June 30, 2009

Sharon Lissauer, Madoff Victim of Mystery

A picture in today's New York Times showed Bernard Madoff victim Sharon Lissauer speaking to the press outside the courthouse after Madoff got his 150-year stretch in the Big House. Lissauer's been quoted and photographed before. But today's image struck me. Take a look -- she was dressed to kill, and I don't mean in the sense of wanting to wring Bernie's neck:

Identified in stories as a "former model," Lissauer evidently made the most of the moment, with her mop of blonde curls, form-fitting sleeveless dress and level of comfort in front of the cameras. Is this woman on JDate? She looks like she'd be a hit.

All the articles reveal very little about her. The New York Post quoted her court appearance from Monday:

"I keep on thinking I'm going to wake up from it but it keeps on getting worse," said Sharon Lissauer. "My life and my future have been ruined. I was always so careful with my money."

"I'm begging him if he has any money from offshore accounts from his family if has any hidden money that he disclose it and give it to victims to they can have a little of their lives back," she added.

"Upon reflection, I think he should spend his whole life in jail because what he's done is just despicable. ... He destroyed my spirit and shattered my dreams."

Lissauer broke down crying as she finished her statement.

Photos show her in her apartment. But otherwise, nothing else about Lissauer shows up on the Internet, a curious absence of details for a model who is much in the public eye.

Who is she?

Van | 09:50 PM | 06/30/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: - Pintele Yid

June 12, 2009

Now That's Entertainment: Air Sex World Championship Competition Hits NY Tonight

Why did this have to be a kid weekend? Otherwise, I'd hightail down to the Highline Ballroom for the New York City Air Sex Finals. Based on the concept of air guitar, "air sex" is, well, use your imagination.

Part mime, part burlesque and all embarrassing fun, the Air Sex World Championships is holding competitions nationwide. New York is the fourth event of 16, ending in Tucson later this month.

The website uses plenty of photos and videos to carefully explain this difficult and demanding new sport. The rules show the seriousness of this exciting new form of entertainment:

Time: Contestants have a maximum of 2 minutes to perform an air sex routine. This can include all phases of an air sex encounter: meeting, seduction, foreplay and intercourse, or you can simply cut to the chase.

Music: Competitors must perform to music, you can either bring a CD of your performance track with you, or you can choose from our selection of air sex music. You may also include an audio prelude to your performance, maximum of 30 seconds.

Other Rules: Unlike air guitar, there are not many other rules. Props are allowed, teams are allowed, talking is allowed. The only important rule is that all sexual climaxes must be simulated, not real.

From looking at the website, some "brand names" are already emerging. Check out the videos of Slut Truffle in the Austin competition, where her tender, emotionally nuanced performances remind one of nothing so much as an air sex interpretation of "Swan Lake."

Down the road, I can see this becoming a hugely successful TV series, "So You Think You Can Do Air Sex?" with celebrity contestants and judges. I suggest starting with the cast of "One Day at a Time" and then move on to "Lost in Space" so we baby boomers can have performers we identify with. After that, celebrity face-offs, starting with Al Roker vs. Bill O'Reilly.

Van | 08:48 AM | 06/12/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Life and how to live it

June 03, 2009

Uncle Obama Wants YOU to Have a Happy Marriage

The oddest commuter-train poster I've seen lately shows a man and woman in bed. The man is asleep, mouth wide open, presumably in mid-snort. His arms are around a woman who looks back at him with that sitcom-familiar look of exasperation and affection. Oh, those men! The ad text refers to "engagement ring, wedding ring, snoring?" which was pretty clever.

The ad could have been for a TV show, but in fact it came from a program supported by the federal government. It directed readers to the website www.twoofus.org. Who exactly runs the site is a little vague:

The National Healthy Marriage Resource Center (NHMRC) is a national resource and clearinghouse for information and research relating to healthy marriages. We strive to be a "first stop shop" for marriage and family trends and statistics, marriage education and programming, scholarly research, and the latest news and events. In particular, the NHMRC also provides training and technical assistance presentations and documents for federally funded Healthy Marriage Initiative grantees.

