I knew and loved my machatunim (in-laws), Froim & Riwka Lumerman. I met their daughter, Malka, at a Brooklyn College houseplan (fraternity) in the Fall of 1961. Having just been accepted, as one of the new guys, I was assigned to get goils for the Friday night party. So I called up Shelly, a girl I had met and who was a friend of my neighbor. Not only was she receptive, but she had a friend! Shelly assured me that her friend, Molly, was sweet, attractive and intelligent. That seemed nice, but all I could think about was my social coup - 2 goils!

 

     I wasn’t disappointed. It was the era of the ludicrously highly-teased sprayed hair. (I once accidentally set a girl’s hair on fire when I tried to pass a lighter to a friend!) The two young women, high school seniors, opened the screen door and slowly walked down the stairs. I expectedly looked up. Oy! Shelly was nice. Molly was beautiful - unique. Contrary to the Style of the Day, her soft long rich-blond hair fell to below her shoulders. Her eyes were a deep-blue, and she had a smile to-die-for. But it was her voice, something about her voice, that arrested me. It wasn’t that she had an accent. She spoke a beautiful melodious English. I couldn’t discern a recognizable accent. Unique. Shelly was right. Molly was sweet, attractive and obviously intelligent. But her hair, her way of being, and her mysterious voice!  I was hooked. Who was this golden blue-eyed Jewess?

 

     To make a long, very long, Story short, I gradually found out. Though a shy 17, I managed to ask for her number (Cloverdale 6 -  6134). Give me a dollah for every time I called. So we became friendly, she graduated from my high school, Lafayette, in 1/62, and enrolled in Brooklyn College. We dated. I gradually “solved” the Mystery; English wasn’t her first language. It was Yiddish. She was born in the Polish forest. She lived for years in a DP (Displaced Persons) camp in Germany. Germany! She arrived in the United States  with her parents and siblings when she was about five. Only then did she begin to learn English. And she learned very well, but your Grandmother never learned to have a Brooklyn accent.