Vacation Day 1

Posted on August 25, 2011 by 40andover

Actually, vacation started last night (we like to keep to a Hebrew calendar and start holidays at sundown).

POB (partner of blogger) and our son (now known as our collective Source of Sanity, SOS) are already out of town on our family vacation (too long of a back story).

I was really, really tired. I wanted to disconnect and decompress, so I watched a Phineas and Ferb marathon (courtesy of our DVR). The riff the writers did on the Mexican-Jewish Festival at the local Jewish Center was hysterical. Also as funny was the skit about Phineas and Ferb as detectives out of the Maltese Falcon, Dragnet and then CSI:Miami. I know, I know, it is a cartoon for kids, but it is far superior to most things on TV. Still, it would be hard to watch it if you didn’t have a kid. And you need to watch a few to get into the groove. But I digress.

I spoke with POB and SOS and then got into my jammies. It was 9pm.

I slept until 10am this morning. I was tooo lazy to make fresh coffee, so I drank cold coffee from the fridge. I waited until 10:30 to look at my blackberry. I thought that was pretty damn healthy for someone with my level of neurosis.

I alternated between Phineas and Ferb and Bloomberg on the Markets, as I read the paper. The paper and the markets were depressing and P&F was over. I dragged myself to the gym. It was about 11:15am. It was already raining but I went on a short run just to get my adrenaline going.

First words of the day, spoken to the barista at Le Pain Quotidien on Broadway: “Iced double espresso, please.” Aaaah, VACATION.

I don’t use an iPod anymore at the gym. I feel a little to isolated when I do that. Unfortunately, today, the shows on the TV monitors featured the hunt for Qaddafi, Hurricane Irene and Warren Buffett. Ok, not relaxing. So, I try to focus on other things. Not so much going on at the gym on a random Thursday morning, so my attention drifts back to the TVs. Somehow I think this relaxation thing should be easier.

I leave for a nap. This vacation thing is starting to work.

I have stress dreams about forgetting to go to classes and having to read everything on the syllabus in one night. Ok, so I checked my blackberry and sent some emails. Ok, my love-hate with vacation is more volatile than the stock markets.

So, vacation is not a cold turkey kind of experience. I need to eeeeeeeeeaaase into it.

I go back to the gym (I was raised to be an over-achiever) and lift weights and, in my best yoga position, breathe in good oxygen and expel bad humors.

All this does is make me hyperventilate. “Why,” you ask? HOW CAN YOU ASK WHY? Don’t you read the paper, watch the markets and look at the Hurricane warnings?

Of course, I can’t really relax. POB and SOS are staying at her father’s beach house with her sister and our nephew. Right in the path of Hurricane Irene. As is the house we are renting next week.

POB and I have a wedding to go to on Saturday evening in Westchester. The original plan was for POB to leave SOS with my sister-in-law and nephew on Friday and we would pick him up once we settled into our beach house rental on Sunday.

I am ready to call it Hurricane Irene a disaster that requires us to change our plans. I want my family, and my sister-in-law and nephew to come back to NYC and stay until the storm passes.

The problem of course is that people don’t believe the media anymore because media hypes everything for ratings. Like the boy who cried wolf. But, I don’t care. I am willing to be wrong on this because there is no victory in being right. And I will just rant against corporate-controlled media in a blog entry. Win-win situation.

Of course, when I went shopping, I didn’t really stock up on much, except some expensive tap water labeled as natural spring water and lychee fruit, which are refreshing and a pain to eat. I guess I am not a good natural disaster shopper. That’s why POB needs to come back. She knows what to do.

Ok, maybe this vacation thing gets more relaxing once you get into a groove and natural disasters are out of the way. So far, I think it would be more relaxing to be at work . . . .

The Slippery Slope

Posted on August 22, 2011 by 40andover

I rented a humongous car on Sunday morning for the multi-generational family sojourn to and from Rhinebeck for a family barbeque. I am a regular at the rental car place and (as long as no one is waiting) I kibbitz with those behind the counter while I wait for my car. It is a nearby location of a national rental chain with huge corporate profits. Still, they’ve been in the neighborhood for decades and that’s important.

When I arrived I asked for a portable GPS (remember the trip to Philadelphia? see prior blog entry), since I forgot to request it when reserving the car. The car that was scheduled for me had to be driven from another location. 20 minute delay. No GPS. I built in extra time so I was ok with it and since no one was around, the people behind the counter and I, well, kibbitzed about this and that.

The guy in charge of the car intake and outflow (how else would it be described) radioed that the exact same model with GPS had just been returned!! Awesome. Except there was 1/4 of a tank of gas and since the car itself was the size of a military ops vehicle, I would need to refill shortly after getting on the road.

Noooooo problem. I know that someone would have to go to the bathroom within 5 minutes of clearing Manhattan. This is my family after all.

When I got in the car, there was a full tank of gas. Hmmm. I must have heard wrong. I picked up the brood and off we went.

This morning, I had to return the car. If you live on the Upper West Side of New York City, you know it is a pain to get gas. The stations are shoe-horned into crevices along streets leading to major highways and bridges, so getting gas can be life-ending experience. I look at the fuel gauge. A little more than 1/4 filled. I remember that I was told that the tank was only 1/4 filled. I look at the print-out from the rental place. Yep, it says 1/4 filled.

