New York, New York – Everybody Fits In

The aspiring psychiatrists were attending their first class on
emotional extremes. "Just to establish some parameters," said
the professor to the student from Arkansas, "What is the opposite
 of joy?"    "Sadness," said the student.
And the opposite of depression?" he asked of the young lady
from New York.  "Elation," said she.
"And you sir," he said to the young man from Texas, "how about
the opposite of woe? "The Texan replied, "Sir, I believe that
would be giddy-up."

My mother was never quite normal. I am not aware of any study of the
relationship between being  irrational and the development of dementia in old
age. However, the nice thing about dementia is that aberrant behaviors finally
seem to have an explanation (i.e. it’s just those plaques and tangles on the brain).  

Being an observant Jew gave my mother the perfect opportunity to obsess.
Keeping a Kosher home meant that we ate dairy and meat foods with different
dishes. The two must never touch. Pig and shellfish products were also taboo.

With the insight of a Santa Claus she knew if we sort of accidentally used
the meat dishes with ice-cream.She glared through the window as my sister,
father and myself sat on the front steps eating the forbidden Chinese food out of
cartons. Did the rituals create more anxiety, more opportunities to err or did the
structure provide solace? Our goof ups such as using the wrong fork could be
corrected with a backyard utensil burial and her god was always forgiving as
she recited a prayer in Hebrew; memorized, but not understood.  

Growing up in New York City in the 1960’s, I thought being around strange
people was a feature of urban living. After all, men in layered, unmatched clothing
pacing back and forth, shouting about Armageddon in front of the swankiest
Manhattan eateries barely drew notice. Homeless women carried their life’s
belongings in shopping carts and visitors treaded carefully around drunken bodies
strewn about the Bowery as they veered toward Chinatown and Little Italy. Mom
wasn’t like these unfortunates, but neither was she any type of go-getter like my
sister and myself.

Mom followed all the local news stories, especially any rapes, murders or
kidnappings of young girls. The news clippings followed me to college and beyond.
Yet, she knew little of world affairs and history other than the events surrounding
the Holocaust and the Israeli struggle for survival. It’s not that she was dumb. An
economic savvy in playing the stock market, or perhaps, her ability to compulsively
follow the tedious stock trends earned Mom the money that would see her through
years of widowhood and expensive institutions.

I wish my mother had the kid of obsessive compulsive disorder that made a
person clean and line up all the spices in size order or scrub the pots and pans until you
could see your reflection. Instead, I had the kind of mother who started new projects
and never finished the old ones. Wall paper hung partially stripped. the upholstery
was removed, leaving pins to hold the new fabric in place-for years. Dress patterns
were bought for dresses never sewn and ingredients bought for meals never prepared.
The keys