Sarit sat with Judy Goldstein for a chat on a beautiful May morning. As you may know, Judy is soon retiring, and leaving her position as office manager at TBA. Judy has been working at TBA for 28 years!
Judy has been a member of TBA since 1978. She saw the building before it was renovated, the school before it was across the street, the preschool which is no longer in operation, and a vibrant community which has changed over the years. Sarit was curious to hear from her what brought her to Temple Beth Abraham, how she became the office manager, and what the TBA community was like all these years ago.
Here is Judy’s story in her own words:
I was born in Elizabeth, New Jersey but grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland, a city halfway between Baltimore and Washington. Unlike Nashua, Silver Spring had such a large Jewish population that the schools were closed on Jewish holidays because there were so many Jewish kids. I have an older brother and a younger sister, but also have 2 first cousins (one a year older and the other 2 years younger) who may as well be brother and sister to me. They lived around the corner from us for most of my formative years.
My upbringing was not particularly religiously observant, but we were raised as Conservative Jews and observed all the Jewish holidays and I attended religious school up to 3 days a week and even attended Hebrew High School for a while. My mother and her sister were very active in the Jewish community. They were both Jewish nursery school teachers and directors at synagogue nursery schools. They both were very active in Hadassah – becoming regional officers. So, from a young age, they got me involved in Jewish life. I was involved in Young Judaea, both as a member and a group leader and went to Camp Tel Yehuda in NY. I excelled in languages and Hebrew school, and participated in a special learning program (by invitation only) at a Camp Ramah in New York.
I graduated from the University of Maryland in College Park with a B.A. in Early Childhood Education. I met my husband, Steve, at the end of my freshman year in college. We actually met at a dance at the Jewish Community Center in Rockville, Maryland. Neither of us dance or are very social people, but we met at this dance at the JCC of all places. We got married right out of college and moved up to Nashua four years later, in 1978, when Steve was offered a software job at Raytheon. This was a big area for software engineers. We lived in an apartment for the first year or so, and then our son, Jeremy, was born in 1980, and soon after that we bought a house. Our second son, Dan, was born in 1984.
One of the first things we did when arriving in Nashua was to call Temple Beth Abraham. We went to a service early on where we were greeted by Laura and Dick Horowitz. We joined the Temple soon after. I also found out that there was an ORT (I had been an ORT member in MD) social event coming up which we attended and, thus began our entrance into the Nashua Jewish community. My New Hampshire ORT friends became family to me as I acclimated to New England. We played bridge, bowled, had a couples’ club for social events.
Temple Beth Abraham at that time was at the same location it is now, but it was much smaller! It was different than it is now, but its members became like family to me very quickly. The Temple community included people from all over the country. We had moved away from our families and most members were not Nashua natives. So we all supported each other, we were a community.
Even though my college degree was in early childhood education, I realized early on that I was not meant to be a nursery school teacher. All my jobs during high school and college, and in the early years of my marriage had been secretarial or admin support. I realized that this is what I liked to do. I stopped working when Jeremy was born to be a stay-at-home mom so I could be there for my kids.
When both boys were in school full time and I figured out the carpooling for Hebrew school, because religious school at that time was two afternoons a week, I was hired by Elaine Brody (TBA President at the time) to be a part-time Secretary. Florence Marshall, who had been the TBA secretary for 23 years, was easing her way out of her position on the way to retirement. I worked with Florence for a few years helping and learning the ropes to take over the office. I also ended up taking on bookkeeping duties as my friend, Alex Blatt, who had been TBA bookkeeper for a number of years, was moving out of the area. He felt, and Temple officers agreed, that I could take on these duties also. Once Florence Marshall retired totally, I was working full time at the Temple as Office Manager and Bookkeeper.
In my years at TBA, I have worked with 3 rabbis, 15 presidents of the congregation and seven treasurers. I’ve seen many changes during this time. I have also had wonderful co-workers and friends, especially Richard Bryant and Diane Toth, who have worked at Temple Beth Abraham just a few less years than I have. Up until 7 – 10 years ago, people were very involved in Temple life. The school was large. We had many volunteers, and we had a temple bulletin, run by Jules Lelchuk and Ben Freedman. Those are things like they will carry with me forever. Jules used to work at a print shop in New York, and I loved being in the office with him because the bulletin was his baby and we worked on it together – it was wonderful. Jules and his wife, Shirley, became like parents to me. We also had Shalom Preschool on site, which I became involved with when both my sons attended it. I was on the preschool’s board of directors and eventually became the Co-President of the Board of Directors of Shalom Preschool. I was also a very active member of ORT and TBA Sisterhood, serving in many positions on their boards of directors.
The Temple back in those days was a very vital place! People were always in the building, especially in the kitchen: Bar Mitzvah parents coming into the kitchen to cook, parents cooking for class services, people cooking for Shabbat, Shabbat dinners or a luncheon on Sunday. Parents would come in during Hebrew school, visit the gift shop and hangout with each other. In my personal life I am a pretty private person, a solitary person even, but here at temple I was always surrounded by people and I loved it! My favorite part of my work, and of my temple life has always been the people. I loved seeing all the generations of people from the Shalom preschool students to the seniors, and the school parents. We had a strong sense of community, and it truly felt like a big family.
It is interesting that the women in my family all ended up being very involved in the Jewish community. My sister worked at the JCC in San Francisco for over 30 years, and my closest cousin worked at her synagogue as the Education Director and Bar/t Mitzvah tutor. She later became very active in the Reconstructionist movement, working in education and programming, which she is finding a hard time retiring from.
This has been the longest job I ever had, and it is hard to step away. But it is also time to do that. Things have changed in the temple, and in my life, and I need to figure out what the next chapter is. I know I’ll get together with friends, play mah jongg, exercise more, and volunteer. My wish for TBA is that it continues to remain successful, that the membership grows, and now that COVID is ending, I hope the community feels like it used to be – connected and like a big family. I’m feeling hopeful, and plan to help in any way I can.