Destiny
Leah Vincent2013EssaysFirst PersonReflectionsTopicsFamilyOff the DerechReligionThe Frum World
My daughter has snorted one spoonful of yogurt and spewed a second spoonful across her face. It is time for a bath. I look for some music, flipping through a box of old CDs that I recently unearthed. I find a CD with white footprints stepping across the blue cover. Destiny, Volume 1. The music of my childhood.
My parents were permissive, allowing us to listen to Destiny. My cousins were not only forbidden to listen to these English-language albums, they weren’t even allowed to listen to male soloists who sang Hebrew Psalms and other passages from the bible. Soloists, with their flashy stardom, were too secular. Only the prepubescent voices of yeshiva boys choirs were kosher enough for them. But I was lucky. My parents were permissive.
Indulging in memory, I slip the disc into the CD player.
The familiar chords start as I strip before the bathroom mirror, shifting the baby from arm to arm as I unhook my blouse, the crescendo of the filling bath competing with the song.
“In our shul, he was known as the candyman…”
Who is this brown naked woman? I think, as I step out of my underwear. My child self is revived by the musical memories. She is puzzled by my reflection. How did I become this free, brazenly immodest woman? What planet am I on?
I shake my head, come back into myself, dip my toes into the water to make sure it isn’t too hot, and step into the tub carefully. My daughter’s pudgy fingers pinch my upper arm as she clings to me.
I remember every word to these songs. I sing lustily, my hands in impassioned fists, as the baby sits on my lap and splashes in the water.
“Aleph bais, gimmel daled hay…”
Will she have such memories? I wonder, as I watch my daughter’s elongated face in the shiny faucet. When she bathes her children will she play the Old McDonald she is growing up on, and will it fill her heart till it swells too big for her chest?
By the third song, the nostalgia fades and my childhood self recedes long enough for my adult ears to hear the words I am singing.
Because that’s the third song about death.
In the first, an ordinary Jew goes rushing into a fire to save a Torah scroll, proving he is no ordinary Jew. In the second, a cheder boy is about to be murdered for reciting his aleph bais, when the Russian soldier remembers the aleph bais of his own childhood and lets the boy live. In the third, a non-religious chaser of the American dream find himself praying when his plane goes into a tailspin during a lightning storm.
And his. His, him, he. Male characters, all of them. She’s gargling with the bath water and I’m back in my parent’s green-carpeted living room, belting out these verses that were tattooed on my heart. Him, his, he. Bad Jew dies. Good Jew faces death and survives. These were the “scandalous” songs? Black and white death threats wrapped in cool English rhymes that mimicked the forbidden songs of the radio?
The next song, that’s the one that really gets me. Two brothers, best of friends. (Brothers, sons, his, him, he.) One good, one bad. The good one becomes a rabbi, the other, of course, an underworld criminal—what else? There is only the shadow, the identical extremist. Then, at the climax, after years of filial estrangement, the rabbi opens his door to find a baby, with a note.
“Please, take care of my son. May he never see a gun. Raise him as a good Jew. I hope he grows to be just like you.”
Do I pull out the words as I sob, as my daughter arches her back and sticks her fingers in my mouth, puzzled at the noises her quivering mama is making?
I can see my brain now, like a half-baked hunk of liver, squashed and fingerprinted into submission by these verses. The “bad” one, he becomes the leader of the “underground,” “crime his best friend,” yet even he is not so bad as to think he should raise his own child.
There is no need for police, when the rules are internalized, becoming bars that confine one’s own brain. My defiant child self, so angry at the secular woman I am, poor girl, poor sweet little girl, raised on such a narrow path of black and white, hate and obedience disguised as everyday life.
I haul my daughter out of the bath and I turn off the CD. I put Paul Simon on my iPhone and play it as loud as I can without hurting my baby’s ears. She gurgles at me. My baby. The one I am going to raise my way. The one I am not giving up. “My momma loves me, she loves me,” I sing along with the music. She, she, her. Love, hugs, she loves me like a rock. She laughs. I kiss her. We dance to the song.