The NHMRC supports the Administration for Children and Families, furthering its commitment to promote and support healthy marriages and child well-being by providing research and program information and generating new knowledge about promising and effective strategies.

The Administration for Children and Families is part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Is this a good use of "stimulus" money?

Continue reading " Uncle Obama Wants YOU to Have a Happy Marriage"

Van | 06:21 AM | 06/03/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Linkfest

May 31, 2009

The Accountant and the Jews

I did a quick read of The Accountant's Story: Inside the Violent World of the Medellin Cartel. The author is Roberto Escobar, elder brother of Colombian drug boss Pablo Escobar. The book is easy to flip through and full of details about the Escobars and their world. For veracity, I put it on the level of The Goebbels Diaries -- intriguing, but keep in mind the author and the context. For style, the book reads like Soviet realism. Instead of boy meets tractor, it's boy meets coke.

Some other brave author could shake the story and find a completely different view: The Escobars and the Jews. As the accountant for the cartel, Roberto had to figure out what to do with the billions in cash pouring in. One passage was so striking that I marked the page. Tossed off in the book's uninflected style, it reads:

Laundering money could be very expensive, costing as much as 50 percent of 60 percent of the total value. So there were always people willing to do deals. it wasn't just Pablo who had to launder money; it was everybody working in this business. We all knew the people who would make deals. Among the groups well known for cleaning money were the Jewish people with the black hats, long curled sideburns, and black coats. One of our pilots used their services regularly -- because they only charged 6 percent. They wouldn't get involved with drugs, so to work with them you had to have a convincing story of where the money came from . . . . At that point the money in the suitcase belonged to him. I had two huge guys there with handguns and this little guy would take that suitcase with millions of dollars in cash by himself and wheel it through the streets of New York.

As they say, mazel v'bracha!

In other places, Roberto discusses his brother's security arrangements. As with money laundering, he knew who could provide quality service:

Pablo began his war to defend himself from our enemies by transforming his sicarios [assassins] plus dozens of other men into a trained force. The pilot Jimmy Ellard testified in court that he told Pablo that the security was not good: "And the best thing you can do is employ American Green Berets." he said he had contacts in America to accomplish that, he said. Pablo said thank you very much, but informed him that he had hired his own military people to do the training,. Later it was learned that these were Israeli and British mercenary soldiers hired to train people in the methods of warfare that would be necessary.

Somebody with a keen investigative bent could look at these tossed-off lines and come up with an unnerving book. Maybe it's already out there, for sale in fine synagogue gift shops everywhere.

I'll look next at Killing Pablo by Mark Bowden, book that is supposed to be a movie for release one of these days.

Van | 12:50 PM | 05/31/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Natural disasters

May 25, 2009

Shoe Porn, Male Division

Women and shoes, shoes and women -- that's what makes the world go around, to paraphrase Lenny Bruce. He actually said something spicier, but you get the point.

I've always told friends that women have most of the fun in life in the fashion arena. Shopping involves such drama, such choice, such consultations, so different from the find it-size it-buy it approach men take. The looks has to be right for the occasion, the style has to say something, the heel has to be just the right height.

I decided I wanted to get in on the action, and recently I find the male shoe porn guide at, of all places, the Sears store in Danbury, Connecticut. There, I found the spring 2009 workboot catalog. While this footwear won't get applause during Fashion Week in New York, the collection had me eagerly thumbing through pages thinking, "I want this and this and, yes, those." What did I see?

Continue reading " Shoe Porn, Male Division"

Van | 10:19 PM | 05/25/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Life and how to live it

May 21, 2009

Aunt Charlotte Chronicles: "Vaa-yun, Where's My Letter?"

My brother Cooper and I were young and puzzled. Our mother Shirley and her older sister Charlotte sometimes talked about “Dear Momma” and “Dear Poppa.” Who were they?

