Beautiful writing! No doubt your father loved you and his family immensely, and it was that comfort and security you felt when you were around him and not subjected to the intense vapors of cigar smoke. My dad, also born and raised in Brooklyn, went to work while in high school to help support his family. He never completed high school. Got a job as a longshoreman returning from Europe after WWII and later worked as a mailhander for the Post Office at their huge facility near the Brooklyn Bridge. He was always strong and powerful, smoked a pipe almost every day and until his death at 92 he continued smoking, walking up 3 flights of stairs with groceries and fruit from the local store and settling before the TV in his rent controlled Brooklyn apartment to watch another episode of Mannix or the Rockford Files. A blue collar Brooklyn Hillbilly Jew. Scared of nothing. Fearless. Modest. He was gentle, loving, kind to my mom and they enjoyed a long and happy marriage. An awesome role model for me, my sister, and all his grandkids. To this day I miss the smell of his pleasant smelling pipe tobacco, either Cherry or Cavendish. Big Abe!
I love, love, love this!! So many of my academic colleagues had well-educated, pretty well-off parents, and I think a big part of the difference between how they write (aspiring to be a part of the “elite”) and the way I write (to connect with people) has to do with “class” stuff. I bet your blue collar Brooklyn Hillbilly Jew and my salesman Brooklyn Jew would have enjoyed watching Mannix together!
Absolutely beautiful writing, thank you! I suspect our fathers were of the same generation, although mine leaned more toward science. He was the best educated man I've ever known, taking every opportunity to learn that was presented to him.
Like your father, mine was a feminist, insisting that I go to college so I would have better job opportunities. Meanwhile, I had female friends whose fathers refused to pay their tuition.
Maybe it was the immigrant experience that shaped them, or maybe just personality. Either way, we cherished them, miss them, and are forever grateful to them. 🧡
Thank you! It sounds like your father was more of an actual feminist than mine was. But either way, something was passed down…
Makes me think about how much is yet to be explored about our generation of feminists (I’m guessing our ages are similar), everything that shaped us, and everything we have contributed. We’ve sort of been written out of the current picture, haven’t we? But we persist!!
Re-reading “The Male Body” many years later. Thank you for expressing our eternal emotions through our bodies. We all “know” this; we just needed you to present it to us so we can “feel” it.
Thank you so, so much. I love the fact that you are re-reading that book. Many of the cultural references are stale, I know—a constant liability of writing about culture! It’s good to know the larger ideas still communicate!
We read this and “Unbearable Weight” in my classes I taught years ago. After retiring in 2020, I could not give them away! Your “male body muses” were/are momentous!
I have thought about this many, many times. He was without a doubt one of the smartest people I’ve ever met, and a wizard with words. Whenever I get in touch with the ways he hurt me, my sister, and my mother (not physically), I think about how hard it must have been to have your ambitions cut short in that way. He (and my mother, who my sisters and I wrote about elsewhere) were among the many tragic stories of that generation.
Beautiful writing! No doubt your father loved you and his family immensely, and it was that comfort and security you felt when you were around him and not subjected to the intense vapors of cigar smoke. My dad, also born and raised in Brooklyn, went to work while in high school to help support his family. He never completed high school. Got a job as a longshoreman returning from Europe after WWII and later worked as a mailhander for the Post Office at their huge facility near the Brooklyn Bridge. He was always strong and powerful, smoked a pipe almost every day and until his death at 92 he continued smoking, walking up 3 flights of stairs with groceries and fruit from the local store and settling before the TV in his rent controlled Brooklyn apartment to watch another episode of Mannix or the Rockford Files. A blue collar Brooklyn Hillbilly Jew. Scared of nothing. Fearless. Modest. He was gentle, loving, kind to my mom and they enjoyed a long and happy marriage. An awesome role model for me, my sister, and all his grandkids. To this day I miss the smell of his pleasant smelling pipe tobacco, either Cherry or Cavendish. Big Abe!
I love, love, love this!! So many of my academic colleagues had well-educated, pretty well-off parents, and I think a big part of the difference between how they write (aspiring to be a part of the “elite”) and the way I write (to connect with people) has to do with “class” stuff. I bet your blue collar Brooklyn Hillbilly Jew and my salesman Brooklyn Jew would have enjoyed watching Mannix together!
Absolutely beautiful writing, thank you! I suspect our fathers were of the same generation, although mine leaned more toward science. He was the best educated man I've ever known, taking every opportunity to learn that was presented to him.
Like your father, mine was a feminist, insisting that I go to college so I would have better job opportunities. Meanwhile, I had female friends whose fathers refused to pay their tuition.
Maybe it was the immigrant experience that shaped them, or maybe just personality. Either way, we cherished them, miss them, and are forever grateful to them. 🧡
Thank you! It sounds like your father was more of an actual feminist than mine was. But either way, something was passed down…
Makes me think about how much is yet to be explored about our generation of feminists (I’m guessing our ages are similar), everything that shaped us, and everything we have contributed. We’ve sort of been written out of the current picture, haven’t we? But we persist!!
We just have to write ourselves back in, as you are doing:)
Re-reading “The Male Body” many years later. Thank you for expressing our eternal emotions through our bodies. We all “know” this; we just needed you to present it to us so we can “feel” it.
Thank you so, so much. I love the fact that you are re-reading that book. Many of the cultural references are stale, I know—a constant liability of writing about culture! It’s good to know the larger ideas still communicate!
We read this and “Unbearable Weight” in my classes I taught years ago. After retiring in 2020, I could not give them away! Your “male body muses” were/are momentous!
Powerful, honest and loving. I wonder how your father might have channeled the education he surely would have relished, given the opportunity.
I have thought about this many, many times. He was without a doubt one of the smartest people I’ve ever met, and a wizard with words. Whenever I get in touch with the ways he hurt me, my sister, and my mother (not physically), I think about how hard it must have been to have your ambitions cut short in that way. He (and my mother, who my sisters and I wrote about elsewhere) were among the many tragic stories of that generation.
I come from a family in which generations carried the pain of what the previous generation was denied. Oh, the agony of thwarted ambition.
Thank you. I don’t mean to pry, but I am very taken with your story. How did your mother and father part?
Ok. So later I read more of your work and find that your mother passed early. Thanks again for sharing your story.