Diane knew her family was waiting for her when she opened the passenger door of the old Datsun station wagon. Shelly kept the engine idling while she tapped the steering wheel, leaning her head forward to watch her daughter get into the car.

Diane flopped down and slammed the door. Diane’s grandmother sat in the back seat,next to her brother Max, who occupied himself with a purple plastic pony. His feet dangled just over the edge of the seat, providing him with the perfect opportunity to kick the back of Diane’s chair.

“Max,please stop kicking me!”

“I’m not kicking you!”

Shelly pulled out of the driveway,announcing, “I have a few stops to make.”

Diane sighed. She knew that her mother’s stops could take hours. She threw her arms up. “You said we were going straight to Marlene’s house!”

“Well, I have some stops to make first.”

“How many?”

“What difference does it make?”

Diane pulled the Walkman out of her coat pocket.

Shelly stopped at a red light and stared at Diane as she unraveled the earphones. “I don’t want to hear your hock-in-cup music.”

“Don’t worry, I have headphones.”

“I can hear it through the headphones.”

“No you can’t.”

Diane opened the Walkman and checked the tape, Juda’s Priest Live. She closed the cassette door and pushed the play button.Meanwhile her mother turned the radio on and flipped through the channels until she found the Jewish station. A group of men sang in Hebrew.

Diane pushed the play button. Rob Halford chanted “Breaking-the-law,Breaking-the-Law” into her ears. Shelly cranked the volume up on the car radio so that it overpowered Diane’s headphones.

“Can you turn that down just a little?” Diane asked. “It is the most obnoxious crap I’ve ever heard.” She reached for the dial but Shelly slapped her hand away.

“No-I don’t want to hear that head-splitting noise you call music. Besides, it is important to understand your Jewish heritage.”

“Mom,a bunch of Hassids singing about the coming of Mechiach to the tune Michael Jackson’s Thriller is not exactly Jewish Heritage!”

“Shelly– leave the kid alone,” Her grandmother interjected.  “It’s too loud back here anyway.”

Diane knew that her mother only turned the volume down enough to pacify her grandmother, but continue drowning out her Walkman. She could feel her mother’s eyes shift from the red bandana that Diane used to cover the shaved parts of her head, to the puff of curly bangs covering her eyes and nose.

“I still can’t believe you shaved all your hair off!” Shelly shook her head and pulled her lips into a grimace, turning her eyes back to the road.

“Again with this?” Diane flung her head against the seat. “I have bangs, ma.”

“Well,it looks terrible.” Shelly glanced at her daughter. “You look like a freak— is that what you want? To look like a freak? Who told you to do this— Danielle?”

Shelly banged the steering wheel and stopped short, jamming her foot on the break. Everyone in the car jerked forward. 

Outside, traffic on the Belt Parkway slowed to a crawl.

“All you wear is black all the time. What kind of look is that for a young girl?”

Diane rolled her eyes, but did not answer.

“Why do you want to look so hard?”

The pop beat faded, replaced by a mournful tune from an oboe. Soon, a man startedsinging in an operatic voice.

“Romania! . . . “

“Oh no!” Diane exclaimed. “This is cruel and unusual punishment!”

“…Mamaliggila, and a pastramila…”

Shelly burst out laughing and turned the volume up on the car radio again.

“Shelly!”The grandmother screamed. “Too Loud!”

As the Yiddish song played, Diane picked out a word every so often that sounded like some kind of deli meat. One song blended into the next while traffic continued to inch along the highway.

“Can we at least find something from this century?” Diane asked.

 They could smell the stench of the Starret City landfill through the air vents— even with the windows up. Max kept kicking her chair. Diane stopped her tape, turned around, and eyed her little brother.

“Max! Please! Cut it out!”

Her grandmother stretched her arm out just above the little boy’s legs. 

“Maximilian,that’s enough,” she whispered. Max stuck his tongue out and gave his sister araspberry.

Diane slapped her thighs. “Ugh! Why did I agree to come with you people!”

The song ended and the radio announcer spoke.

“I’m Art Raymond and you’re listening to the Sunday Morning Simcha on W-E-V-D, New York’s only Yiddish music radio station. Today we have a very special contest brought to you by our friends at Empire Chicken. If you are the twenty-fifth caller, you too can win your very own Empire Kosher Chicken— slaughtered under the strictest rabbinical supervision! So, don’t miss out. Pick up your telephone and dial 212-888-W-E-V-D.”

“Shelly,”Diane’s grandmother said while rifling through her purse. “Let’s stop at Zawn’s.I have a two-fer coupon and the chicken is thirty cents a pound. I just have to find it.”

“Oh ma – that’s a good deal! And it’s on the way.”

 Diane remembered the chicken farm from their last trip out to Long Island. She stood in the rain with her cousin Melissa and Max, staring at the penned chickens running through coups, while her mother,aunt, and grandmother stocked up on poultry inside the store. Her brother tried to pet the chickens. He slipped his hand between the mesh wire fences and gotit stuck. Max screamed as Diane and Melissa tried pulling it out. The wire scratched and cut his arm while frozen shards of rainwater stung their necksand faces. 

“Good grief!” Diane sighed again. “We are never getting to Marlene’s house!”

A group of children sang a jingle on the radio, “Schmerling-Schmerling, Cho-co-late-Cho-co-late.”

Diane turned her Walkman back on. Rob Halford screamed, “We Are—De-fenders- of-the-Faith!” She leaned her head against the window, closed her eyes, and prayed for an escape.