Mom explained, “When we were little girls, we saw our mother writing letters. Charlotte and I asked her, ‘Who are you writing to?’ And our mother told us, ‘To Dear Momma and Dear Poppa.’” That is, my grandmother Eva Lissner wrote to her parents, Esther and Lehman Michelson of Gonzales, Texas. So granddaughters Shirley and Charlotte forever referred to their grandparents as Dear Momma and Dear Poppa.

I always associate this story with the fast-vanishing grace of letter writing. Esther and Lehman, my great-grandparents, were born in the 1860s, so the family chain of devoted correspondents goes way back. In my mind's eye, my grandmother Eva saw her mother Esther writing to her mother Charlotte (my aunt's namesake) and back into time’s embracing mist.

Continue reading " Aunt Charlotte Chronicles: "Vaa-yun, Where's My Letter?""

Van | 08:24 PM | 05/21/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Life and how to live it

May 16, 2009

Out of the Orange and Into the Black: Life at Princeton and Beyond

[Princeton University, my alma mater, holds its Reunions weekend at the end of May. Next year I'll have my 30th reunion for the Class of 1980. Looking ahead to that, I'm looking back at the essay I wrote for the 25th reunion book in 2005, edited for a general audience with bracketed comments updating the essay four years later.]

Even before my first class (Spanish 101 at 185 Nassau Street, consistent of Arlene and 15 guys), Princeton was a disaster, and it never improved. On the Outdoor Action camping trip before Freshman Week I sliced my hand open with a knife, severing two tendons, and ended my first week of classes in surgery at the Princeton Medical Center, not partying. A cast covered my left arm halfway up to my elbow for the next six weeks.

Fall of sophomore year I took Math 103 on a pass/fail basis -- and failed. Has this ever happened in the history of Princeton? I doubt it.

Continue reading " Out of the Orange and Into the Black: Life at Princeton and Beyond"

Van | 10:41 AM | 05/16/09 | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Life and how to live it

April 26, 2009

Our Hairy Jewish Bodies, Ourselves

Let’s not beat around the bush. I’m that hairy Jewish guy, built more like Esau than Jacob, who comics and cartoonists love to lampoon. While I’m bald on top, genetics compensated me with swirls of fur everywhere else: arms, legs, shoulders and back. I’d be a terrible criminal because I leave curly DNA evidence everywhere I go.

The look has pleased me since a line of hair first ran down my chest starting in the seventh grade. An early bloomer, I was. I still delight to see the hair poke up at the top of my shirts, like a wash of black foam on a beach of skin. At real beaches, I shuck my shirt to stroll about in my barrel-chested Russian-Jewish glory. At my health club, sleeveless t-shirts display my shoulders and their halo of hair, what I see as a living tattoo of shapes, shadows and textures.

Continue reading " Our Hairy Jewish Bodies, Ourselves"

Van | 10:36 PM | 04/26/09 | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Doing Jewish

April 05, 2009

Futurenews: Pope Goes Ballistic Over Obama Gift Goof

JUNE 1, 2009: Pope Benedict XVI had to be restrained by a squad of Swiss Guards today after he reacted negatively to gifts presented to him by President Obama during his first visit to the Vatican.

The episode represented the latest misstep by the President in his meetings with world leaders. Ill-conceived gifts have led observers to question the President and the State Department's grasp of diplomatic protocol.

Sources said the meeting in the Pope's office went well until it entered what diplomats call the "Christmas morning" phase. President and Mrs. Obama had four gifts in brightly colored wrapping for the Pontiff, born Joseph Ratzinger in Bavaria, Germany in 1927.

He eagerly unwrapped the first present, which turned out to be a collection of flavored condoms. "He found the gift to be of questionable taste and not appropriate for the Successor of the Throne of St. Peter, and he expressed that point clearly to the Obamas," said a source. "The President said the Pope should 'chill,' advice that the Holy Father did not hear."

