Thanksgiving 2009 - A Sentimental Remembrance

Flashback:

Pick any Thanksgiving in my childhood, and chances are we are on our way to Aunt Beryl and Uncle Yale's house for Thanksgiving dinner. Aunt Beryl is my mother's sister. We shared just about every Thanksgiving and Passover with them. Thanksgiving was usually at her house and Passover was at our house. Thanksgiving was reserved for a day to spend with my mother's side of the family. Beryl and Yale spent the Jewish Hight Holy Days at big family gatherings on Yale's side of the family. We dropped by at my paternal Grandmother's house after services on Rosh Hashonah for Kremslach, and I can still remember seders at her apartment when I was very young. But Thanksgiving will always be associated for me with my mother's family.

My Mother had lost her own mother when she was nineteen and Beryl was 11. After that time, she helped to raise Aunt Beryl, and they were still very close as adults. It didn't occur to me at the time that Thanksgiving might have been a little hard for them as young women. They never had the chance to go to Mom's house for Thanksgiving, showing off their new husbands and the children as they arrived, or to get the favorite family recipes from their mother. If they felt any sadness, they never let us know. For us as children, Thanksgiving was a gala family event.

Thanksgiving at Aunt Beryl's house was more than a meal, it was an all day event. Aunt Beryl and Uncle Yale were and are both great cooks, and the dinner was always delicious. We stayed and visited all afternoon, and at supper time, turkey sandwiches and more pie was always served. I don't remember doing much of anything during those hours, other than watching everyone else. My mother and Aunt Beryl talked all afternoon. My young sister Melinda played with Aunt Beryl's daughter Miriam, who was her age. Shortly after my younger brother Jeff came along, Aunt Beryl had her daughter Lisa, so they were natural playmates. After a while, my older brother Andy started tagging along after Uncle Yale, who probably enjoyed the company. They are still close, and Uncle Yale even introduced my brother Andy to his wife Kathy. As for me, I remember spending the time eavesdropping on the conversations my mother was having with Aunt Beryl, and checking on my father napping in the living room.

When I was young, my maternal grandfather, his sister Great Aunt Nettie, and her husband Uncle Henry, often came to Thanksgiving dinner. Every member of the family had a story. We loved them because of their stories, or in spite of them.

Aunt Nettie's story was that she had been a beautiful young woman who put off marriage so that she could care for her ailing mother until her death. During that time, she worked as a school teacher. By the time her mother died, Aunt Nettie was near 40. She married a curmudgeonly old dentist, Uncle Henry. Uncle Henry said little at family gatherings, until it was time to leave. Then, he would rouse himself and say "Well, Nettie". My siblings and I still sometimes say "Well, Nettie" when we feel like its time to leave a family event. My mother thought that Uncle Henry was a miser, that he and Nettie should have lived in a nicer house and that Nettie should have had a chance to travel. Still, I thought Aunt Nettie loved him. I still remember the look of abject grief that she wore at his funeral.

My grandfather's story was more complex. He had been widowed young. He came by our house often in his big green cadillac. He bought us toys and amused us by balancing grapes in his eyes. We rarely went to his apartment. It was inhabited by the mysterious "French Woman". The "French Woman" never came to our house. It was my grandfather himself who referred to her as the "French Woman", my parents never spoke of her at all. My Grandfather would sometimes mention her, or at least mention that he had to go home because he had something to do with the "French Woman". Occasionally, we ran into them on a hot summer day, at the beach. My grandfather would be in his old fashioned bathing suit, with a top like a man's sleeveless undershirt. He'd come over to our beach umbrella and say hello, but the "French Woman" kept her distance. I only remember going to my Grandfather's apartment once, when my mother and grandfather had some kind of adult appointment. The "French Woman" babysat for me for the afternoon. I was 8 or 9. She found a Shirley Temple movie on TV for me to watch, and brought me snacks. She had dark curly hair, and a slight Canadian French accent. I thought she seemed nice enough. I always thought of her as my Grandfather's cleaning woman with whom he happened to have grown close.

