The Bridge Ladies Read Free

around in her compact kitchen as if she were modeling a new dress. Best of all is the deck overlooking the water, where terns and osprey regularly visit, where the water reflects the light like foil.
    Her table is set with linen and china. Napkins are gathered in silver rings, serving pieces are lined up like soldiers, and precut butter pats rest like a row of collapsed dominoes on a pretty dish.A noodle kugel fills the house with a smell I have long associated with love. On the table, a wooden trough-shaped dish holds a salad. It is hand-painted, and along the rim I notice Rhoda’s name and her late husband’s in a pretty script. Peter and Rhoda. There are reminders of their life as a couple all throughout the house, but I become fixated on this serving dish with the folksy script yoking their names. I wonder if Rhoda sees the inscription, if it makes her sad, or if it is part of the scenery now: his absence nowhere and everywhere.
    I don’t know what I was expecting, but when the Bridge Ladies arrive at Rhoda’s, they don’t seem all that happy to see each other, greeting one another with a bit of forced friendliness. Over time, I will witness all manner of lightly veiled forbearance and exasperation among them in the form of eye rolling, sniffing, and dismissive body language. They never kiss or air-kiss hello. No hugging, no body contact whatsoever. I wonder if it has always been thus. As young women were they affectionate, demonstrative? Or were there rivalries and hidden alliances among them? Did they have fun? It’s true that I can’t stand some of my closest friends; why did I imagine anything different from the ladies?
    When my mother sees me she does that thing she always does. If you blink you would miss it: the maternal once-over. Calculated in a few seconds, she inspects my clothes, my waistline, the sheen or lack of sheen in my hair. She will know if I’ve been getting enough rest, biting my nails, or picking at my face. Doubtless there are some mothers who gaze proudly on their daughters’ figures and outfits, but for Roz and me what I wear and how I look have been a battleground from the time I began to dress myself.
    Though none openly admit it, the Bridge Ladies, like most women of their day, groomed their daughters for potential mates. Yes, they sent us to college for an education but alsohoping we would meet our husbands there. As recently as this past spring, 2015, my mother voiced her wish that my daughter choose a college with a good ratio, and she wasn’t talking about teacher to student. Marriage was essential for our mothers. They feared for us going forward in life without the same protection they believed came with marrying a Jewish man.
    One of the Bridge daughters put it this way: “They’re from that whole generation of women whose prime focus was not career, but getting a man. So that’s your capital.”
    I resented this pressure when I was in my twenties. I knew how badly my mother wanted me to marry, and it made me feel defective and unlovable even as I rejected her outdated values. I was pursuing a career; I wanted a soul mate, not a meal ticket. I once asked my mother what she would prefer: if I got married or won a Nobel Prize. “Don’t be ridiculous” was all she said in response.
    I posed the same questions to each of the ladies:
    Did you always know you would get married?
    Absolutely.
    Did you ever consider marrying a non-Jewish man?
    Never.
    Did you know you would have children?
    Absolutely.
    Did you ever want anything else?
    No (except for Bette).
    Why not?
    It never occurred to us.
    Was it the cultural expectation or was it what you wanted?
    Both.
    In just one generation, the world they knew would radically change. Bridge daughters, collectively: some married Jewish men,some intermarried, some divorced, and some, god-forbid, did not marry. We would not return their serve. We got birth control and advanced degrees,