly, the statement that appears, free-floating, on the last page of every issue:

"The creation of the State of Israel is one of the seminal events in Jewish History.
Recognizing the significance of the state and its national institutions,we seek to instill in our students an attachment to the State of Israel and its people as well as a sense of responsibility for their welfare."

(example)

What this assertion has to do with the other things on the page - like who won what math competition or is the new student government president, has always escaped me. A recent lookjed post pointed me to the mission statement of Frisch and things got curiouser:

"The raison d’etre of The Frisch School, as a unique educational institution of Bergen County, is to promote the values and study of the Judaic heritage as defined within the Written Law (Bible) and Oral Law (Talmud). The wellsprings of Judaic values, under whose rubric all others may be classified, are:

a) the dignity of the human being
...
b) the sanctity of the Jewish people
...
c) the centrality of Medinat Yisrael

We believe that the creation of the State of Israel is one of the seminal events in Jewish history. We seek to instill in our students an attachment to the State of Israel and its people as well as a sense of responsibility for their welfare.

(emphasis added)

On to google, and it seems quite a few other schools, including at least one solomon schechter,* use the same language.

*This is relevant to the extent I was surmising perhaps it is an "Association of Modern Orthodox Day Schools" thing...

So what exactly is going on?