Do I need therapy for my therapy?
05 Nov 2011 10 Comments
in Family, Mothers and Daughters Tags: Ala Moana Center, Buena Park Mall, bulimia, Chicos, Coldwater Creek, Gershun, Hawaii, Jewish Community Center of Greater Kansas City, Kohl's, lifestyle, Macy's, Pearlridge Mall, reflections, retail therapy, Sears, Shopping, T.J. Maxx, Talbot's
I would not describe myself as a shopaholic. I am not that extreme. But I could definitely be considered a shopper. It’s in my jeans.
My mother was totally a shopper. You could probably refer to her as the Queen Bee of shoppers. She gleefully put together a fall, winter and spring wardrobe every season. I think she chose her last residence for its proximity to Chicos, Talbots and Coldwater Creek that were just down the block. The Jewish Community Center was nearby as well.
My sisters and I have definitely inherited her propensity for supporting the economy (not to mention a definite resemblance in the good looks and charm department as well). We got a lot of practice growing up.
I can remember many a childhood evening spent with my mother and sisters at Southern California’s Buena Park Mall. We tried on clothes at the local Sears, J. J. Newberries and smaller clothing shops. We’d always stop half way through our excursion and call my father from the pay phone in the middle of the mall to let him know we were going to be a few more hours.
I think he was happy for the time to himself and the quiet calm in our home on these evenings. Three Gershun girls can make a lot of noise.
These days my oldest sister does most of her buying online. The younger one is more like our mother and a regular at Kohl’s and T.J. Maxx and always happy to take us there when we visit since we do not have those gold mines in the shopping arena in Hawaii.
I fall somewhere in between.
A few years ago I began to refer to it as retail therapy, noticing the positive emotional payoff after a satisfactory excursion to Pearlridge Mall or Ala Moana Center.
I definitely took that form of therapy to an extreme after a few major life changing incidents like divorcing my first husband or several years later breaking up with my new boyfriend when we were dating before we made up and he became my second husband.
My overwhelming feelings during those difficult times were not assuaged by the purchase of a new pair of shoes or a cute jacket. They required much grander gestures: redecorating or buying moderately expensive jewelry.
Over the past few years I have tempered my shopping habits. The combination of only needing a wardrobe for one season in Hawaii, trying to stick to a budget along with a concerted effort at trying to be satisfied with what I have usually work to keep me from visiting the local stores and malls a bit more than I used to.
However, recently I have been shopping up a storm.
When I told my friend Linda about this and that I had several things to return at Macy’s, she said that she does that a lot too. She referred to it as “Bulimic Shopping.” It totally made sense.
I also got this from my mother and I know that my younger sister does it a lot too. I purchase way more clothes than I need or convince myself that it looks good on me in the fitting room. When I get home, I realize that I was fooling myself and wonder, “What was I thinking?” So I take it back.
Some times I simply find something that I like better and buy it knowing that I can return the other stuff later.
I started to look at my recent shopping patterns and have clearly identified myself as a bulimic shopper.
Binge and purge.
If you saw all of the receipts stuffed in my wallet you might be inclined to think that I am a hoarder!
In my defense I will mention that I recently lost a bunch of weight (25 pounds, thank you very much) and am in need of new clothes. The old ones are two sizes too big. So I deserve a bit of shopping for a stylish wardrobe to hang in my closet and from my now visible hip bones. It’s a reasonable reward.
But I’ve been doing that buy and return thing A LOT!
Perhaps the shopping is also replacing the eating? It certainly takes my mind off of the food. Some times I go so far as to consider it exercise too. If I shop for an hour is it an hour of walking? Do you think I should seek professional help?
However you look at it: genetic propensity, retail therapy, bingeing and purging, if not taken to the extreme, shopping can both fill the basic need to be clothed (in a moderately fashionable) way) and be a reasonable form of recreation.
So, thank you mom and sisters and Linda for sharing this habit and its many symptoms. I do believe I will drop the kids off tomorrow at Religious school and hit the mall….just for an hour or so.
