All She Wrote

Risky Surgical Business

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 08 May 2012 14:18:06 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

Almost two years ago, a woman who is dear to me announced she would undergo prophylactic surgery. Her decision to remove her ovaries and fallopian tubes was painstaking; as a mother of young children, she didn’t relish the thought of slipping into early menopause, never mind the physical stress of surgery or disruption of her family life. Yet I felt mostly relief.

A Son Who Does Not Know How To Ask

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 16:30:00 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

It began as the typical nightmare of so many parents, but concluded with an unsettling twist: Danny, age 3, had made his way through the door, down to the building’s lobby and out onto the lively sidewalks of Manhattan. By the time Hannah Brown found her son, in a shop near her Upper West Side building, she was beside herself. But Danny? He registered no concern.

autism If I Could Tell You Israel New York parenting

I’ve Got Mail

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 17:54:26 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

I’m not an Orthodox Jew.

I say this because every once in a while, after I publish an article or column, I receive indignant e-mails denouncing my behavior or thoughts because they don’t align with traditional Judaism. I say this because my February column on modest dress for “tweens” elicited several such letters, including one from a single male writer who was “dismayed by my ignorance,” and also “sad,” about the way my children are being raised.

Tween Fashion: A Modest Proposal

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 18:04:00 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

My son Joel, age 7, and my daughter Talia, almost 10, lean on my shoulders, staring at the computer screen in disbelief. Here was something that didn’t fit their notion of the world. Grown men spitting? At a child? Because her long skirts weren’t long enough? A sincere and sweet boy, Joel wondered if these men, these ultra-Orthodox lunatics of Beit Shemesh, in Israel, had ever read the Torah.

That was last month.

Beit Shemesh fashion modesty tweens

Present From The Past

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 17:18:53 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

I can’t think of the summer of 1985 without wincing. Being 16 and shy, with the kind of fine hair that went limp in dry desert heat, and with only one (miserable) month of overnight camp as my experience away from home, I wasn’t bound to enjoy every moment of a six-week teen tour of Israel.

Leading By Example

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 17:32:38 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

She’s not a rabbi. She has no plans to become one. She sees herself more as a teacher than a trailblazer. And yet, Adena K. Berkowitz — who at 52 is an Orthodox mother of five, a scholar of bio-ethics, a lawyer and an instructor of liturgy, to name a few of her many roles — quietly added an intriguing new hat to her collection three years ago, one that places her among a small group of pioneers: spiritual leader of an Orthodox congregation.

The Politics Of Therapy

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 15:25:21 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

The last time I recall feeling this disturbing sense of dislocation, a boyfriend informed me that he loved someone else. He explained that all through our short but spirited romance, all through his soft renditions of Yiddish lullabies and late-night phone calls, and for two years before that, he’d been seeing that someone else. I felt as if I’d been suddenly transported to an alternative and hostile universe; the person in whom I’d confided still wore the same sheepish grin, but was not at all the person I’d imagined he was.

A Sorry State

Dara Levin — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 18:35:34 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

On rare occasions, she surfaces in my dreams. During these nights, she’s a loving friend, her expressions animated, her laughter loud and long.
In waking life, I haven’t spoken to her since my children, now 6 and 9, were tiny toddlers so demanding that I couldn’t summon the energy to focus on our fight, even as the flames roared beyond control. By the time I was paying attention, our friendship was extinguished.

Labors Of Love

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 19:16:35 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

I received one of my best parenting tips while trapped in a dentist’s chair. Big with my first baby, my voice quieted by the examination, I was an obvious target for advice. My dentist, a mother of three, leaned over conspiratorially. “Don’t let them tell you what to do,” she said.

Schmears Of Sadness?

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 19:14:00 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

After nearly 12 years of marriage, I know the groan well. I brace myself. Who could have died? “H&H is closing its West Side store,” my husband Jeremy says with a wince, referring to the acclaimed bagel shop. I exhale. But he adds, “It just confirms that everything is going to hell in a hand basket.”

This Land Is Your Land?

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 07 Jun 2011 16:49:00 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

My long-legged 9-year-old clambers onto my lap, her eye-rolling cynicism suppressed for the moment. Together we wait, staring at the computer screen’s still image of an Israeli flag, listening as the sentimental strains of a symphony rise up. But when a disembodied voice explodes in song, Talia joins in, belting out the Hebrew words with a gusto she usually reserves for Broadway show tunes, her torso swaying from the effort. My daughter is caught up in the love and hope and dreams of “Hatikvah.”

Israel Jewish life parenting

Testy About Tests

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 10 May 2011 18:55:28 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

It was a day of shock (Obama!, Osama!) and a day of sorrow (The Six Million). But for my 9-year-old daughter Talia, that date, May 2, known as Yom HaShoah on Jewish calendars, was merely the day before a bigger, scarier one; the next morning, promptly at 9 a.m., the New York state tests would begin: a series of five, one hour-long exams that would measure her ability to understand reading passages and tackle third-grade math.

Taking Japan Personally

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 15:49:00 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

My friend’s jaw dropped in disbelief. “You’re going back? What?! Why?”

She turned to her new husband, her eyes twinkling, her voice teasing. “Japan is Elicia’s Israel,” she said. By which she meant, Japan is Elicia’s homeland. By which she meant: how absurd.

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Book Of Love … ’ Tween Mothers and Daughters

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 20:36:04 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

My daughter Talia, animated with talk of gifts and guests and birthday games, grows quiet: “I can’t believe it,” she says, her sunny mood eclipsed by a sudden solemn thought. “Nine?”

Welcome Muddah …: Greetings From Family Camp

Dani Shetrit — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 18:38:27 +0000

All She Wrote

Elicia Brown

Special To The Jewish Week

I’ve learned a few odd habits of New York parents. One of them is that, in this fast-paced town, families often wrap up summer plans in February.

Family Camp Jewish camping Jewish life YMHA