Continue reading " Futurenews: Pope Goes Ballistic Over Obama Gift Goof"

Van | 11:01 AM | 04/05/09 | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: - Across the Pond

March 26, 2009

Idan Raichel Project Rocks the House in Ridgefield

I had never even heard of Israeli musician Idan Raichel until a few weeks ago when a friend tipped me off to Idan and his group, the Idan Raichel Project. Based on the good taste of my music source, I bought the new CD "Within My Walls" at the Virgin Megastore early in its closing sale. I liked the CD, but the mix of languages and styles made it hard for me to get a grip on the music. My image of the music tied very closely to Idan, a fashion-forward looking guy in dreadlocks on the cover of the album.

Still, I jumped at the chance to expand my music horizons last Sunday when the Project played, improbably enough, at the Ridgefield Playhouse here in the Nutmeg State. I snagged second-row seats, which gave me and a friend a fantastic view of what turned out to be an amazingly memorable performance -- one of the bravura music shows I've ever seen.

What the CD barely even hints at is the Project's great stage presence. Looking at the CD, I thought of the group as a one-man sort of operation, Idan center stage, dreadlocks gently swaying like Hebraic seaweed to the tune of mellow Kenny G-like vibes.

Wrong, wrong, wrong. While the group leader, Idan stayed to stage left behind his electric keyboard and let the other nine members of the group carry the show. The musicianship and great vocal power of two women and a man created a varied, propulsive show that I didn't want to see end -- it was that good. Even the pacing worked well, as tempos and moods varied.

The evening ended with enthusiastic standing ovations, lots of picture taking (the Project didn't mind at all), and a real sense of people coming together under a common musical experience. I've listened to the CD more since then and it hangs together much better now that I have visual images to connect to it.

If you see the Idan Raichel Project coming to your town, then run, don't walk, to get tickets. Tell them Van sent you.

Van | 10:07 PM | 03/26/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Doing Jewish

March 20, 2009

Shards of Faith, Reassembled

I wear a chai — the Jewish letter symbolizing life — around my neck. I’ve studied Hebrew and Yiddish, have visited Israel, subscribe to Jewish newspapers, and have been told I look rabbinical. In fact, my great-great-grandfather, Heinrich Schwarz, was the first ordained rabbi in Texas.

Hearing this religious background, you would never imagine my spiritual journey began as a New Testament-reading, hell-fearing member of the First Baptist Church of Mission, Texas. How the heck, so to speak, did that happen? And how did I return to Judaism?

Continue reading " Shards of Faith, Reassembled"

Van | 07:06 AM | 03/20/09 | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Doing Jewish

March 17, 2009

Justice for Bernie: Waterboard Him, Over and Over

The Forward newspaper ran an article recently about possible punishments for Bernard Madoff. It says,

Life in prison is considered probable for Madoff, who pleaded guilty Thursday to 11 criminal charges. But that’s just for starters. How about toilet-cleaning duty in the slammer, a job as a Wal-Mart greeter or simply oblivion?

I found all these suggestions surprisingly pedestrian. I think Madoff should be treated for what he is: a terrorist who undermined the financial system of the United States, especially the Jewish community. In moral terms, he is no different than the worst of the lot at Gitmo.

Like Khalid Sheik Mohammed and others, Madoff has information that the government needs to know. In Madoff's case, we need to know how he pulled the scam off, who helped him and where the money went. It seems like he's not talking.

Fortunately, the U.S. government has ways of making Madoff talk. My idea: Put him in an orange jump suit and pack him off to Guantanamo Bay, where he can hang with his fellow Jew-haters, talk about their big scores and plan their efforts to hire pro-bono lawyers and get more of their rancid poetry published.

Given that Bernie is no doubt a physical and moral puffball, a quick round of waterboard bingo with an experienced interrogator should get him to crack faster than Aunt Goldie's piggy bank, which he probably raided. I have no qualms about using the technique on him, which he might consider an excellent form of penance. Shake every penny out of him, then get him back in the general population, which will revere him as the greatest cause of harm to Jews since . . . oh, you can imagine.

