YONA ZELDIS MCDONOUGH

I’m sitting in a pleasantly air-conditioned car of a Manhattan bound R train, enjoying the sparkling new novel by Cathleen Schine when I am poked by a stray elbow. I stop reading to glare at the owner of said elbow and see it belongs to a young woman who in all probability did not intend to poke me; it’s just that her absorption in applying her mascara—two coats of Maybelline’s Great Lash—has rendered her oblivious to my presence.  I continue to steal glances at my seat mate, who whips out her cream blush and rubs it vigorously into her cheeks, … Continue Reading

Malcah and Chayym Zeldis, Israel, 1949

Below is a brief excerpt from the story “Capricorn Rising,” which will appear in the spring issue of the American Literary Review.  I am working on a collection of stories very loosely based on the lives of my parents (see above), Americans who lived in Israel from 1949 to 1958.  I was born in Chadera, Israel, in 1957 and although I did not grow up there, the country nonetheless … Continue Reading

My mother was not a regular reader of high end fashion magazines when I was girl in the 1960s, but my friend Diane’s mother—a cool, soignée blonde with an alluring French twist and a lily-of-the-valley infused cloud of Diorissimo hovering perpetually about her—was and whenever I visited, Diane and I would pore over their slick, bright pages together in a companionable reverie that needed no words.  Veruschka’s Slavic exoticism held us deeply in thrall; the preternatural perfection of Jean Shrimpton’s full, exquisitely lipsticked mouth was like a valentine.  We longed to look like them, but we knew these girls—and they … Continue Reading

… trying to grow out her bangs

A dear friend invited me on a girls-only jaunt to Palm Beach in March.  Sounds like fun, right?  Well, although the plane doesn’t leave for another month, I have already broken out in a cold, clammy sweat. No, it’s not fear of flying, though I confess to being afflicted with that too. Instead, it’s another, perhaps less commonly discussed travel related anxiety: fear of packing. While I love to travel, the actual process of sorting through my possessions, deciding what I need and what I do not arouses in me a kind of primal panic, as if the wrong decision … Continue Reading

From the time I was very young, my mother let me choose my own clothes.  This resulted in some rather outlandish attire: cobalt blue pants splattered with daisies as big as my face, a hot pink, polka dot tent dress, white fish net stockings (which had to be painstakingly attached to one of the most irritating garments of all time, a garter belt), worn with a black and white op-art trench coat. I received some pointed looks from the mothers of my friends, but this bothered me not a jot. I thought I looked great, and no amount of icy … Continue Reading

I’ve been a devoted Francophile since the age of 12, so I was delighted when it became apparent that my daughter Kate, now 14, is following along in my footsteps.  French is her favorite subject at school, and together we swoon over French food, clothes, shoes and chocolate. It has been my dream to take her to Paris to sample la vie française first hand but malheursement, our finances dictated otherwise. So I decided if I couldn’t take the girl to Paris, I would bring a bit of Paris to the … Continue Reading

Throughout my childhood, being Jewish was defined in terms of what we did not do: go to church, wear a cross, celebrate Christmas or Easter.  None of this was unusual: of course Jews don’t do these things.  But for most Jewish families, at least the ones I knew as a child, such negatives were balanced by the positive things they did do: attend Hebrew school, celebrate bar and bat mitzvahs, observe the Sabbath, and the major Jewish holidays like Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and Hanukkah.
Yet we did none of these either. My parents, and my father in particular, had their … Continue Reading

“When I’m working on a novel, everything is material”, says my friend, the writer Christina Baker Kline.  Christina, author is the author of four novels, including, most recently, Bird in Hand and The Way Life Should Be.  She is co-editor, with Anne Burt, of About Face: Women Write about What They See When They Look in the Mirror and co-author, with Christina L. Baker, of The Conversation Begins: Mothers and Daughters Talk about … Continue Reading

Many thanks to my new Canadian pals at FASHION MAGAZINE, (www.fashionmagazine.com) who recently ran this piece…

With a nod to Blanche Dubois, who believed in the kindness of strangers, I have placed my own faith in the magic of clothes. More than protection or adornment, clothes have the power to bewitch, exalt and transform. I still remember a particular dress—white, scoop neck, pleated skirt, red piping—which I owned when I was no more than five. A rakishly crossed pair tennis racquets graced the breast pocket of the matching jacket.  I adored the dress and especially those racquets—so decorative, so … Continue Reading

Queenie, my favorite lap dog

You’ve heard the term, that’s for sure.  Maybe you’ve even said it.  As in, “Oh, she’s just a lapdog” or “I would never want a lapdog.” Like it’s an insult of some sort.  Or even a curse. Sorry to say, lapdogs have gotten a bad rap, and it hardly seems fair.
Full disclosure: I’ve owned a lapdog for the past four years.  She’s a purebred Pomeranian, with tiny paws, tiny teeth, and a tiny, foxy face.  She weighs all of eight pounds, and she is never happier than when she is in someone’s—okay, usually my—lap.   She will sit on my lap … Continue Reading

Wanda and I come clattering down the stairs of the subway station at 7th Avenue and Flatbush in Brooklyn. It a little after three o’clock on a winter afternoon and we’ve just gotten out of school. We reach the turnstiles and put in our tokens before descending a second set of stairs, this time to the platform itself. A train has just left the station; the people who have gotten off pass us on the stairs. There will be a wait, maybe a long one, for the next train. But we have time and are not worried.

Wanda and I are … Continue Reading

Some of my favorite plastic pieces…Bakelite, Lucite and more…

Natural fibers.   Remember them?  Big buzz words from the late 1970s, they were probably coined in reaction to the tidal waves of polyester, and acrylic that had flooded the market just a few years earlier.  I was quick to jump right on that particular bandwagon, and would no more wear a sweater with five percent nylon than I would a dress made of 100% Saran Wrap.   My persnickety standards applied to jewelry as well and even though I didn’t have a lot of cash to spend on the strands of pearls or the gold hoop earrings I coveted, I nonetheless … Continue Reading