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She is beautiful, she is tragic...
Sunday, April 18, 2004Well, tragic might be little too much of a word...after all, she still stands, they haven't stripped away her stained glass windows and carved wood doors, they haven't crushed her lofty spaces and filled in her foundations for a parking lot. She still lives, a rarity that no one notices, a synagogue in West Brownsville, a dying town that once rivaled Pittsburgh....who would have thought there was enough of a Jewish community to put together such a magnificent building? I wonder what they would have thought, all these worshippers, if they new many years later their beautiful temple would become what it is now. I see their names, placed near the bottom of stained glass windows, and I wonder. The basement is now painted a deep red, sponged over with a brick red color...in places it looks like dried blood, and though I suppose it makes the restaurant and bar look more intimate, I don't particularly like it. On the back wall marquee lighting framed posters for movies that you can rent upstairs...today it's Mona Lisa Smile and something with the Rock in it. A flat screen TV...the same one where I got my first glimpse of Lord of the Rings...graces another wall, and I watch it for a time, trying to decide if the picture's really better while I wait for my sandwiches to be done so I can leave. The Philly cheese steaks alone, I figure, probably violate ever Jewish dietary law there is. Upstairs, there is a pretty, intimate foyer, and twin narrows staircases going up into the loft...I've never been there, it's off limits, though I imagine the view is lovely. Then the main room...some of the pews are left, but they all have computer towers stacked on them. In an alcove to the right, there are booths, and computers-for-hire, to the left, the alcove has a couch and another flat screen TV, playing football. Where the altar once would be, there is a video rental counter, and a place where you used to be able to buy coffee, and in between the door and that counter are tables of software, computer parts all a mess, especially when compared to the neatness of the twin low marble coffee tables that hold displays of rifles. Handguns are in the case to the right. The room is so tall. I look up, up at the huge vault of ceiling, where a seven tiered chandelier hands town, hanging right from the center of a slightly raised Star of David molded on the ceiling, painted a dull gold. Each of the arches over the alcoves bears a smaller star, and to be honest, it was my first clue, the first time I came in here, of the place's past. It is a beautiful place, the dark wood is lovingly kept clean, the doors are magnificent. The windows I could study for hours, looking at the symbols so same and so different from my own religion. The carpet on the stairs is soft under my feel, and thick, making everything silent as I walk up and down, wandering, thinking, killing time. I'm glad it's here. But also, it seems ironic. What has happened. What it has become. A place of worship that rents dvd's, and sells handguns and has wing night, .30 cents, eat in only, and dollar drafts. Permalink Cindy scribed this at 12:21 PM 0 comments |