My Grandfather died when I was 10, and I remember how angry my mother was that the "French Woman" thought she was entitled to some of his things. It wasn't until years later that my mother told me that she was his mistress. As a widower, my mother said that there were many respectable Jewish widows whom my Grandfather could have married. Instead he took up with the "French Woman". My mother believed that the "French Woman" was an alcoholic who had insinuated herself into my Grandfather's life, and that he was too weak to make her leave. I had a more romanticized view. My view was that my grandfather loved my grandmother so much, that he could never bring himself to remarry. Still, he had needs, and the "French Woman" was able to accept him on those terms, without the benefit of marriage.

In 1959, my grandfather died just before Thanksgiving. My last few words with him were in a telephone call just before he went into the hospital for surgery. He called for my mother, and when I answered the phone, he told me that he would see me on Thanksgiving, and to be sure to save some turkey for him. This one year, Thanksgiving was going to be at our house, and my Uncle Albert from Pennsylvania was coming up with his family. Instead of being our Thanksgiving dinner, the turkey and fixings sustained us all through the funeral period. I remember wondering what we would have done for food if my mother hadn't had all of the Thanksgiving fixings in the house.

I remember that my Uncle Albert came up first, and then his family flew in. I got to go to the airport to pick them up. When they got off the plane, Aunt Dorothy, Uncle Albert's wife, said that our grandfather had been like a fairy tale grandfather. This stuck in my mind, because I thought it was so untrue. I figured that she must have thought that because they lived so far away and rarely saw him. To me, he was a real man. I remembered how he struggled to learn the Torah blessing for my brother's Bar Mitzvah, and how proud he looked on the Bimah. I remembered how he took us to Chanukah parties at Temple Beth Israel, where they served fried chicken but no latkes, and how he pointed out to me, with admiration, the great Rabbi Feldman, who indeed was an internationally recognized scholar. I remembered that he tended to doze off during services, and that he gave my mother her first clothes drier. I felt bad for my cousins who could only remember him as someone from a fairy tale, and not as a real man, "French Woman" and all.

Flashforward:

It is November 23, 2009, the Monday before Thanksgiving. I am a grandmother of four. Over the weekend my husband John and I had an overnight our daughter's 6 month old twins, and I will see them again today. On Sunday morning, when they woke up, we fed them bottles in our bedroom, then all played together in the bed, all four of us smiling and laughing. I spoke to my son Saturday afternoon, and we began making our plans for a Chanukah visit, followed by a Christmas vacation visit, a visit for his children's January birthdays, and an overnight visit with his children, who are almost 6 and 2. I am sure that visit will involve some early morning tickles and giggling as well. I am fortunate that I see them all often.

This Thanksgiving, however, instead of spending the day with my children and grandchildren, I will again be visiting with "my Mother's side of the family". I am looking forward to Thanksgiving dinner at the home of my brother Andy and my sister-in-law, Kathy. Aunt Beryl and Uncle Yale, now 80, will be joining us for dinner. Thankfully, some things never change.

October 19 Blog

Please note that as of today, November 7, 2009, my latest blog is actually the October 19 blog about being an author (it posted on the day I started the draft, rather than on the day I posted it). Does anybody know how to fix this?

Halloween

Flashback:

It is October 31, 1958, and I am dressed in my brothers khaki civil air patrol suit, to pose as a soldier for Halloween. I go around the neighborhood with two friends, since our parents feel that 9 year olds are old enough not to need adult supervision. The weather is nice (I am warm enough with a sweater under my costume), and we wander father through the streets of the neighborhood than we ever have before. At one house, the woman invites us in and gives us warm caramel apples. We eat them as we start heading for home. It is the most delicious Halloween treat ever. I marvel that someone went to so much trouble for the trick or treaters. It was a wonderful Halloween.

Flash forward:

It is October 31, 2009, and I awake from a nightmare at 5:00 am.

