The Out of Town Advantage: A Mishpacha Symposium

Project coordinator: Gedalia Guttentag

I

n the Jewish world, where the term “out of town” means anywhere outside the Tristate area, an “out of towner” is someone who, while working a little harder with limited resources, also knows what it means to be an integral part of a small community. But what are the trade-offs? The spiritual and physical inconveniences and benefits of living far from the centers of Jewish life? Mishpacha asked several prominent “out of towners” to share the challenges and the blessings of a life-choice that has both individual and family ramifications, addressing these and other issues:

• What kind of adjustment did you or your spouse experience, and when did you finally feel like it could work for you? 

• Do your children resent being “out-of-towners” when they go off to camp, yeshivah, or seminary?

• How do you find spiritual role models for yourself and your children?

• If several hundred families would move to your town from Brooklyn, would you consider the influx a blessing or a challenge?

Better than Par

Rabbi Baruch Levine, Waterbury, Connecticut

D

on’t move to Waterbury if you’re expecting an assortment of 40 dips to choose from for Shabbos. Our store carries around four, but that’s fine. It’s better than when we first moved, when we actually had to have our gefilte fish with just Hellman’s mayonnaise and non-heimishe chrein (horseradish)… such suffering.

Truth be told, on my many trips back and forth from New York and Lakewood, I would often find myself on a Thursday night in one of the new-age boutique kosher supermarkets buying Shabbos items to bring back home to my family in Waterbury — I didn’t want them to feel deprived. Until on one such trip something in me moved. I walked into one of these supermarkets with a different pair of eyes. I found myself confronted with way too many choices, and it was just giving me a big headache — and so I challenged myself. Why am I doing this? We are perfectly happy with the store and selection that we have where we live. We will spend less money and consume less calories. The next day, I walked into Waterbury Kosher World where I felt at home and bought what we needed for our oneg Shabbos. We survived that Shabbos — and every one since — fully intact.

Growing up in Toronto, I would spend my midwinter breaks visiting New York. My family would stay at the Park House hotel on 12th Avenue in Boro Park and spent the day gallivanting up and down 13th Avenue — from Paskesz to Bencraft and everything in between (breakfast every day was at the Donut Man). We had an absolute blast — but by the time it came for us to go back home, we were delighted to escape the honking and double parking of Boro Park. Of course, by the time the next year’s midwinter rolled around, we needed that “in-town” fix, so we returned to the Park House and hit those streets again! Those were some of the best vacations we had. The following summer in camp, as I was hanging out with my in-town friends, I told them, “You know something — being a New Yorker is nice, but the worst part about living in New York is that you can never visit New York!” (Today, you can probably replace New York with Lakewood.)