After Bernie spills the beans, occasional waterboard sessions might be good for his moral development, and good practice for newbie interrogators.

May he live to be 120!

Van | 10:43 PM | 03/17/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Doing Jewish

March 10, 2009

Violence in Northern Ireland: Erin Go Gaza?

In September 1984, during a backpacking trip, I somewhat whimsically decided I had to check out Northern Ireland. The Troubles raged through the province. I took the train from Dublin to Belfast and stayed at Queens University for several days while I took buses and trains into the countryside. The place had a distinctly non-touristy feel. I've followed the area's politics with interest since then.

The new killings of soldiers and police are alarming, after a decade of peace, more or less. If the Irish Republic Army's splinter wing is beginning a terror campaign, I wonder if it will emulate Palestinian terror groups to retool its imagery and messaging. Analysts have seen links between the groups, but as I recall, the IRA never really won the hearts of left-wing loons, like the PLO and its successors have. This time around, I bet the IRA could score major points with progressives by a few simple tweaks of its communications strategy. Let's call in Operation Erin Go Gaza.

Continue reading " Violence in Northern Ireland: Erin Go Gaza?"

Van | 09:57 PM | 03/10/09 | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: WWIV

March 05, 2009

"Tonight: Lola Blau" to Appear at La MaMa in NYC

The one-woman play "Tonight: Lola Blau" starts next Friday, March 13, at New York's La MaMa theater at 74A East 4th Street. Written in 1971, the play deals with some sensitive and always compelling post-Holocaust issues. The website describes them succinctly:

Lola Blau is a Jewish singer trying to find work in Nazi-occupied Vienna. Escaping to the United States, she is obliged to sing in seedy nightclubs before achieving fame. After the war, she returns, with some trepidation, to Vienna. Her story is told in a nearly continuous flow of seventeen Kurt Weill-style songs, each cleverly evoking a mood, a period or environment in wickedly accurate parody and pastiche. In Lola's return concert, she slyly condemns all those who failed to notice the disappearance of six million Jews and confronts the audience with its prejudices. She dares the audience to share Kreisler's (the composer's) disgust at Austria's posing as a victim of Nazism rather than as a collaborator.

I for one doubt I'll have any difficult sharing Lola's disgust at Austria.

Playing the part of Lola is Anna Krämer, who has appeared in both New York and Germany.

"Tonight: Lola Blau" has only six performances, so if this sounds intriguing, get to the phones. And at $15, the tickets are a bargain.

(Truth in blogging: Through circumstances too complicated to describe here, I edited materials for the program guide. So, support the play and you get the pleasure of reading my sparkling, if uncredited, prose.)

Van | 09:23 PM | 03/05/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Sensual pleasures

March 04, 2009

Idan and Hank III: My Last Waltz at the Virgin Megastore

As soon as I read in the Wall Street Journal yesterday that all the Virgin Megastores are closing, I knew what I had to do. The flagship Times Square location is only three blocks from my office, so at lunch I raced over, ready to scoop up whatever caught my fancy.

The depressingly common "Everything Must Go!" sale looked like it had started days before. I beelined to the World Music section, where I already found evidence of shrinking stocks. I looked around, the floor reeling under my feet like a sinking ship. The retail music scene I loved was collapsing on me again. This time, however, no new store stands in the wings to claim my affection and shopping dollar.

To get the full context of my intense connection to music retailers, let's rewind a few years.

Continue reading " Idan and Hank III: My Last Waltz at the Virgin Megastore"

Van | 10:45 AM | 03/04/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Sensual pleasures

March 01, 2009

$900M for Gaza? Great! How about $900M for Charles Manson?

President Obama is doing the right thing by allocating $900 million for rebuilding Gaza, still under the wise leadership of Hamas. This is a humane, progressive approach that puts resources where they they will win the U.S. friends and admiration.