In the nightmare, we are at a convention. I have lost track of my husband John. He had gotten annoyed when I snapped at him about something inane, and wandered off with an attractive single friend. I am feeling annoyed and jealous and I want to find him. I wander into the front of an auditorium where a program is about to begin, to look for them. The room swims, and my legs ache. I sit on the steps in the front of the crowded auditorium, and a South American dictator enters. Security is tight. I feel nervous, but I notice that my friend Alice, whom I have known since high school, is sitting nearby. I innocently take notes on the program as some children from the South American country testify as to the wonderful medical care they have received. A woman with her hair pulled back tightly in a bun, a military uniform, and a small white earpiece with a white wire in her ear confiscates my notes. I feel afraid and look for my friend Alice, but she has left. I want to leave, but I am afraid to because I move so awkwardly, that I am afraid I will attract attention trying to rise from the steps and exit. I awaken with a start.

I lie there quietly, not wanting to awaken John. If it were a weekday, I would get up, but it is Shabbat, and I am hoping he will awaken and turn to me. I especially don't want to awaken John because I had already kept him awake enough this week. Tuesday, I was cranky when I came home from a day trip with my club. The facilitator decided that a slow luxurious lunch, such as we usually have with these trips, would be a waste of time because we were going to a museum with a lot to see. But after wandering the museum for hours (even though I used my travel cane to lean on) my legs ached and I was exhausted. I felt annoyed that women older than me had a lot more energy for roaming the museum, and no one else used a cane. A woman I did not know had sat next to me on the bus, and talked to me about how she missed her busy life as a state legislator now that she had retired. Without planning to, I tell her that I used to miss my job, but now that my memory is slipping, I have so much trouble just getting through the day that I no long miss it. Then I am annoyed at myself for revealing something so personal, and annoyed even more that this is true. So, I snap at John that evening.

Then, later in the week, I go to the Temple Sisterhood dinner. I sit with friends and enjoy myself, until it is over. Then, exhausted, I get up to leave, and notice that everyone else is bustling around helping with the clean up. I walk out with a woman in her nineties, who seems to be the only other completely exhausted person in the room (it is only 8:00 pm). That night, when John gets up to use the bathroom, I sit up in bed and say "Damn it, Damn it, Damn it!". I punch the pillow in anger. He asks me what is wrong, and I tell him how angry I am at having been exhausted and not able to bustle around like the others. He tries to comfort me, but I am wound up. I decide to go watch TV downstairs, so he can go back to sleep.

The next morning I report to him that I am calm. I spend the morning cooking Shabbat dinner (bread in the bread machine, haricots vert with roasted peppers and onions, and casserole of turkey, mushrooms, onion and barley). I get lost in the tasks and forget my problems. As I cook, the pleasant young woman who cleans for us cleans upstairs. When she comes down, I have not quite finished cooking and we chit chat about Halloween costumes and what I am cooking. She has never heard of barley, and I show her the grain.

By Shabbat morning I am feeling rested, and I decide that if John is not up by 6:00, I will get up. I doze off again, and then John is awake. I tell him my dream, and he comforts me, knowing that I am oddly anxious about him being with other women. I read that this itself is a symptom of Parkinson's Disease. He soothes me, and age and time are now meaningless concepts. Before we rise, he says he will turn on the news, to see if the world is still there.

We have a good day. While I cook French Toast, John sends our son-in-law a Happy Birthday message. I prepare Turkey a la king for dinner. With my sister, we go to services, and rise for the mourner's kaddish because it is my father's yartzheit. We stop for lunch with my sister at a local pizza shop, and then she goes off and John and I go to Real Art Ways, a Hartford Arts and Cinema venue. We see a French film that we had seen in Paris two years ago. We are delighted with the scenes of Paris, and we love the film again.

We stop to buy pretzels for Halloween treats, and watch "The Cat Women", and "The Return of the Cat Women" as we eat our suppers and hand out the treats. By 8:00 the treats have all been distributed, and the street is quiet. We turn out the lights.

I check facebook and find happy messages from the kids. Our son-in-law enjoyed his birthday, and compliments our daughter on the delicious dinner she cooked. Our daughter has commented on the Halloween costumes of the neighborhood kids who are dressed like popular children's entertainers. Our daughter-in-law chimes in because she knows about all of the popular kids' entertainers from our five year old granddaughter. Our daughter-in-law has also posted a reminder that this is the tenth anniversary of their first date, and my son responds happily and mentions that he has posted their first date picture. I remember that our son had come home for our 50th birthday Halloween costume party, and had borrowed the car the next day to drive to Boston. At 9:39 my daughter calls to report on the day's events and that her baby twins looked cute in their costumes but didn't like them. She tells me that she has posted to my Facebook wall that she is glad I am her Mom, and to John's wall that she is glad he is her Dad. I tell her that I too am glad I am her Mom, and marvel that she would go to the trouble to make these posts.

