Fateful Encounters

Today, December 7th, is my mother’s birthday. Rose was a member of the greatest generation, born in 1915 and living through the technological advances and formative tragedies of the twentieth century: the major wars, the Great Depression, the loss of her extended family in the Holocaust, the assassinations.

She was a “late bloomer” in her personal life and began the career of her young dreams — teaching in elementary school — at the age of fifty, her earlier efforts derailed by the Depression (photo below from mid-1940s).

THE BIG BASH

When mom turned seventy-five in 1990, she threw a huge birthday party for herself. She rented a function room at the Holiday Inn in Linden, New Jersey, hired a Klezmer band, and invited every family member, their children and grandchildren, friends and neighbors, the Jewish community, teaching colleagues, some people she had met on trips.

An accomplished toastmaster, she delivered a powerful speech about family ties as the link between past and future generations. Others followed with tributes and stories. My cousins and I wrote and performed a skit about family trivia that was well-received.

You have to know where Rose was coming from. She was not a narcissist who sought adulation. She just wanted to celebrate life to the fullest, and this was another opportunity to do so. Her love of family coursed through her veins like fine Manischewitz.

She was one of seven children, and I was one of seventeen cousins. Due to the large numbers in the family and our strong identification with Jewish traditions, there were many special occasions to attend each year — weddings, Bar Mitzvahs, a Bris for a new baby boy, graduations, Passover Seders.

My mom composed a “Rosie-Gram” for each and every such event. She worked the room, interviewed the principals and guests of all ages on her cassette recorder, typed a detailed account on mimeograph paper, printed it in the school office and then delivered a stack of copies for me to mail to all concerned.

These hundreds of newsletters, from the 1960s to the first decade of this century, form a history of all of the characters, events, and trends in an extended family that found joy in the gathering. To this day, my cousins tell me how they treasure the written story of their weddings and milestone events from early years, starting when our grandparents were alive.

The family historian, extrovert extraordinaire, optimist to the core, auburn-haired beauty — my mom.

THE FATEFUL ENCOUNTER

The following summer, Rose drove her big green Chevy up to New England to visit us in Essex. She was buddies with her counterpart, my mother-in-law, and stayed with her in Revere for the weekend. Frances would promise her, “Rose, I’m gonna get you a fella,” a famous line for which she’s remembered fondly.

Next morning, mom went down to the breakfast room to write her “Vacation Rosie-Gram” on a legal notepad. A tall older gentleman at the next table asked if he could “borrow” a piece of paper to write to his estranged brother. My mom agreed and a conversation ensued regarding his family situation.

The letter composed, he explained that he wanted to bring it to his brother that day, instead of mailing it and allowing the feud to fester. My mom consented to his suggestion that she accompany him on his mission, and off they drove to New Hampshire, Rose Weiner and Eli Smith.

Mom didn’t write a Rosie-Gram about this serendipitous road trip. Instead, she telephoned me that night to announce that she was getting married. She laughed about the aptly-named restaurant where they had lunch, “The Mr. & Mrs,” an omen. I retained a calm demeanor while trying to determine if my mom was completely off her rocker.

Rose referred to her three and a half years with Eli as “the whipped cream of my life.” These two extroverts tuned into each other perfectly, attending Eli’s annual Knights of Pythias Conventions, introducing each other to family up and down the East Coast, sitting for their portrait in formal dress, acting in the senior citizens’ production of “Fiddler on the Roof” (photo below taken at Eli’s 85th birthday party in 1995).

She moved into Eli’s apartment and never looked back to her home in Linden. My daughter and I spent weeks sorting through accumulations of forty years, triaging into trash, charity, and valuable mementos. We brought up a couple of suitcases of clothing and albums of family photos — she wanted nothing more.

