Hermine’s Morning Joe I happen to be a tea drinker,  but I do like the smell of coffee brewing,  and when the coffee smells especially good I think of my wonderful mother-in-law Hermine. My mother was a good cook,  but Hermine was an extraordinary one.   I,  on the other hand,  never prided myself on… Read More

Macy’s Parkchester,   circa 1960 Selling Pop-Its at Macys Like any red-blooded American girl when I was young I did my share of shopping.   Of course it was a simpler and more personal affair then –  no Amazon Prime or online shopping.  Instead we went shopping with our mothers or our girl friends who… Read More

Me as Helen Morgan, 1964 Theater Dreams When I was very young my parents took me to see the original Broadway production of The King and I and I was spellbound.  I listened to the cast album for hours and I dreamed about growing up to be a famous actress. One of my adored great aunts… Read More

Cooking with Gas “Now you’re cooking with gas.”,   my grandmother used to say.  I thought of her after Hurricane Sandy hit New York on October 29, 2012. Although we live uptown,  our proximity to the East River puts our apartment building in the city’s infamous flood zone A.  When Sandy made landfall that day,… Read More

Unleavened Passover is a joyous holiday when we Jews celebrate our freedom from bondage in Egypt.  Every year at the Seder we retell the story of our ancestors who followed Moses across a desert in search of a new home in the Promised Land. The Bible tells us that these ancient Hebrews left in such… Read More

Passover Shopping List Shopping for Passover last week I found myself laughing again over something that happened many years ago. We were having 10 for Seder,  and after calling the butcher to order lamb for my traditional stew,  I wrote out a long shopping list for everything else I needed,  and headed for the  supermarket.… Read More

And Things That Go Bump in the Night It’s been one week since we started our unplanned Covid 19 quarantine/staycation and I’m still reeling with the disbelief and the worry.  And each day brings news of people we know or of well-known personalities who’ve been affected. Yesterday we learned of the coronavirus-related death at 81… Read More

9/11  I’ll never forget the date my husband’s college roommate Joel came from Newton, Massachusetts to spend a few days with us in New York – it was Monday,  September 10, 2001. On that Monday Joel drove down from Newton to New York’s JFK airport.  His cousin and her three kids were arriving from Israel… Read More

Call Me By Their Names My parents named me Dana after two relatives they never knew – my father’s grandmother Dinah who perished in czarist Russia,  and my mother’s uncle David who drowned as a teenager in the Rockaways. I like my name and never minded that it’s a bit uncommon, but it’s always disconcerting… Read More

Minyan – for Uncle Sol I don’t think of myself as an especially spiritual person, but after the death of my husband’s uncle Sol,  I had a religious experience. Sol,  who died just short of his 96th birthday,  was a surrogate father of sorts to my husband,  and grandfather to our son,  and a much… Read More