I am warmed by memories of my father, and the Halloweens when he marched through the neighborhood with me. I feel contented by the nice day I have had, and happy to know that the kids and grandkids all had a nice day too. It was a wonderful Halloween.

Sixty Years of Memories

Flashback:

Pick any year between 1950 and today, and undoubtedly on October 20 I would have been celebrating my birthday. I remember the birthday parties and the orange halloween cakes. I remember the presents from the kids, friends and family; the cards, good wishes and cakes; the years of candles blown out. I remember that when I turned 18, my parents drove up to UConn to take me to dinner at the Altneveigh Inn. I remember that my first date with John was on my 20th birthday in Paris, and that I got engaged to John on my 21st birthday. I remember that on our 50th birthdays we threw a halloween party, complete with costumes, and that Rachel missed it because she was in Israel then, and Marc had his first date with Cheryl the next day.

Flash forward:

Today I turned 60. I am glad to be alive, and to have lived to see my children married and with families of their own. I was glad to go with John to Paris to celebrate, and deeply grateful for the generosity of friends and relatives who are treating me to assorted invitations, cards, good wishes, and gifts. Although I am filled with an overwhelming variety of emotions, the predominate one is gratitude for all that I have experienced during the past sixty years, and all of the people I have known.

To me, birthday celebrations have been important. They have helped me to mark the time, and created lasting memories of the people who have been in my life. They have focused my reflections, and prompted me to pause to appreciate my life. In the next couple of months, I will be attending a 90th birthday party and a one year birthday party -- celebrating a life well lived, and the promise of young life. So to us all, whatever age we may be -- L'Chaim - To Life!

Oh to be an author!

Flashback:

The year is 1967, and I am surreptitiously carving quotes from John Kerouac's On the Road into the school desk while the teacher drones on. Many things have been carved into the desk before, but not by me. It is, however, the end of my senior year, and it is now or never. Now or never not just for carving words into the desk, but for breaking away, for going On the Road, for defying convention, for being a writer. But how can I write, without writing about sex and longing, feelings and hating, loneliness, and passion? And how can I write about those things, knowing that my parents will read them? No, I think, I don't have the guts. I will never be a writer. I will just go home, and eat scrambled eggs for breakfast.

Flash forward:

I have just had my sixtieth birthday, and I am now writing a blog. Judging by the reactions of my readers (friends and family), I'm not that good at getting my point across. Maybe not becoming a writer was a good decision after all. Still, I'm convinced that there is some universality to what I am trying to say, and that the story of my life is not so different from other people's stories. I want to talk about my view of what the things are that are really important and what the things are that matter.

Thus the blog about shoes wasn't really about shoes, it was about these things: that feeling happy about something doesn't depend on whether or not it is expensive (t-shirt vs. expensive shoes) or whether you are old or young (flashback vs. flash forward) but on your attitude that the particular thing is a treat, or a good buy, or a luxury, or just something that you wanted. It's also about making the best of a bad situation (wearing hand-me-downs or needing to wear orthodics) to the point where you see it as a good situation. So it's about relativity, but also about longing, and longing fulfilled (the nice shoes), and longing that will never be fulfilled (wearing high heels again).

The blog about Halloween may have sounded like a lot of venting, and in a way maybe it was, but it was also about this: that even when you feel low and discouraged, you can suddenly feel again that kind of pure happiness that you felt in childhood. I tried to honestly describe my low not to get pity, but to try to make the point stronger that you can be feeling pretty low and discouraged, but still experience that pleasure of just feeling happy. It's harder, in a way, to describe the happiness. Do I flash forward to fireworks as a symbol for passion? Do I come out and say that I know a thousand things may be going wrong in my life, and I understand that a thousand things may be going wrong in your life, but let's all try to get past that and just feel good when we get the chance, and try to appreciate each other? Do I just come out and say that rather than trying to say it through a story?