Since the taxpayers are extending the hand of friendship to Gaza/Hamas, I suggest that the administration keep up the momentum by providing $900 million to the far-sighted leader of a group that used bold tactics in pursuit of an anti-racist, anti-colonialist agenda -- Charles Manson. Hey, I bet Bill Ayers is down with that.

Continue reading " $900M for Gaza? Great! How about $900M for Charles Manson?"

Van | 05:14 PM | 03/01/09 | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Domestic Politics

February 22, 2009

Message to the President: Start Thinking BIG with $1Q

The stimulus bill, a/k/a the Generational Theft Act, rounds up to $780 billion. Analysts of the bailout regularly bring up figures of $1 trillion, $2 trillion, and more. I guess that's a lot of money, but spread among 300,000,000 Americans, the per-capita total is pathetically small. As I calculate, that's only $3,333 per person. That won't get the economy going again. It barely pays for teens' text messaging.

President Obama, think BIG. Think about the hope and change that brought you into office, how millions of Americans and billions of global masses turned to you to heal the economy, lower the level of the oceans and cool the planet. You must do more, now. A stimulus bill won't do much about rising oceans, and a piddly $780 billion won't do jack for the economy, either.

Forget about a trillion dollar plan. Instead, go for the gold with a QUADRILLION DOLLAR BAILOUT. That's $1,000,000,000,000,000.00, or as I call it $1Q. Forget the banks and automakers -- pay the money directly to individuals. That's hope and change on A-Rod style steroids.

Let me explain.

Continue reading " Message to the President: Start Thinking BIG with $1Q"

Van | 10:58 AM | 02/22/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: - From Sea to Shining Sea

February 08, 2009

Defiance: Der Yiddisher Wild Bunch Goes to Lithuania

If you can see only ONE movie with Nazis from the current bonanza, go see "Defiance," about the fighting Bielski brothers. Daniel Craig does a great turn as a partisan leader, with the much quoted line, "Our revenge is to live."

It's a good quote, and the characters back up that let's-live philosophy with heapin' helpings of Jew-on-Jerry revenge scenes. Germans and collaborators are stabbed, bombed, machine-gunned and subject to summary execution. I liked it, I really liked it! One striking scene inside a German police station gets a slow-motion Sam Peckinpah "Wild Bunch" treatment in slow-motion with the blood flying.

In fact, I wish Peckinpah had been around to make this movie. I've got nothing against Ed Zwick, and the movie combines Yiddishkeit and slaughter in an aesthetically pleasing way, but I wish the director had pushed the mayhem even further in a delirious screw-you "Wild Bunch" style. Now that I think about it, the perfect (living) director for this film would have been Paul Verhoeven, whose Black Book was a stunning riot of guns, girls and, ultimately, grisly payback. I saw the film with a Dutch-Jewish friend and we were both mightily impressed.

Meanwhile, in another of the Nazi flick universe, I can't believe "The Reader" got all those Oscar nominations. I found it watchable and uniformly interesting, but my ability to emotionally connect with the angst of chain-smoking Germans is limited. Seeing it on a big screen adds nothing to the experience; bag the theater and wait for the DVD. Its saving grace is the appearance, in a small but crucial dual role, of Lena Olin, who grabbed my imagination in 1988's "The Unbearable Lightness of Being." Hats and undershirts never looked the same after I saw Olin in this movie.

Van | 07:59 PM | 02/08/09 | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Sensual pleasures

January 25, 2009

Casting a Wide Net at the Greenwich Library

I made a culture run to the awesome Greenwich Library today and came home with arms full of a rich bounty of entertainment in three media. Here's the haul of goodies, with some notes:

Movies: Deja Vu with Denzel Washington. I've already seen this great thriller, but I wanted to watch one scene again, one that kicked off a blog idea.

Books: 2666 by the late Roberto Bolano. I've read very positive reviews of this book, set in the fictional Mexican border city of Santa Teresa (Ciudad Juarez). At over 800 pages long, that's a lot of train reading, but the locale fascinates me so I'll give it a try. If I can't swing it, hey, I'll go back to my chick lit research reading.

