I remember standing at a bus stop in Stamford Hill when I visited London as a teenager, intent on getting to Harrods so I could buy the newest Harry Potter book. All I was really doing wrong was reading secular books. There were boys who took their hats off once they got to the city and ate hamburgers and talked to girls.
There were girls who wore lipstick and sashayed down the main avenue in tight skirts. Perhaps it wasn't just the books that made me think sinful thoughts. Had I never read them, there is no way these desires would have burgeoned within me. But then I wanted to see the world, wear jeans, drive a car, learn how to play the piano – all of which were impossible dreams for a woman of my circumstances. It started with the small things: clear nail polish, subtle eyeliner, a ride on the subway. Like my zeidy predicted, I became seduced by the devil. I doubt it came as a surprise to anyone that I left the Hasidic community. There was no doubt that my heart was already thoroughly blackened by the time I was 10 years old. My grandfather used to say English was an impure language and to employ it in any way would mean employing Satan himself as commander of my heart. Break a rule and you're automatically on God's blacklist. Maybe I didn't wear red nail polish like a shiksa gentile, but I was peeking into an evil world, living vicariously in it through fictional characters. In a black-and-white world you can either be bad or good.
Because I read books in English I knew I was a bad girl.
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