My father, Julius, had died in 1980 at age sixty-seven, when mom was sixty-four, after thirty-six years of marriage. During their courtship (to see their own fateful encounter, click on my blog piece Weather Report: Chance of Clearing), they exchanged weekly love letters between Elizabeth, New Jersey and Glen Cove, Long Island. My dad continued to romance his bride with tender letters of love and devotion — and Whitman’s chocolates — throughout their marriage (photo below taken in Copenhagen in 1977).

The birthday letter my dad wrote to my mom on December 7, 1979 (at the end of this piece) was his last, written five months before his death. It begins, “No words, perhaps, can explain the love I have for you….”

Mom didn’t care to “date” for the twelve years after she was widowed. She continued to teach, attended every family event, and even learned a Haftorah for the Bat Mitzvah she never had as a girl. The triggering event for a new direction in her life was the chemistry between two outgoing people who didn’t think twice about connecting, then taking on the world together.

Eli’s daughter and I supported them in their relationship and we remain friends, remembering those crazy times when our parents’ romance took off like wildfire and they moved in together, inviting “hundreds of their closest friends” to their wedding reception.

LOOKING AT MOM — AND MYSELF — THROUGH NEW EYES

Recently, I figured out something important about my mother that had escaped me before.

When my father died, my cousin’s wedding had already been scheduled for a couple of weeks later. I did not have the heart to dance, socialize, and celebrate with abandon at a happy event. My mom went—and I never understood how she could do that—until now.

Rose needed family and people around her to breathe, to live. She put herself in the middle of the loving energy swirling around her to survive and heal. Now, as a widow myself, I understand that there are no normal timelines or mandates for grieving. I respect my mother’s courage to do what worked for her.

I tuned into her outward cues, all positive, that seemed to say she was okay. But maybe she wasn’t. Was she trying to protect me, feeling that her grief was a burden to hide from her thirty-seven year old daughter, preoccupied with a career and a growing family? Only when I lost my own husband could I relate to the pain she may have suffered underneath her upbeat facade—and appreciate how hard she was working to make herself whole again.

After my husband Paul died in December 2013, I was invited to a big (they were always big) family event scheduled for mid-January. At first I declined, but as the time approached, I felt braver. However it happened, I was the driver for some extended family members.

I entered the crowded function hall, full of noisy celebration, non-stop music, food galore, photographers and videographers. I soon felt sickened, disconnected, teary and lonesome in the midst of accelerating gaiety. When the man sitting next to me described the struggles of his brain-damaged child, I shut down completely. My emotional reserves were exhausted.

I realized the mistake I had made in moving too fast, my judgment for my well-being not to be trusted. As I drove the group home at midnight, pea-soup fog enveloped the coastal route, reducing visibility to ten feet ahead. The drive was interminable and hazardous, the stress unbearable. I was learning that many steps backward precede one step forward on my brand new road through grief. No exit in sight.

I am grateful that my mom handled loss in her life in a way that led to healing and peace for her. In that way, we were different.

NEW LOVES

Looking at the arc of my mom’s life after my dad’s death, I applaud her acceptance of companionship at an unlikely time and place. Meeting someone over coffee ☕ in a senior citizens residence does not, at first, sound like the makings of an epic tale of romance.

My mom, in her mid-seventies, was ready to open her heart to a guy with a warm personality. The widower in his early eighties noticed the bright spark of love for life in the vivacious lady. They both trusted their instincts, opening the door to three blissful years, until Eli died in 1995. Rose outlived him by eighteen years.

In my own life, I trudged on my dogged path of grief without end for two years, believing that this was what I deserved—until a handsome, soft-spoken gentleman invited me out for coffee ☕ when our literary discussion group adjourned. David broke the spell that kept me living inside of myself, immobilized in a safe zone I had strived mightily to build around me.

In my heart, I heard my mom saying to me, “My dear Barrie…..go on that road trip, take a chance, change your life, find your future. I waited twelve years, but it’s okay if you don’t.”

Mom, life-giver and teacher to me, even now.

The Birthday Letter