For Openers...
Oh, Purim,
How You've Changed
TED ROBERTS
Special to The Jewish News
P
urim, we hardly know you
anymore!
When I was a grogger-
twirling Purim celebrant
long, long ago (only a few years after
the collapse of the Prrsian Empire),
Purim was a modest little holiday. Yes,
there was a costume ball. Girls' cos-
tumes were old tablecloths and card-
board crowns; boys wore sheets, simu-
lating the royal robes of King
Achashverosh, or khaki pants. (My
mother swore — although it wasn't in
the Book of Esther — that Mordecai
always wore khaki pants and who
argued with his mother in 1940?)
Though none of us was a drama
critic, we intuitively,understodd the
flaw in the 4th century BCE drama.
Not enough characters for the 300
contestants at the Purim ball.
It would take 50 years before we
were cynical enough to figure out that
Purim was really a masquerade ball,
not a religious celebration. Now you
can come as a can of Campbell's
mushroom soup, Michael Jordan or
the Spice Girls.
But who wanted to go to a costume
ball with 100 kings, 100 Esthers and
100 Mordecais? Besides that, Morde-
cai was a real challenge. Only my
mama defended the khaki pants con-
cept.
Female crossdressers were rare or
closeted in the '40s. They never
showed up at the Baron Hirsch Syna-
gogue Purim Ball. So girls were severe-
ly limited. All Esthers. The only ques-
tion was what kind of tablecloth
would the future queen of the Persian
Empire of 300 BCE have worn?
Mothers pondered this question: oil-
cloth, cotton, plastic?
Even wrapped in paper or soiled
Howz By You
Esther: (with a big smile and a
wink) "Kill Haman."
King: "Okay."
A powerful scenario that taught an
adult lesson to the juvenile audience:
the King of Persians and Medes,
whose empire stretched from India to
Ethiopia, had all the power of a
stewed chicken drumstick in the
hands of this Semitic seductress.
Pass me a grogger and a Coca Cola;
I'll drink to that. 111
Yiddish Limericks
by Martha Jo Fleischmann
A long-eyelashed ostrich
named Clara
Begged, "Ma, let me please
wear mascara,
Without which, you know,
I'll not catch a beau."
She answered,
"Aff mere de nevarar*
* Idiomatic — "Don't worry,
take the blamer
* Literal — On me, the crime!"
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tablecloths, we loved the Purim ball
because kids got free Coca Colas. At
least that's the way it worked at our
shul.
Yes, the cokes were nice, but what
else gilded the festivities? There was
no music. A few hundred kids milled
around the assembly hall and drank
cokes and slid on the waxed hardwood
floor. It was a simpler time. We
thought sliding on the waxed wooden
floor was a great game — especially
when some clumsy kid slid into the
refreshment table.
Oh, yeah, there were hamantashen
— as edible as the cardboard coasters
on the table. If Haman is in hell, he's
on a 100 percent diet of those haman-
tashen. -
Sometimes there was a "dramatic
presentation." That set our little libidi-
nous hearts — two years behind the
libidinous hearts of our feminine class-
mates — on fire because we'd read the
Purim story. Maybe we'd get the
voluptuous Vashti dance scene that
the Book of Esther has exorcised. It was
not to be. Instead we got the classic
Purim play:
Haman: "Kill the Jews."
King: "Uh ..."
Ef11-1?..
k
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