Freedom to love the law that Moses brought,
To sing the songs of David, and to think
The thoughts Gabirol to Spinoza taught,
Freedom to dig the common earth, to drink
The universal air—for this they sought
Emma Lazarus
When my Uncle Myron, known to most as Rabbi Myron M. Fenster, was to visit Baltimore for the annual gathering of the Rabbinical Assembly asked for a favor, I couldn’t say no. He wanted to go to an Orioles game at Camden Yards.
Not any ticket would do for Uncle Myron and I called in a favor and procured field-level box seats, ten rows behind home plate for a Sunday afternoon game.
As game time approached the temperature rose to 97° with the humidity not far behind. I navigated to our seats which I discovered with dismay were exposed to the full brunt of the sun. Uncle Myron went straight to the kosher hot dog stand and promptly arrived at our seats with dogs and knishes in hand. And so, we sat, munching on these kosher delights and drinking Diet Cokes while the sun blazed down upon us and the humidity drenched out shirts. Miraculously, we lasted till the seventh inning when we mercifully sought the refuge of the air-conditioned car.
What was it about kosher hot dogs and baseball? It came to me several months after our outing.
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| Uncle Myron |
Kosher hot dogs at a baseball game represented the great coming together of the disparate parts of Uncle Myron’s identity. He is a proud American, born into the depression years and raised during days of the “greatest generation”. His father had come to America as a teen after watching his brother being murdered in the streets of Russia. America was the land of his family’s salvation. The land where he played stick ball on the streets of Flatbush, met and married the girl next door, and was accepted to the rabbinical program at the Jewish Theological Seminary. Guided by the learnings of our sacred books and grounded by the wisdom of our teachers he has been a spiritual guide and teacher to thousands.
To be an American Jew. To be a Jew in America. Baseball, hot dogs, box seats, the Star-Spangled Banner. A double play, an inside fastball. A hot dog slathered with mustard and a Coke. A commitment to Jewish tradition honored. “Baruch ata H’shem….HaMotzi Lechem Meen HaAretz. Blessed are you, Creator of the Universe Who brought forth hot dog buns from the earth.”
