Two extraordinary events

to benefit children in
our community who
have special needs and
their families

An Alien Life Form
Called Teenagers

/—

with us, he spent all his remaining
few years ago our family
money, about $250, to purchase a
sipped mint tea in the
black leather jacket with brass buckles
home of a cave-dwelling
and
brass studs all over the thing.
Berber gentleman living in
Francois showed it to me
the High Atlas Mountains, a
and with a huge grin glee-
few hours south of
fully predicted, "My parents
Marrakesh, Morocco. I'm
weeel ATE zis jacket!"
pretty sure that he'd never
I now realize that parents in
heard the joke that ends,
every era have felt the angst
"And for a Jew, life begins
of raising teenagers. A bibli-
when all the children are out
cal scholar explained some-
of the house and the dog
thing I had never before
dies."
considered. "Why was it,"
Everyone else knows this
he asked, "that Abraham was
gem, and there's some real
RABBI BOB
about to sacrifice Isaac at the
truth in it. My wife and I
ALPER
age of 12, and not 13?" And
still adore our pets, but life
Special to the
he answered his question
does change for the better in
Jewish News
with wisdom that shows the
some respects when the kids
link of each generation of
are finally out on their own.
parents to the others. "Because at 13"
For one thing, we can begin to view
he solemnly intoned, it wouldn't have
the complex teenage years with some
been a sacrifice."
of the humor that hindsight offers.
If I ever return to Morocco, I'd like
For instance, I remember:
- The time I sat down at the dining
room table to find my daughter wear-
ing black pants, black shirt, black lip-
stick, black eye shadow, and black nail
polish. My son sported a scruffy beard
"He calls it Pay-per-Jew."
and a bandana tied around his head.
— The character of Arthur (Chris
"How lovely," I remarked. "I'm dining
Eigeman) in the new television series
this evening with Morticia and Willie
"It's Like, You Know . . .,” on his
Nelson!"
Protestant roommate who earned his
* My daughter's summers at a camp
fortune by selling the rights to Jewish
for severely over-privileged children.
High Holiday services on cable TV
We paid thousands of dollars so that
she could spend eight weeks living in
"The authorities couldn't care less
a three-sided wooden hut, with no
about healthy Arab kids, let alone sick
water, no electricity, downwind from a
ones."
latrine. She could have had the same
— Jerusalem City Councilor Anat
thrill just by going into her brother's
Hoffman, of the left-wing Meretz Party,
bedroom.
on Israeli Arabs, whose poverty rate is
* Our French exchange student,
double their Jewish counterparts.
who taught me that teen behavior is,
apparently, universal. On his final day
"If I think I can help in the saving of
even one life, I will take on any role
Rabbi Bob Alper is a Vermont-based
offered to me. "
stand-up comic and author.

to visit our Berber friend again. I have
a joke to tell him, and I bet he'll be
able to relate to it. The punch line is,
"And for a Berber, life begins when all
the children are out of the cave and
the goat dies." 1-1

Yiddish Limericks

by Martha Jo Fleischmann
A proper baboon just deplores
His wife prancing 'round on all
fours.
She says, "You'd be rancin*
If all of these vancin**
Were jumping around in your
drawers!"

dancing
** bedbugs

salon

First Annaal
Cat-A-Trion

Sunday,
April 25, 1999
10:00 a.m.-4:oo p.m.

gaircats/Blow dry
($2o cacti ; $35 both)

Manicares (Om)

631 Orchard Lake Road,
West Bloomfield
248-539-2211

Quotables

llowz By You

Former Israeli Prime Minister
Shimon Peres, on being asked by one of
the sides in the Kosovo conflict to act as
a mediator.

—

"In Palestine, we also have refugees.
Why didn't America intervene
here?"
— Khaled Zeghari, a Palestinian
construction worker, on NATO's mili-
tary campaign against Serbian forces.

"You know the history."
— An advisor to Ariel Sharon, on
why the Israeli foreign minister refuses
to condemn Serbia or support NATO
bombing in Kosovo. The advisor was
alluding to Serb assistance to Jews dur-
ing,the Holocaust.

RABBI, THE BUDGET COMM ITTEE
MET LAST N16(41- AND
EX PRESSED THEIR PEEP

CONCERN./ OVER INCREASING
EXPENSE S

SOME BOP6ET CUTS, TILC. BE
TOUGH 0 IV EVERT ONE, OUT J'Ivl
50Re ,900`1.1. AGREE THAT IN TIME
END, WE'LL FE A STRON6ER
CONGREGATION)

Noon-4:oo p.m.

GameWorks

BY Mendel

50 WE'RE RECOMMENDING

Sunday,
May 23, 1999

.900 WANT TO CUT OUT A GC-
RE (,1 GIOUS SERVICES ??

Great Lakes Crossing
Mall, Auburn Hills

OH COME ON NOW,
.900% RE NOT GOING TO

GET A U, FUNDAMENTALIST

OM US ARE .900?

The Merle and Shirley Harris Children
and Family Division.
Because every child is part of our community.

( 2

Call JARC
48) 35 2-'5 27 2

A'tICS 4206

11 4/23
1999

Detroit Jewish News

.5