What do you do if you can't write like F. Scott Fitzgerald? How do you describe the fact that incredible pain and incredible happiness sometimes go hand in hand. How do you say that sometimes something that might be viewed as sorrowful isn't all that bad, and that something that society seems to view as a good thing isn't so good for you.

My view of life may be naive, because I've never lived through a sorrow that was so horrific that it crushed my very soul. Yet, my observation of knowing people who have lived through such sorrow is that they survived by actively seeking out and appreciating what remained in their lives that was good and beautiful in the truest sense. My Grandmother grew up in poverty, fled persecution, worked in sweatshops, was widowed at 46, and then lost a 23 year old son in World War II. Yet she was truly happy being with her family or good friends. She loved having her grandchildren visit. She was always ready with a cake in the freezer in case company dropped in.

It follows that my Dad lost his Dad as a teenager, and his brother shortly after that. My mother also lost her mother when she was a teenager. Both of my parents grew up in poverty. Yet their smiles when we went on a picnic, or a day at the beach, were filled with joy. They appreciated the prosperity that let them have a comfortable home, clothes, plenty to eat, now and then a day or a week at the beach, and bicycles for the kids. My mom loved to swim. My Dad played catch with us in the back yard. They had lived through a lot, but their love of life, and their joy in their family gave them so much.

My Aunt Nettie never had financial problems, but she married late, and never had children. She had been a teacher, and she loved children, and she must have longed for a family of her own. Instead, she took that love and she spread it around to all of her nieces and her nephews. She came for visits, and I though of her as the maternal Grandmother I had never met. When she was gone, and I was an adult, I met an adult from our congregation that at best would be categorized as "slow", though I never knew the real diagnosis. She told me that my Aunt Nettie had befriended their family, and had given her a confirmation present. In tribute to Aunt Nettie I befriended her too.

Her name was Emily, and she inspired me. She was slow, and annoyed people, she needed social workers, and suffered from paranoia. Despite that, or maybe because of it, she appreciated any little kindness that anyone showed her. At first, we drove her to the bus so she could have a day at the beach. Then, when that bus stopped, we took her to the beach now and then. Finally, we took her once a year to Elizabeth Park, had her over for some holidays, and drove her now and then to services. She wrote a thank you note for every ride and every outing, no matter how small. She never forgot a hostess gift. She enjoyed life whenever she had the chance, as narrow as her life was.

I feel humbled to have known such courageous people. They were not rich or famous, well-educated or well-known. But, in my opinion, they lived life brilliantly. They knew who they were, and what mattered to them. They never apologized for who they were or for who they weren't. They appreciated sunshine and fresh air, being with friends and playing with children, praying and celebrating. They complained, they got angry, they had frustrations, they mourned. But in the end, to me, their overriding quality was an unabashed love of life.

I once thought that you could only write about life if you could somehow write simultaneously in a thousand different colors, to capture the richness and the nuance in every situation. I want to try to write like that. I am now sixty, if I am going to do it ever, I must do it now.

I think I will continue to blog. I am, at last, an author.

Wardrobe Delights

Flashback:

The year is 1955, and I am playing in the neighborhood in the early summer, wearing my new sneakers and my new Davy Crockett T-Shirt. The sneakers were a yearly occurrence, but always a welcome one, freeing our feet from the oxford shoes worn by children during the school year.

The T-shirt, though, was really special. Best of all, my brother had an identical Davy Crockett T-shirt. That meant that, not only could we dress as twins now, but when my brother outgrew his, I could wear that one when mine got too small. I sure felt lucky to be the little sister. It was a real two for one deal!

Flash Forward:

It is late summer 2009, and I am perusing the "name Brand" section of the Nordstrom's shoe department. Because of my orthodics, and other issues with walking, the stylish high heels and sandals are out of the question. Fortunately for me, however, this has lead me to the belief that it is not inappropriate to splurge if I find a pair of comfortable shoes that will accommodate my orthodics, and still look stylish. This might sound like a tall task for some, but in the Nordstrom's brand name shoe department, nothing is impossible.