Let’s talk about the F word…
01 Nov 2011 6 Comments
in Family, General, Kvetching Tags: children, community, fundraising, Hawaii, huli huli chicken, kids, life, Lorraine Gershun, personal, Zippy's Chili
Every where I go I bump into people who are doing it, on street corners, at the local supermarket, at my kids’ school.
It’s hard to turn around these days and not find somebody asking for money in support of a program or a cause or a trip to the mainland for a championship game. The F word of which I speak has more than four letters. It has 11–FUNDRAISING. But the sound of it is becoming just as distasteful as the vulgar term that usually comes to mind.
I am not unwilling to support a worthy cause. On the contrary. I am an enthusiastic supporter of all causes worthy. I just don’t agree with the plethora of methods employed to garner my precious support and am not sure that other people’s definitions of worthy match mine.
My husband created an acronym that aptly relates to the title and shares the sentiment. In order to avoid being accused of using profanity, I will spell it out for you: Fundraising Using Children and Kids.
Yesterday I went to the Kapolei Safeway and met a group of cub scouts who were set up next to the entrance. I approached their table without being asked, eager to support an esteemed organization such as theirs. They were selling popcorn. I like popcorn. I was ready to buy. The smallest bag was $10. TEN DOLLARS for a bag of caramel corn? I couldn’t believe it. The one that had nuts was $20. That’s nuts!
That’s what got me thinking about how fundraising has become big business and that too many people besides the actual beneficiary are out there making money off of my support.
Raise your hand if your kids have had to sell Zippys chili tickets, huli huli chicken tickets or some other kind of tickets for their school or sports team? Then raise your hand again if you ended up buying those tickets, picked up the said chili or chicken and applied it to the next potluck invitation you received.
Or maybe you paid for an entire box of 48 bags of M & M’s because you and your kids ate them over the course of the past month.
I would rather write a check than sell all of those tickets and candy. It is cheaper, so much easier and I can write it off as a charitable donation.
I would also rather support a car wash. That seems like good value for my money and reasonable return for effort.
I wonder how much money each of us spends buying snacks and candy and magazines from every kid that comes knocking on our wallets. What if I applied the money that I spend on your kids to my own and you kept yours to yourself and we all stopped asking everybody to support each other and simply took care of ourselves?
At least these young peddlers are selling something. I have ranted before about the groups who stand on street corners with scoop nets asking me to drop some cash from my car window so that they can travel to the mainland for “The most amazing opportunity ever.” Usually it is a sports team that has qualified for a national tournament. It looks like begging to me: Children standing on a street corner asking strangers for money so that they can go on a trip to play a game. I say, if you can’t afford it, don’t go.
I also think that these leagues should provide a viable way for their teams to garner support. Find sponsors for these kids. Apply for grants. Give them jobs.
We have come to think of so many luxuries and privileges as necessities for our children and then ask other people to spend money in support of them. Let them concentrate on school and local activities, earn a scholarship for college, get a job and then travel to their heart’s delight.
Please do not misunderstand me. I know that there are many children in our community and beyond that cannot afford even the basic necessities. I am not talking about them. I am the first in line to organize a school supplies drive for these students and to donate money to organizations that feed and clothe and house them. I also think that they deserve the opportunity to participate in extra curricular activities and sports. I am willing to make a donation in support of that too.
I also know only too well that our public schools are under funded and in dire need of support. That is an entirely different blog post.
I just think that our community fundraising efforts have evolved in a direction that ends up using our children as a means to a somewhat capitalist end and in the process we end up selling ourselves and them a little bit short.
My apologies….
15 Oct 2011 9 Comments
in Family, Holiday, Parenting, Traditions Tags: culture, eBay, Hawaii, High Holy Days, Holidays, Jewish, reflections, religion, spirituality, tradition, yahrzeit candles, Yamim Noraim, yizkor, Yom Kippur
I must apologize to my parents. I am sorry, Mom and Dad. I forgot to light the yarzheit candles in your memory on Yom Kippur.
