Marshall Field & Co. Clock in Chicago Every Dec. 31, when the hype of New Year’s sequins and resolutions threaten overload, I escape. I become five again and recall my family’s first celebration in America. Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, is a pensive time; a moment to search deeds and cleanse oneself of the year’s wrongdoing and wrong-thinking. America’s party hats and countdowns to midnight were as alien to my parents as self-flagellation. But as new arrivals they wanted to be American. So when their friends, the Tschewicks, mentioned New Year’s Eve, my parents listened. After...