Music: Finally, the main event gets started. I always feel like Queen for a Day scrambling down supermarket aisles scooping up groceries when I hit the CD section at the Greenwich Library. In this case, music is the meal, and the Greenwich buffet is always open. Today's delectables:

Continue reading " Casting a Wide Net at the Greenwich Library"

Van | 07:11 PM | 01/25/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Life and how to live it

January 12, 2009

In Search of Memories: My Mother, 25 Years Later

This essay ran in the long-defunct publication New Men's News in December 1984. It has never appeared online. An earlier Kesher Talk essay on a related topic, "Ranchito Morbido," appears here.

The train raced south through the foggy countryside of France in September 1984. My destination was Châteauroux, where I had been born almost 27 years earlier. Gazing at the fields and windbreaks this September, I wondered how many times I made the two-plus hour trip from Paris held on my mother’s lap.

The visit carried a double emotional wallop. I had never seen my birthplace, an Air Force hospital. Also, it completed a grieving period for my mother. Shirley Elizabeth Lissner Wallach died of bone cancer January 12, 1984, aged 63. That date is the apogee of a line of mourning which began in August 1981 with a dawn phone call from her sister Charlotte telling me the diagnosis.

Continue reading " In Search of Memories: My Mother, 25 Years Later"

Van | 06:40 PM | 01/12/09 | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Life and how to live it

January 05, 2009

Reading a Non-Trilogy Russian Trilogy

Recently I read three Russian-themed books by separate authors and enjoyed them all. They are not strictly related, but in my mind they stand as a trilogy, starting in 1941, moving to 1953, and then on to the current social miasma that is Russia. In the correct order, the books are "City of Thieves" by David Benioff; "Child 44" by Tom Rob Smith; and "Stalin's Ghost" by Martin Cruz Smith.

Two of the books have strikingly similar openings. Child 44's first page says,

That had been the moment Maria decided to die, with nothing to eat and nothing to love.

City of Thieves has an equally haunting sentence, in which a character tells his grandson:

You have never been so hungry; you have never been so cold.

Stalin's Ghost brings back Moscow investigator Arkady Renko for another round of battles against bureaucracy, criminals, memory of his father, and a well-heeled rival for the hand of his girlfriend Eva.

All the books mesmerized me with their mix of history, danger and romance in a cold, dangerous place. For readers who want even more Eastern European skullduggery, Alan Furst's The Spies of Warsaw has a French-Polish atmosphere, with Russian spies sliding into the plot at key points.

Fans can join me in twitching in anticipation, because Tom Rob Smith is writing a sequel to Child 44, called "The Secret Speech," a reference to the 1956 denunciation of Stalin by Nikita Khrushchev. All I can say is -- bring it on.

Van | 07:50 PM | 01/05/09 | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Sensual pleasures

January 04, 2009

Writing That Hits Home: U.S.A. by John Dos Passos

I read the U.S.A. trilogy by John Dos Passos over 25 years ago. The trilogy's introduction hit me like an anvil dropped on my head. It still does, although I'm no longer 25 years old and living the freelance writer life in a tin-roofed top-floor studio apartment in Brooklyn:

The young man walks by himself, fast but not fast enough, far but not far enough (faces slide out of sight, talk trails into tattered scraps, footsteps tap fainter in alleys); he must catch the last subway, the streetcar, the bus, run up the gangplanks of all the steamboats, register at all the hotels, work in the cities, answer the wantads, learn the trades, take up the jobs, live in all the boardinghouses, sleep in all the beds. One bed is not enough, one job is not enough, one life is not enough. At night, head swimming with wants, he walks by himself alone.

No job, no woman, no house, no city.

Van | 04:20 PM | 01/04/09 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Life and how to live it

January 02, 2009

CSI Katonah: Raiders of the Lost Wallet

The case began in the opening hours of 2009, on the 1:04 a.m. Metro-North train churning through the center of Westchester County. My friend and I got ready to stumble off at the Katonah stop. For some reason I looked to my left and down as I zipped up my coat. On the floor, between two facing seat sections, sat a black wallet.

