AP English assignment.[:

Kindergarten1

I was at the red crayon table, right next to the blue one, with the signs hanging from the ceiling telling us where to go by the colors of the signs as well as words we wouldn’t be able to read until later. We spent a day in the blocks corner, setting up stop signs and making like our blocks were cars; we learned about traffic during blocks time and then the bell would ring and we’d all switch corners. House was always my favorite, so I saved it for last. 2

Sunday school was just like school, house in one corner, blocks in another, with tables all strewn in the middle. The stories were nicer than the ones in school, and we never ever got homework. Being Jewish was fun; we ate snacks with the letter K on the packages, and we spoke with funny sounds before we ate and before we went back to playing.3

Everyone wished me a Merry Christmas that year and I just wished them a Happy Chanukah in return, shocked when they didn’t know the story of the Maccabees and the oil; that was my favorite story.4

Second Grade5

Every few months Mrs. Klapowitz would change the names of our tables from boroughs to bridges to tunnels. There weren’t enough tunnels, so my table was a bridge twice. She always used to assign us information cards on Tuesdays; mine were never chosen on Wednesdays.6

Second grade started Hebrew School, much different than Sunday School. Two days devoted to being Jewish now, two days for snacks with the K’s and two days for stories, which seemed much less pleasant, but more meaningful these days. I could read the prayers, and I said my own during our silent time; it meant something.7

My Hebrew school teacher went to Israel over one of our breaks and offered to put letters in the Western wall for us, we’d just learned about it and pretended we understood its significance.8

“Write what you want to say to G-d on a piece of paper, I won’t read them, they’ll be between you and him. You can give me your paper any time before class is over.”9

I was the last to give in my paper, my few sentences taking the entire allotted two hours of class time. Those words are in the wall now, only for G-d’s eyes.10

Seventh Grade11

Middle school was different; only grown-ups change classes. Only grown-ups got that much homework and only grown-ups like me got that much more homework to do in an ancient language they didn’t understand.12

Mr. Camera always reminded me on Monday afternoons to tell mom that the meetings would be Tuesdays at six; they were on the school leadership team together. Mom would tell me, “Amy’ll pick you up tomorrow, I have leadership.”13

“Fine.”14

Mom drove Daniel and me to Hebrew school and we brought our snacks with the K’s on the packages. I asked once why it was so important that we eat the foods with the K’s.15

“They’re kosher. And the Torah says that we should all keep kosher and follow these laws.”16

I didn’t ask why, and I didn’t pay attention when he started to teach us about what made certain things kosher. I listened so that I could play Jewish Jeopardy with Jenna. We were always a team; we always won with the torah portion section. Jenna always remembered the torah portion.17

“Final Jeopardy,” our teacher called out, “which of the following isn’t kosher?”18

We won that game of Jeopardy, too (shellfish isn’t kosher), Jenna and I, and we got all A’s on our report cards that Sunday, our services attendances boosting us to the top of the class.19

Praying always gets you good grades, I learned.20

Eighth Grade21

“Who knows a lot about the Holocaust?” Mrs. Neufeld asked the class.22

I raised my hand high, like always, and she handed out the thin yellow books with the bright Jewish stars on them and the tall sunflowers beside them.23

“Sarah, you’d know this,” my teacher pulled me into the classroom on my way to lunch, quick questions about the history of the Holocaust filling the air. I answered as best I could since I ‘would know this.’24

Rabbi Warman asked me if I’d finished my prayers yet, I was usually the last one standing since everyone liked to rush their silent prayers. I nodded, I still had a section or two to read on the last page, and I sat down.25

We opened our workbooks and learned the words for cat, dog, table and house, taking turns to read out sentences with little value or meaning.26

In November we’d had try-outs for the play at school, Pippin, Daniel and I got parts and rehearsal was every day. Every Tuesday, we walked in half an hour late to the Rabbi Warman’s class. We caught the endings of some of the more truthful versions of the stories I used to love. Abel was a rapist and Abraham had a mistress. And this is how our religion started?27

We were almost B’nei Mitzvot; we started haftorah lessons. Gossip leads to leprosy, mine said, don’t speak badly of others while they’re not there.28

I went home that Monday night after singing my haftorah twice, once to a sleeping Rabbi. Laying in bed, I thought about G-d.29

What had made him so special in second grade? Why do these stories matter and who kept records of all twelve of those tribes? Why do we stand up when the torah is out and why can’t you wear leather on Yom Kippur?30

I was bat-mitzvah-ed and I graduated with an award from Hebrew school; everyone had fun at the party.31

High school32

“What’s faster than a speeding bullet?”33

Rabbi Warman told me this joke.34

“A Jew with a coupon.”35

High school was filled with people, so many different people. Everyone looked crazily different and it was confusing. I wore my Jewish star the first day of high school and in the second week, I heard my first Jew joke. It was a good one, and I laughed.36

I wore my Jewish star most days, blaming the price of my sandwich on the Jews and whispering to Freisi in global that it was the Jews’ fault that something or other happened. It’s a joke; I laughed.37

Rosh Hashanah rolls around and I have homework.38

“Finish it later,” my sister told me, changing into a skirt so she could lead the children’s service, “come be Jewish for a little while.”39

Yom Kippur rolls around and I go to temple immediately; this is the one holiday I still understand. I don’t know Hebrew anymore, it all fell out of my head when Halabi started to teach me algebra, but I know what the day is for.40

“G-d, I’m sorry I don’t believe in you as much as I used to,” I don’t say it out loud, “but I always tried to.”