It wasn’t until the Yizkor service that I realized my mistake.
I love the moment when we are sitting in the Sanctuary, the late afternoon sun is streaming through the stained glass windows casting a golden glow over the congregation and representatives from the Sisterhood stand at each of the memorial boards and turn on all of the lights on the memorial plaques.
I know this is a memorial service for those who have passed away and it is traditionally very solemn, but something about the moment makes me feel more joyous than sad.
There is something comforting about all of those people and all of their lights and all of their lives lighting up together for us to feel and remember them all. It is not like the lonely one or two lights that shine during services at each Shabbat, commemorating the individual Yahrzeits.
It is collective and powerful and fills me.
Somehow I imagine that it has a similar effect on those whose memories are being honored as well. They might feel a little less lonely since they are being remembered in a crowd. Lighting up together, connecting through our collective memories.
So that’s when I remembered that I forgot to light the candles at home and I was sad. It gives me similar solace to see the light of my parents’ memories dancing together on our kitchen counter for a full 24 hours and I missed it.
I light a single candle on the anniversary of each of their deaths, but it feels a bit more lonely and a reminder of our loss.
The funny thing is that I planned ahead. If you call shopping on eBay planning ahead. I ordered yarzheit candles and special holders from Israel. I purchased them months in advance in anticipation of this moment.
And then I forgot.
My family suggested that I could still do it when we got home, but it did not feel right. The flame would seem false. In reality, the service would be enough.
I am pretty sure that it bothers me more than it would my parents. They were of a generally forgiving nature in life. I can’t imagine it would be any different now.
I will remember next year. I will remember them and the others and the candles.
Meanwhile, in the spirit of the Yamim Noraim, my apologies. I will try again in 5773.
What’s your New Year’s resolution?
28 Sep 2011 6 Comments
in Holiday, Traditions Tags: 5772, camp boo, High Holy Days, Holidays, Jewish holidays, new year's resolutions, Rosh Hashanah
When we go to visit my youngest sister at “camp boo” in the summer, we enjoy one of their many traditions of “Highs and Lows.” It is a simple one.
At dinner we go around the table and share the high moment and low moment of the day. Sometimes there are as many as 13 guests around the dinner table, so there’s a lot of sharing going on.
When I try to do this sharing thing around my small family table at home, I usually get groans and reluctant participation. They don’t enjoy it as much as I or the campers at my sister’s table do.
I love this kind of stuff. It could probably be said that I am one of those people who is always trying to appreciate the meaning in the moment.
I also like to make New Year’s resolutions. I do it every year. The cool thing about being Jewish is that we celebrate the Jewish New Year in the fall and then there’s another one in January. I know that Chinese New Year is also an option, but I have not gone there yet.
One of my many resolutions last January was to start using the calendar on my computer. I have been very successful at this, adding a smart phone to the mix and syncing the two. I have even gone so far as to find a way to update my husband’s electronic calendar with our family schedule.
For Rosh Hashanah I usually take a more spiritual approach. But I make resolutions nonetheless.
So instead of torturing my family this year, I have decided to turn to you and ask: What is your New Year’s resolution for 5772?
Perhaps you will be more like the campers at “camp boo.”
Happy New Year from Walgreens
23 Sep 2011 3 Comments
in Holiday Tags: High Holy Days, Holidays, Kalihi, Kapalama Shopping Center, L'shanah Tovah, Rosh Hashanah, Walgreens
My mainland family is getting New Year’s cards from us this year. Just the immediate family, sisters and parents. We don’t usually send cards for the High Holy Days. We don’t really send them for many occasions –except maybe birthdays, Mother’s and Father’s Day and Halloween to my youngest sister whose nickname is “boo.”
