Page 46 - Philly Girl

30 Janice Shapiro

I learned about Oreo cookies at her house; no junk food was
permitted in mine.
Barbara and I used to sneak into her parents’ bedroom
to read the hidden, illustrated book about “what married
women do.” We loved this book and would read it together,
repeatedly, throughout the years.
Barbara also had the privilege (from my point of view at
the time) of going to Hebrew School—which she dreaded.
I wanted so badly to be allowed to go too; I wanted a bat
mitzvah. But my parents did not think it was necessary for
girls to have a bat mitzvah. Barb and I made a deal that she
would come over once a week with her Hebrew lessons and
teach me everything that she had learned. This lasted about
two times. But I wore my first bra to her bat mitzvah party.
And at that party, I danced with “older boys.”
Something that occurred at that party is a good demon-
stration of her mother’s kindness to me. My mother used to
give me a Tonette home permanent every year, and I despised
them. I hated the smell of the liquid, the burn on my scalp,
and how I looked so ugly afterwards. I did not want to go
to Barbara’s party with my frizzy look from the dreaded
Tonette. Now, as it happens, my grandfather was a barber
by trade, and I used to hang around the barber shop where
he worked when I was a child. In fact, for a time, I aspired
to be a hairdresser. In any event, as a preteen, I was confident
that I knew how to cut hair. So before the party, I took my
toy scissors and chopped off half of my hair. Anne took one
look at my botched haircut the very second I walked in, and
took me aside to the bathroom. In the midst of her daugh-
ter’s bat mitzvah party, she found a pretty bow from one of
the gifts, and stuck it on the bald side of my head to hide my
inglorious mistake. I have always loved her for that.
Barbara and I had some ingenious projects. Our bed-
room windows faced each other. One day, we hooked up a
clothesline pulley. We put written messages in a paper cup