Wex

Dreaming of a White Christmas

As this festive season of the year draws to a long-awaited close, I have to confess that, like so many members of other communities, I’ve been dreaming lately. Not of a white Christmas, particularly, but of “White Christmas” itself, the Irving Berlin song that has become virtually synonymous with the American idea of Christmas. It’s no secret that Berlin was Jewish. Like Al Jolson, he was the son...

Wex

Wex at Chanukah

One hotel room, non-smoking, Anytown, U.S.A. A book of matches with the words “Success Without Kollel” printed on the cover. Eight small, braided candles; nine, if you count the shammes. A battered prayer-book, its pages daubed with candle wax and stained with tears, said to have been presented to Jerome “Curly” Howard of the Three Stooges on the occasion of his bar-mitzvah. One lonely Child of...

Wex

What makes a pauper rejoice?

“Ven freyt zikh an oremen?” asks the Yiddish proverb. “What makes a pauper rejoice? Az er farlirt un gefint, When he finds something that he’s lost”––because a pauper can’t afford a replacement. This is especially true when what’s been lost is one’s youth. I was interviewed last week by a journalist whom I’ve known since we were in high school. Though never close, he and I have always...

Wex

Where does “nu” come from?

I’ve been doing a great deal of research lately into the origins and history of the Yiddish word nu and have made a discovery that has changed my whole outlook on life. If you think that nu comes from German, you’re wrong; if you try to trace it back to Slavic, you’re going to hit a dead end. As I’ve just found out, we’ve been nu-ing since we were slaves in Egypt, and maybe even before. It turns...

Wex

Wex the luftmentsh

Traveling from town to town on the Jewish Book Fair circuit, I’m beginning to feel like part of the great collective known as orkhe-porkhe--hoboes, vagrants, yidishe bindlestiffs like Stuffy Derma, the tramp on the old Milton the Monster Show. The term comes from the Hebrew oreakh poreakh, "a flying guest,” one who's here today and gone tomorrow. Unlike those of us who collect royalties, real...