new age of diversity. They had met at a student cafeteria at Brown University, where Charlie had been a senior and Carol a sophomore.
âHe could have been a Hawaiian,â Carolâs
mother said in an offhand moment after imbibing too much champagne at a
welcoming dinner in the Greenwich, Connecticut, home of Carolâs parents, Mr.
and Mrs. Clark, after they had returned from their short honeymoon in the
Berkshires. It was a tiny slip of the tongue and in conflict with the familyâs
Wasp tradition of reserve. When he was in the company of Carolâs parents and
relatives, Charlie always felt an oddly forbidden sense of guilty pleasure in
the knowledge that he, the Jew boy from the old ghetto land, had absconded with
the heart and body of this âBlonde Goddessâ sorority girl of legend and
entitlement.
Charlieâs parents,
liberal and progressive to the core, wore a façade of complete acceptance. When
they slipped in front of Carol, it came in the form of a joke, as in an
occasional remark from Charlieâs father that âshiksas made the best wives.â
Pure shtick, Charlie would say, laughing without any attempt at rebuke.
Charlieâs mother, in a typically Jewish Burns and Allen riposte, would remark
that there was nothing more domestically satisfying than a nice Jewish husband
for any girl, especially a shiksa.
It was a case, they both agreed, in
which true love trumped tribal affiliations and outmoded irrelevant rituals. Of
course, Charlie knew he was irrevocably and inescapably branded a Jew by his
name and to some, his looks. He was comfortable with that. It was, after all,
who he was, and he had too much pride to reject the idea that he had sprung
from an ancient people who had survived centuries of persecution and pain. Just
because he was not into their God fantasies didnât mean that he didnât consider
himself a Jew. He could never reject such a notion and he made no effort to
hide his pedigree. Carol accepted it fully and completely and gave him no
reason to think otherwise. She hadnât converted, which was okay with Charlie.
There was no need to. She had equal pride in her Christian antecedents.
Nor did they feel any sense of
compromise. The world had changed and they were part of it. It never occurred
to him that he was watering down the faith and she never acknowledged any hint
or attitude that she had surrendered to an alien horde.
From the beginning,
Carol and Charlie had asserted that they would be aggressively
non-denominational and if they had children they would allow them to choose
what religion they wished to identify with or none at all. Nor was it an issue
between them. There was one small concession about identity that Carol had
adopted early on. She called herself Carol Clark Goldstein. It was the name she
used in business as an advertising executive and in her personal relationships.
Completely supportive, Charlie would always introduce her to strangers with her
three names.
Their social and
business circles consisted of people of all persuasions, political and
religious, and all skin tones and accents. The old boundaries of past
generations seemed extinct in their own, although occasionally a word or
gesture might hint of a mild imagined reaction in someone observing Carol when
they were introduced. Goldstein? Funny, you donât look Jewish. Later they would
chuckle over the observation.         Â
As for their daughter,
with a name like Goldstein how could she deny that her father was a Jew? In
fact, as she matured, she was rather proud of it, although she stayed on the
edge of any formal affiliations with Jewish groups and shrugged off those areas
still cordoned off by prejudice against Jews. She could not understand the
bigotry, the extent of which surprised her once she got to college, but she
didnât lose any sleep over it, thinking those who practiced such sentiments
were bigoted
âHe could have been a Hawaiian,â Carolâs
mother said in an offhand moment after imbibing too much champagne at a
welcoming dinner in the Greenwich, Connecticut, home of Carolâs parents, Mr.
and Mrs. Clark, after they had returned from their short honeymoon in the
Berkshires. It was a tiny slip of the tongue and in conflict with the familyâs
Wasp tradition of reserve. When he was in the company of Carolâs parents and
relatives, Charlie always felt an oddly forbidden sense of guilty pleasure in
the knowledge that he, the Jew boy from the old ghetto land, had absconded with
the heart and body of this âBlonde Goddessâ sorority girl of legend and
entitlement.
Charlieâs parents,
liberal and progressive to the core, wore a façade of complete acceptance. When
they slipped in front of Carol, it came in the form of a joke, as in an
occasional remark from Charlieâs father that âshiksas made the best wives.â
Pure shtick, Charlie would say, laughing without any attempt at rebuke.
Charlieâs mother, in a typically Jewish Burns and Allen riposte, would remark
that there was nothing more domestically satisfying than a nice Jewish husband
for any girl, especially a shiksa.
It was a case, they both agreed, in
which true love trumped tribal affiliations and outmoded irrelevant rituals. Of
course, Charlie knew he was irrevocably and inescapably branded a Jew by his
name and to some, his looks. He was comfortable with that. It was, after all,
who he was, and he had too much pride to reject the idea that he had sprung
from an ancient people who had survived centuries of persecution and pain. Just
because he was not into their God fantasies didnât mean that he didnât consider
himself a Jew. He could never reject such a notion and he made no effort to
hide his pedigree. Carol accepted it fully and completely and gave him no
reason to think otherwise. She hadnât converted, which was okay with Charlie.
There was no need to. She had equal pride in her Christian antecedents.
Nor did they feel any sense of
compromise. The world had changed and they were part of it. It never occurred
to him that he was watering down the faith and she never acknowledged any hint
or attitude that she had surrendered to an alien horde.
From the beginning,
Carol and Charlie had asserted that they would be aggressively
non-denominational and if they had children they would allow them to choose
what religion they wished to identify with or none at all. Nor was it an issue
between them. There was one small concession about identity that Carol had
adopted early on. She called herself Carol Clark Goldstein. It was the name she
used in business as an advertising executive and in her personal relationships.
Completely supportive, Charlie would always introduce her to strangers with her
three names.
Their social and
business circles consisted of people of all persuasions, political and
religious, and all skin tones and accents. The old boundaries of past
generations seemed extinct in their own, although occasionally a word or
gesture might hint of a mild imagined reaction in someone observing Carol when
they were introduced. Goldstein? Funny, you donât look Jewish. Later they would
chuckle over the observation.         Â
As for their daughter,
with a name like Goldstein how could she deny that her father was a Jew? In
fact, as she matured, she was rather proud of it, although she stayed on the
edge of any formal affiliations with Jewish groups and shrugged off those areas
still cordoned off by prejudice against Jews. She could not understand the
bigotry, the extent of which surprised her once she got to college, but she
didnât lose any sleep over it, thinking those who practiced such sentiments
were bigoted
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