Now the parents of a five-month-old son, Ezra, and three-year residents of San Diego, Shoshannah and Cedric find that living in North County affords them multiple opportunities to express themselves as Jews. He did so not because his then -fiancee asked him to-in fact, like traditional rabbis, she discouraged him until she was certain he was doing it for himself-but because he wanted to be Jewish like the children they planned to raise together. He underwent conversion more than two years ago, after several years of serious study. What both Harts would like people to know is that Cedric is every bit as Jewish as Shoshannah. Nevertheless, he conceded, the effect is alienating.
“It is kind of annoying,” Cedric, an elementary school physical education teacher, said, speaking in the present because questions of his Jewish identity still persist. The couple would be at a synagogue service or another Jewish gathering, and people would question whether Cedric was Jewish, since he is African American. Jump ahead five years to their move to California, where Shoshannah, now a practicing attorney, went to law school, and Cedric, 32, found himself in the hot seat. “They asked me, ‘How do you celebrate Christmas? Why don’t you believe in Jesus?”‘ recalled Shoshannah, 28, who grew up in a strongly identified Reform Jewish home in Phoenix and attended a local Chabad synagogue, where she observed her Bat Mitzvah. When the Arizona natives began dating more than 10 years ago-she was about to begin college at Arizona State University, he was finishing up there-they faced a barrage of questions from Cedric’s parents, devout Christians, about Shoshannah’s belief system. Shoshannah and Cedric Hart know a thing or two about this, as they have spent many years listening to what others think they know about them. Every day, in every way, people make assumptions about others based on gender, affect, physical attributes, gestures, and accents.
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