The Noble Scarlet RU-Rah-Rah Rules of New Brunswick

1. Every house on Senior Street must, and this is non-negotiable, have a wooden porch. It does not matter if you can afford stone steps. It does not matter if you cannot afford paint. It does not matter if you're afraid of wood sprites. You can have it with your toast, you can have it with a ghost, but you MUST have a wooden porch! (Bum ba dum.) This rule has been in effect since the Revolutionary War, judging by the age and state of some of these wheezing porches. It adds charm and a homey, idyllic feel to our classy little slum. Yeah, uh-huh.

2. Similar to #1, every house is mandated to have a well-manicured patch of weeds in front of the house. It must not exceed 20 square feet. All forms of grass and other gentle plantestry are banned from the municipality. This is New Jersey people! We are tough! Like weeds! And then we mow them down.

Although NB's quaint little cottages sport a variety of weed on their front porches (and an aroma that drifts out of the windows 'round eventide), it is rumored that some Johnny Rebs secretly have GRASS growing behind their innocent-looking houses. This rumor is as yet unconfirmed, since to do so would require me to face off with the residential pit-bull of whatever property I'm invading, and I like my ears intact.

Our front lawn actually sports gravel, and two healthy evergreen bushes. They're cut into squares, and are collectively named Georgie. Say hi, Georgie.

3. No food-related store is permitted to close before 3 AM. Lest it not properly present service at college rush-hour: midnight. I wonder...if the stores closed at a reasonable hour...might the students learn to BUY things at a reasonable hour?
Nah....

4. If a service does not have the mandatory 50 cent gigantic red "R" sticker on its window, then it is not worth patronizing. This may or may not be true. I shall have to do a closer study when all the frat boys return after summer break. Certainly most of the vendors pander to the Rutgers ego ad nausaeum:
     "Welcome to college town! We're RED!"
     ("psst! It's scarlet, not red!")
     "Whooops, didn't know how to say that in Spanish/Hindi;
     we're SCARLETTE!" *big, cheesy, buy-my-stuff smile*

Ah, the power of the free market.

5. Ramen soups are a new food group. I wouldn't even consider them food, let alone a staple item, but our local supermarket has half an aisle devoted exclusively to Ramen soups. They know their customers, I guess. G-d save the student living off of that stuff! (There, but for the Grace of G-d, go I, but more on that later.)

Let Me Introduce Myself....

Hey y'all! My name is, for all intents and purposes, Silly. I'm a 19 year-old Orthodox Jew, and I'm starting at Rutgers in the fall. I am naive, innocent, and going to fight tooth-and-painted-nail to keep it that way. That's my challenge folks: surviving college with my heart, mind and soul intact. What do you think are my odds?

A bit of background: I was born in Orlando, FL. My parents moved back up to Brooklyn, NY, when I was still little. (Brooklyn is a little place located somewhere on the west coast of Long Island, for those of you who don't know that quaint little neighborhood. In Brooklyn, red brick grows like poppies and the sidewalk is dalmationed with old gum. Luverly and citified, Brooklyn is.) For most of my life, I have lived in a two-bedroom apartment on the sixth floor of a pre-war building. Some of my fondest memories were made there: writing on the windowsill while watching the snow gather over the fire escape; gathering on the roof to see fireworks rocketing in every direction on the Fourth of July; curling up next to my dad on our itchy old couch while he reads to me about some poor bloke named Watson, who seems to be trodden upon by just about every person he meets. (Indeed, the only person mousier than Watson in all of Sir Doyle's works seems to be Watson's near-invisible wife. Mayhap that was the basis of their marriage?) I grew up there, with my big brother, and my little sister. 

We went to Jewish parochial schools. My parents could not afford it, but our Judaism, and our role as moral servants of G-d, was important to them. Time and again school tuition challenged us, and Dad would consider enrolling us in public school, but with G-d's help I graduated from Manhattan High School for Girls, with a full scholarship to take the year off and study my roots in Jerusalem.

My time in Jerusalem was a maturing process for me. Sure, I had my hitchhiking adventures, and silly moments. (Maybe I'll do special posts on Israel memories, interspersed with my daily kvetches...) I also had the opportunity to observe and join in with many different cultures, and many different world views, and that led me to examine my own in matters that I had taken for granted before. The result: I'm now a die-hard Mitzvah Machine, and my main goals are to help as many people as I can, in as many ways as I can, and through that and the Torah build my relationship with G-d. 

Easy enough to say that in Israel! I have returned (temporarily, just long enough to get my college degree) to the States, and it's a whole different world here. People are meek, and they do what they're told to do by their bosses, the media, or really whomever has a stronger sense of self than the standard American. It's embarrassing. I know I grew up here, but I feel truly alien here now. Where is the intellectual curiosity? Where is the warm plate of cookies shared between erstwhile strangers? Where is the drive? The powerful opinions, developed by deep, critical analysis of the world around us? Where did morality and free-thought GO in this country??

I don't know, but I plan on finding out. Hmph.

My quest for morality and the American mind starts here and now, in New Brunswick, NJ. I'm sharing an apartment with three other girls at 93 Senior St. New Brunswick is a strange place, and I've been bumbling along trying to learn the native language ("Jerseyse"). Now that I'm starting to get my feet under me, it's time to lay out the RULES OF NEW BRUNSWICK, summer-style.