7 Responses
Beautiful piece!
This piece carries substantial significance with me since I remember how strongly I was attached to this particular song – “Those Two Brothers”. My ninth grade teacher taught it to us and I was hooked. I ran out to purchase all Destiny cassettes – forbidden, of course, to us ultra Hasidic girls, and spent hours playing all those tunes on the piano. Somehow I always identified with and “knew” I was the “bad” brother (or rather sister/daughter???) and worked real hard trying to avoid that. I didn’t want to have to leave my proverbial son at my brother’s/sister’s doorstep. For a while I did the best I possibly could to not turn into that “bad” brother.
However, life has its ways of catching up with us. Fast-forward a number of years and kids and experiences. My perception of this narrow view of life has drastically changed. Much of the self-blame and shame of being the “bad” one for having different and more open views of reality is slowly coming into perspective.
Unfortunately, my sons and daughters are not being raised the way I would have chosen to had I been the person I currently am BEFORE bringing them into this world. But for now it suffices that they listen to Journeys and Destiny freely – without having to be labeled the “bad” ones for that.
The odd thing about this is that in spite of being quite clear on an intellectual level how utterly absurd this all is, during weak moments self-doubt still has its way of rearing its ugly head and wreaking havoc – hopefully not to the extent of being conveyed too openly to my children and creating a self fulfilling prophesy. On reflection, as so poignantly depicted, the lasting impact our childhood indoctrination has and the extent this grasps us in its hold is at times astounding.
What about Miriam from the Lonaro family (who would sing at the shabbos table), Rochel goodman, whose neighbors bought her a ticket to Israel, The old widow who lit shabbos candles with her tears and I’m sure lots of others?
not related to article, but interesting:
http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/oy-if-he-were-rich-man-not-selling-heaven-ebay-6C10115938
man sells portion in olam haba on ebay.
Dear Leah,
I saw you yesterday on Katie C.’s show. I just wanted to reach out and let you know that your story meant a lot to me. I hope that your experience doesn’t keep you from the love of the G-d of Israel. Yeshua loves you so much, and I pray that G-d will continue to bestow blessings and protection to you and your family! The verse below is very encouraging…just wanted to share with you.
Romans 8:24-28: It was in this hope that we were saved. But if we see what we hope for, it isn’t hope – after all, who hopes for what he already sees? 25 But if we continue hoping for something we don’t see, then we still wait eagerly for it, with perseverance. 26 Similarly, the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we don’t know how to pray the way we should. But the Spirit himself pleads on our behalf with groanings too deep for words; 27 and the one who searches hearts knows exactly what the Spirit is thinking, because his pleadings for God’s people accord with God’s will. 28 Furthermore, we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called in accordance with his purpose;
which song includes a “Bad Jew dies” ?
why do you assume the “bad brother” was OTD? he may have well been an ultra-orthodox jew, the only description the song gives about him is “crime his best friend” i’m sure you agree that crime would tag him as the “bad” brother.
Often male writers write about him, his, he (other than eishes chayil that we all sing every shabbt a man wrote about the valor of women)and women write abt she and her. b/c that’s what they relate to, themselves.
the same song writers also wrote english songs about she/her like, “s.s. shabbos queen” and several destiny songs about women and mitzvos reserved specifically for women like lighting shabbat candles.
This article definitely struck a chord. I loved the “Destiny” CDs so I know the songs Leah refers to. The last two lines were especially powerful. We talk about being OTD and starting new lives for ourselves, but for those who have children they are creating new lives for their children too. Lovingly. Honestly. In a world where “she” is not an immodest word.
I feel so sorry for those “Russian soldiers” you mention. You know: the ones who were given to the Tsar by the klal in order to protect the nice, bright, well-connected yeshivah bochurs.
Still Jews. Always Jews. Yet spurned as “Russian” in childhood songs.
How sad.