Then I see them! Suede Stuart Weitzman loafers for half price! Red and black. Black and red. Everyone who knows me knows that I have a thing for red shoes, but the black are more practical. Red or black? Black or red? Finally it hits me, maybe I should buy them both. After all, I can't go around embarrassing my husband by wearing orthopedic shoes before I am 60! I make the purchase, and go gleefully home.

Still I wonder, were they really half-price? I go back to the mall the next week when the sale is over, and there they are, at double the price I paid. I sure feel lucky to have spotted them while the sale was on. It was a real two for one deal!

The Fragility of Life

Flashback:

The year is 1969, and I am lying on the bed in my dorm after dinner, barely breathing. Some of the other students in the dorm found me wandering the halls, gasping for breath. A nursing student guides me to my bed, and tells me to tip my head back, to clear my air passages. I follow her instructions, and put all of my energy into breathing. I hear other students saying that they called the infirmary and were told that it is probably menstrual cramps, so they are going to get the house mother. I want to tell them to find my roommate, who is my best friend, but I can't speak.

As I lie there, it becomes increasingly difficult to breathe. I think: it would be so much easier just to stop, but then I would be dead. I think: it wouldn't be so bad to die, it feels peaceful, and I don't feel afraid, but I will try to breathe a little longer.

Men rush into the room and immediately place an oxygen mask on my face. It becomes easier to breathe. One of the men lifts my hand and examines my fingers. He says: she doesn't look quite as blue. With the oxygen mask on my face, they lift me onto a stretcher, and take me to the infirmary with the sirens blaring.

In the infirmary, the doctor looks to me to be annoyed to have been disturbed. He immediately diagnoses an allergic reaction, and gives me a shot of adrenalin. Almost instantly, I am breathing easier. They keep me overnight, but send me back to the dorm for breakfast the next morning. My dorm is on the other side of the campus, and I feel light headed and unwell as I walk along, annoyed that they didn't allow me to rest longer.

But for the first time, I understand the fragility of life.

Flash Forward:

I am about to celebrate my sixtieth birthday, and I have lived fully.

Because of my early brush with death, I plunged forward in life, without regard to convention. Less than two years after the incident, and before I had finished college, I was married. Three and one half years after that I was nine months pregnant, and attending my Law School orientation, with my husband waiting in the library in case labor began. By the time I was thirty, I had two children, a full time job as a law clerk, and a husband who was working full time and going to law school nights as well.

Those busy, rapid, giddy, joyful, years proved to be a blessing. By the time I was 34, I had had a hysterectomy, after suffering for years with acute pain from large, but thankfully benign, tumors. Thank God I had had my children before the pain began! At 56, I was forced to retire due to chronic illness, but I was grateful for the long career I had had up to that point.

I am not by nature, a perpetually cheerful person. I kvetch, I complain, I argue, I yell. I try to see my life in melodramatic terms: after struggling to build a career in a male dominated firm, I am felled in my prime by chronic degenerative illness. But to be honest, it's not that bad.

The truth is, the office politics were getting very aggravating, and the long hours were keeping me from taking vacations. I had a great disability policy (thanks to the firm), so the early retirement was not a financial burden. Thanks to a bevy of brilliant and compassionate doctors, I keep going with a concoction of prescriptions, obviously created by another bevy of brilliant and compassionate doctors and scientists. My family and friends have been loving and supportive, my husband is still the love of my life, and my kids grew up to be amazingly kind and accomplished adults.

I still complain, I even complain a lot, but happy surprises interrupt my gloom. My children-in-law are both such nice people that I would be proud to have them as friends even if they weren't married to my children. The biggest surprise is the sheer joy that being a grandparent brings. Somehow, it brings you back to a time in your life when life was full of wonder and joy. As the babies are delighted by a sunbeam, you remember to enjoy the delights of sunlight. As a child is excited by a museum display, you remember the joy of learning.

I have now stepped into the role as family elder, a little more tired, a little more warn, but perhaps, if I am lucky, a little more wise. Despite my best efforts to be gloomy, I find my self looking forward to what the next stage of my life will bring. That's me, the inadvertent optimist.