Why is this year different from all other years? Oops, wrong holiday. Then why are we sending New Year’s cards you may ask? Because they had them on display at the Walgreens in the Kapalama Shopping Center on North School Street in Kalihi, that’s why.
They didn’t have just one generic card for the occasion, they had an entire section of cards for Rosh Hashanah. It’s like a Rosh Hashanah miracle.
That Walgreens is my new hangout. I go there a few times a week because it is near Kamehameha’s Kapalama campus where I pick up my older daughter when she stays after school for hula or study hall. I can pick up a snack for her and use the bathroom before I drive up the hill.
When I discovered their New Year’s cards I had to support them. The Jewish community in Hawaii doesn’t get much acknowledgment from very many local retail establishments. When we, do I want to show my appreciation by spending my money there.
Since I am seeing Christmas trees going up in the stores before the Halloween candy comes out, I was doubly struck by the wonderfulness of Walgreens.
I had to share.
And even if you did not get a card from us in the mail, from my family to yours:
L’shanah Tovah Tikatevu–May you be inscribed for a blessing in the Book of Life.
I’m thinking that somebody at Walgreens will.
Confessions of a Jewish Mother–My daughter starts high school
09 Aug 2011 1 Comment
in Family, Mothers and Daughters, Parenting Tags: Hawaiian, high school, Island Pacific Adademy, Jewish, Jewish Mother, Kamehameha Schools, Neal Blaisdell Center, ninth grade
My oldest child starts high school tomorrow. I keep thinking, “This is it.” We have arrived. The next four years are going to go by really fast.
As my husband describes it, “She is in the chute.”
I imagine her standing at the top of a ride at the water park, grabbing the bar and swinging gleefully down the wet slide, emerging with a joyous splash in the pool below.
While I know that this is her journey, her rite of passage, I am finding that it’s a pretty big transition for me too. She is enrolled in a new school and I’m starting to feel like the new kid on the block myself.
I imagine myself in line behind her for that same ride, thunking and bumping my way down, not so gracefully, water shooting up my nose as I try to keep up with her, hoping for a smooth landing.
We are both navigating new hallways.
She attended the same small school for grades two through eight. She was in the same class with her friends for seven years.
Not only have they been in the same class, they have celebrated at birthday parties together, gone on trips together and played on teams together.
I know their families. We have watched our children blossom and learn. We have volunteered together, driven carpools together and raised our kids side by side.
Together, together, together.
That’s all about to change. She is officially a member of the freshman Class of 2015 at Kamehameha High School’s Kapalama Campus. A wonderful and unique opportunity and a huge change.
There were a total of 60 kids in her eighth grade. This year she will be among 450 freshmen attending classes, most of whom have been at the school since kindergarten, fourth or seventh grades.
We are “New Invitees.” We both have to make new friends.
On the first day of school she will face that lunchroom, look into the sea of students at the tables and wonder where to sit. For many, alliances have already been formed. She already knows a few kids, but she enters without her usual safety net.
I remind her that she will find friends in her classes and clubs and sports. They will form bonds. It will just take a bit of time.
I can totally relate. Until now I knew exactly what to do. At her old school I knew all of the staff and the teachers and the parents. I knew the Head Master by name and he knew us. It was a very intimate environment.
I will also have to make new friends. At parent orientation I faced that same lunch room and had an inkling of how she feels.
Luckily, I am not shy and quickly found a seat and began to get to know my fellow parents.
I admit that I feel a bit out-of-place. While my daughter is part Hawaiian, I am not. After 18 years teaching at Wai’anae High School which has one of the highest student populations of native Hawaiians in the state, I am used to being a minority. I have often been the only white person in the room. This time I feel a bit more conspicuous.
I am also used to being one of the few Jews around. There were only a handful at her former school and not very many of us live or work on the west side of Oahu.
Kamehameha is no different. We know one other Jewish family who has kids in the elementary school. Adding that they go to chapel during the week, I am not sure that I will be visiting her classes at Chanukkah and teaching the kids how to play dreidle. I am wondering if her absence will be excused for Rosh HaShanah.
