an excerpt from joan’s LATEST book suddenly jewish: the life and times of my jewish mother

Esther Lanch was a strong child in mind and body. She was Rose’s daughter in most ways – aware, astute, bright, self-confident, and beautiful. Her mother taught her well. And yet, her preferences were not always compatible with her mother’s desires. And sometimes Esther gave in to her emotions. One morning as she walked to the neighborhood Catholic school on the Lower East Side, she was in tears because she hated where she lived and where she went to school. At almost ten years old, she worried about her family and never felt safe, and she worried that the kids in school would see her goiter. Mostly, they did not because as Esther got older, she found a way to keep the scarf tied securely around her neck to hide it. The girls in school again loved the scarves and the problem went away.

Esther was about to get an education outside the classroom and on the streets of the Lower East Side. The Roaring Twenties had arrived, but that meant nothing to Esther in the beginning. She didn’t know about speakeasies or wild drinking or police raids or mafia shoot outs. She was too young to understand the ramifications of Prohibition under President Harding and his Republican cronies. She heard Jake tell Rose that they were a pack of thieves and liars. Her understanding of that would come later.

Esther got her best education from the newspapers and rag sheets sold on every street corner in the Lower East Side. On the way home from school, she would hang out at the news kiosks and read about everything happening in New York and in other big cities like Chicago and Philadelphia. Even her citizenship was a mystery.

Her visa was stamped in New York City, so she thought that was how you become an American citizen – get a new visa when her family moved to another city. Sometimes, Esther listened to Rose talk to the woman named Golda, who took care of Mildred after school in the afternoon, about the evils of drinking and how Golda thought Prohibition was going to solve the immorality of America. “But Rose, drinking is a symbol of evils of city life,” said Golda as she itched under the headscarf she wore. “The government has to control modern society by eliminating alcohol so politicians can turn back the clock to an earlier and better time.”