Ever the curious one, I picked it up. Nobody had sat in those seats for several stops. I asked some young people a few rows back, "Hey, did any of you drop your wallet?" Nobody did.

New Year's Eve was fading, but the Raiders of the Lost Wallet were just swinging into action.

Continue reading " CSI Katonah: Raiders of the Lost Wallet"

Van | 04:19 PM | 01/02/09 | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Tikkun olam

December 25, 2008

Happy Holidays from Hamas: Crucifixion OK'd as Punishment in Gaza

I suppose the Jews forced them into this: the tradition-minded legislators of Gaza reached way back into the annals of jurisprudence to find appropriate censure for some crimes. As filtered through various sources and finally mentioned on Solomonia:

Hamas members of the Palestinian Legislative Council in Gaza have approved a new bill "to implement Koranic punishments," including hand amputation, crucifixion, corporal punishment and execution.

It's nice to see Hamas finds the old Roman ways worth emulating. What's next, reading chicken entrails and speaking Latin?

When Hamas does crucify someone, I wonder what kind of play it will in the mainstream press. "Ancient Penalty Reflects New Strictures Imposed by Israel" sounds about right.

Van | 03:34 PM | 12/25/08 | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: - Gaza and Palestine

December 21, 2008

Hamas Names Madoff "Financial Jihadist of the Century"

January 1, 2009: The terrorist group Hamas honored financier Bernard Madoff as its "Financial Jihadist of the Century" last night with a gala dinner at the Gaza Conference and Suicide Bomber Training Center. The event celebrated Madoff "for his decades of unstinting and effective service to fulfilling the dictates of the yetzer hara, the Evil Inclination, in destroying Jewish institutions."

The honor capped a whirlwind year for Madoff, whose careful investment strategy paid huge dividends for Hamas and other Islamic terror groups. The U.S. financial crisis led to withdrawals from his investment funds, which, in fact, were in all probability never actually invested. Madoff simply used new investments to pay off earlier investors. His entire financial structure collapsed, taking with it billions of dollars of investments from many Jewish families and organizations.

Due to some passport problems, Madoff was unable to attend the gala, but he appeared via video and simply said, "Thank you for this honor. You're too kind. I couldn't have done it without all the little people, and big people, who blindly trusted me."

Speaker after speaker extolled Madoff's innovative approaches to financial jihad directed against Jewish organizations. One speaker declared, "We have had success in killing and injuring individual Jews -- bus bombings, Chabad in Mumbai, kidnappings. But our friend Bernie has taken jihad to an entirely new level. We killed individuals but he harmed institutions and wounded the entire Jewish communal infrastructure. That takes a true visionary. And most important, Bernie destroyed hope and trust among Klal Yisrael. Families are devastated, institutions and charities are closing, Jewish communities will never recover. What will happen now when solicitation letters and calls go out? Jews will think, 'Am I giving to a cause, or giving to support shmucks who shovel donations to their ganif cronies without a thought for whether the pals are criminals or not? Am I helping the worthy poor, or the yacht industry?' The cause of jihad simply cannot buy that kind of support."

The dinner tribute booklet overflowed with notices from many groups, praising Madoff's accomplishments and pledging funds for Gaza's new Madoff Family Institute of Advanced Financial Jihad. His voice choking, Madoff said, "My only regret is that my beloved mother and father are not alive to see this legacy. They would have been so ashamed of me."

The back cover ad brought tears to the eyes of the hundreds of jihadi dinner guests, clad in their finest evening wear and bomb belts. It simply said,

"Bernie, we deeply appreciate your outstanding disservice to the Jewish community worldwide. Although you're the son of apes and pigs, you are a truly unrighteous man unto our generation. That's why we're going to kill you last. Yasher Koach, Osama."

Van | 12:06 PM | 12/21/08 | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | Categories: Doing Jewish