And talk about new hallways. Island Pacific Academy’s Middle School takes up one entire hallway and shares a few classrooms with the high school upstairs.
According to the Kamehameha website, the campus is 600 acres, has more than 70 buildings, an Olympic size swimming pool, tennis courts and an athletic complex with a football/soccer field, track and seating for 3,000. It is home to 3,196 students in grades K-12.
On our first few visits I got lost and worried that we wouldn’t find our way around. It took a while, but I have finally figured out where to park.
Ninth grade classes are concentrated in two main buildings. But she will have to walk up and down the hill to the dining hall and the performing arts center. “Think of it as exercise,” I told her.
Entering high school is a big transition, period. It doesn’t matter if it’s a new school or not. The beginning of ninth grade can be daunting for both students and parents. Classmates have changed over the summer. New kids arrive from other schools. Teachers and procedures are unfamiliar. And it all counts like it has never counted before: academics and athletics, extracurricular activities and social opportunities.
It’s exciting and scary all at the same time. She is in the chute.
She has a great opportunity ahead and we will both do just fine. In no time she will have lunch mates and new Facebook friends. She will join clubs and go to football games.
I will attend meetings and school events and volunteer. I will check the website for homework and announcements. I will meet the parents of her friends. I will find ways to connect.
By the time she graduates in her white Kamehameha muu muu a the Neal Blaisdell Center, singing her school song, it will be in her heart and a part of our family.
We will survive high school.
Dating advice to my daughters…..
09 Aug 2011 2 Comments
in Family, Mothers and Daughters, Parenting, Relationships
Be a lady, let him pay, don’t fart.
Confessions of a Jewish Mother–My daughter rode the bus
16 Jun 2011 Leave a comment
in Family, Mothers and Daughters, Parenting Tags: Buena Park, Huntington Beach, Jewish Mother, parenting, Rotary Club of Kapolei, The Bus
Now that I have claimed my identity as a Jewish Mother I am compelled to share my adventures in this arena of my life.
Today was a prime example. My 14-year-old daughter rode the bus all by herself for the first time today. For her, it was not a big deal. For me, it was monumental.
I am finding that her blossoming busy schedule is coming in conflict with my generally robust line-up of commitments quite often lately and I just can’t be in two places at once.
I have resigned myself to the role of chauffeur rather than escort as my children reach adolescence (not to mention ATM machine.) But I cannot be at their beck and call every hour of the day. I do have a life of my own, you know.
Summer vacation brought a change in her schedule which added some conflicts with mine. We had to find a creative solution to get us each to different locations at the same time. Thus, the bus.
I often look back on the privileges my own parents afforded me and at what ages they were bestowed. My mother was pretty over-protective and I figure if she let me do it, then I should probably extend that opportunity to my own daughter.
I was allowed to take the bus from Buena Park, CA to Huntington Beach with my friends the summer before ninth grade in 1974.
Today I let her ride the bus to the local park where she is a Day Camp Jr. Counselor–15 whole minutes–so that I could attend my weekly meeting at the Rotary Club of Kapolei.
Like I said before, I was nervous. When I asked her what she was worried about, the only problem she foresaw was finding the right timing to pull the string to signal the driver to stop at her desired destination.
I told her that she was perfectly capable of handling the logistics. I gave her the printout from The Bus website that delineates her route. I reminded her that she is the one who usually navigates the airport when we are traveling on the mainland. She is usually the first to find the way to the ticket counter or baggage claim.
I told her that the thing that concerned me was, “Stranger danger.” This is when she reassured me.
“I’ve got my iPod for that,” she said.
That’s when I knew it would be okay. My daughter would ride the bus to her volunteer job, she would ward off contact with any predators with her iPod headphones plugged snugly in her ears and she would pull the string at the right moment to disembark and cross the street and start her day.
I put bus fare on the counter, reminded her to text me when she arrived and went off to my meeting.
I won’t tell her that I checked my phone every few minutes until she got there. Or that I was tempted to text her and check on her progress, remind her to be safe or put on sunscreen. I simply waited for the words, “I’m here.” I replied, “Have fun” and relaxed to enjoy the rest of the meeting.
The mother of them all
07 May 2011 Leave a comment
in Family, General, Mothers and Daughters, Rites of Passage Tags: blog, Jewish American Princess, Jewish Mother, lifestyle, personal, stereotype
In a recent dinner conversation, a friend of mine said that she identifies herself as a runner. It led to further conversation as to how we each identify ourselves.
My husband said all the right things, “Soldier, husband, father, etc.” I did too. I gave several responses: mother, wife, community volunteer, writer, etc…. I even heard myself saying, “Retired Teacher!”
What I found disconcerting, however, is that in all my complexity, I craved some sort of clear-cut, all-encompassing, simple label that I could use to brand my entire identity.
It wasn’t until days later when I was thinking back on that particular conversation that I came up with the perfect answer: “Jewish Mother.” I am a Jewish Mother, an identity of which I am exceedingly proud.
I remember the first time somebody referred to me as such. I did not feel so grand. I envisioned the stereotypical Jewish mother who interferes in the lives of her children, feeds the world, is demanding and controlling. Think of Fran Drescher’s mom in the TV show The Nanny.
How could I be seen in relation to that?
When I was a teenager in Southern California’s Orange County in the late 1970’s, we joked about another stereotype: The Jewish American Princess, or JAP for short. That’s how my friends and I referred to some of the girls who went to the same Jewish weekend camps as we did.
We saw them through the perspective of another stereotype: spoiled, materialistic, whiny and demanding. Semi-privileged that we were, we only viewed ourselves as borderline.
Borderline seemed okay with me, a bit glamorous, a tad alluring, while still human and reasonable (as reasonable as a teenager could be.)
I took that image with me to college, Borderline JAP, and wore it pretty well. I taught Hebrew School and continued with the camps. I associated with new Jewish friends and learned more about my faith. I enjoyed a reasonable amount of comfort, but came nowhere near the ostentatious style of others that I met.
This borderline status was still hanging in the back of my closet almost 20 years later when my friend Mark from L.A. was visiting us in Hawaii. He was the first to call me that name, “Jewish mother.”
Like I said before, my reaction was not so positive. While he did not mean it as an insult in any way, I felt a bit rattled.
I had not worn my college clothes in a very long time. But they were still hanging around in the back of my mind as a connection to my past. While I had no illusions that I would fit into them again some day, I had not thrown them out either.
After the initial shock I realized how much I had changed. It has been a VERY long time since I could even be remotely mistaken for some sort of princess, Jewish American or not.
I had been a mother for longer than I had been in college. I wouldn’t let my daughter near a princess dress or tiara or anything. If I were to be described in any royal terms, “Queen Bee” would be a better choice.
I had to rethink my identity.
I quickly cleaned out my closet and left my memories to yearbooks and photo albums. But I was not quite ready to fit into my new skin. I had not made the full transition to Jewish Mother, even one without the negative stereotype.
That term was reserved for the ladies at the Temple who help with the Oneg Shabbat after services on Friday nights, the Sisterhood President, my own mother. But not me, not yet.
That was several years ago. I am happy to announce that I did grow into my own skin. I have a lovely wardrobe and I wear many hats.
After driving the Hebrew school carpool for years, making latkes for the Temple Chanukkah party, feeding my family plus many of Waianae High School’s journalism students and volunteering to donate matzah for the Sunday school’s model seder, I am pretty sure I have earned the proud status of Jewish Mother.
Yes, I might be a bit overprotective of my two precious daughters and I might care very deeply about the welfare of the ones I love. However, I am not meddlesome or overbearing, more like loving and caring.
A Borderline Jewish Mother is a perfect description.
Being Jewish in Hawaii 