I am tired. I am late for work. I am late to return the car. I was planning to write the premium check for my life insurance later this morning when I got to the office. No one will know if I return the car as-is. In fact, according to the company’s records, it is a gallon or two ahead. And, don’t I pay enough already to rent a car in Manhattan?

No one will know. No one. Actually, someone will know (yoo hoo!!). I will know. I who try to teach my child to do the right thing not because you will get rewarded if you do (or get punished if you don’t) but because it is the right thing to do.

I will know. My parents used to say, “if doing the right thing were easy, everyone would do it.” Yeah, but I can navigate the mania of city driving and I can afford the late charge, the cost of a tank of gas and being late for work.

So, I go to the scary gas station where you have to back out onto a two way street just yards away from that access and exit ramps of the West Side Highway and do a high speed, ultra-alpha-macho U-turn. Did I mention the school down the street? Luckily, it is a really long block and there is nothing residential until the corner. And, anyway, I am always early on my premium payments so if something happened, my family would be ok financially.

I can’t help but think [for those of you who think I am an easy chair liberal who often contemplates my navel, wait for it . . . wait for it . . . and a one and a two and a . . . ]: If we were struggling financially, would I look at it as a gift and stay quiet? (Think Paul Muni in, “I am a Fugitive From the Chain Gang” www.imdb.com/title/tt0023042/.)

Maybe doing the right thing depends on what lies in the balance.

do over

Posted on August 21, 2011 by 40andover

I just got back from a family trip to Rhinebeck for a barbeque hosted by my first cousin and his wife. I drove Aunt Betty, DOB (dad of blogger), SOB (sister of blogger), HOSOB (husband of SOB), POB (partner of blogger) and our son, TLP (the little prince). Cousin Gentle arrived by train.

I need to have a do-over because the journey was not epic — nothing grotesque and peculiar happened. No blog material.

First, I picked up the rental car and it had GPS and EZ Pass. And, I got an extra 10 percent discount because, well, I just looked like I deserved it. I found a parking spot on my street. I was able to come upstairs, read the Style section of the Times and watch a pre-recorded Phineas and Ferb episode (I must admit that I was watching for my own pleasure; TLP was doing something else).

We got on the road within 10 minutes of our planned departure. I had three copies of the directions (one for each row, so everyone could follow along). We didn’t even put on the GPS. We didn’t even make a rest area stop. 2 hours door-to-door and no traffic. DOB didn’t do anything terribly outlandish and he didn’t even mind staying more than 20 minutes after arrival. So, SOB’s and my $1,000,000.00 bet about the time that DOB would say, “well, all you lovely people. . . .[it is time to go]” was for naught.

It was like taking the Stepford family out for a drive. I kept glancing in the rear-view mirror to make sure I recognized the passengers. Yep. They belong to me.

Also, Aunt Betty flew in for a week of seeing people and family (no family are not people) and we all wanted her to have her full of the ganza mishpocheh (the extended family). DOB did start singing his usual set of 5 of the most annoying songs ever sung (if they are sung all the time), but SOB and I could just walk away. HOSOB had to endure it.

Of course, I learned some things of note about the ganza mishpocheh. First, Cousin GS does not hold back. Not one thing. Not one thought. If he has something to say, he will say it, good, bad, ugly, inappropriate, whatever. That is why I love Cousin GS, he speaks his truth, which can never be reconciled with the events as anyone else sees them, and he makes me seem like a diplomat.

We had time to visit with our cousin who is living with brain cancer and his wife and kids. He is a different man than I remember. Of course, he is. His speech is labored, he is partially paralyzed, but his eyes sparkled, especially when he played with his kids. He is more interested and interesting now. My last in-depth conversation was about how he was going to conquer the world financially. In truth, I was a bit put-off, but he was young and cocky. Now he seems happy just in the world and views treatments as a necessary evil. I have to say, though, I wish he were still that cocky 30-something year-old and not the 36 year-old living with brain cancer. No one should learn about life this way.

It was a great occasion, where people were happy to be together and comfortable being their truly imitable (not inimitable) selves. (I think at POB’s and my wedding, we are going to have an extended Blogger family imitation extravaganza.)

TLP played with cousins he only just met (the grandchildren of my first cousins). They were fast friends. It was sheer joy to see.

The barbeque was one of those occasions that we will all remember years from now and be forever grateful we made the schlep.

But, still, what is there to blog about?

Disconnected

Posted on August 20, 2011 by 40andover

It is Saturday morning. POB (partner of blogger) went to the gym at an ungodly hour that would shame me if I were susceptible to being shamed. TLP (our son, the little prince) is subjecting me to Pokemon and Bakugan while there is a perfectly good Phineas and Ferb show on Cartoon Network. I love Phineas and Ferb, in fact I DVR the show for POB and me. TLP is only sort of into it. (Ok, enough back story for a different blog entry).

My blackberry ran out of juice just before it was my turn for torture in the name of fitness. This meant that I was going for a run without any telecommunication devices. POB and I had to plan ahead and decide when and where I would meet her and TLP for a picnic in Central Park after the run.

Old style planning. Never-heard-of planning for an entire generation of children.

I walked out of the house, feeling strangely like I lost an anchor. No, not an anchor; actually, a ball and chain. No, not exactly, a ball and chain; more naked. No phone, no texting capabilities, no internet. It is okay if I were actually naked; hey, it is New York, no one would notice. Except that I need a sports bra. That is totally non-negotiable. Good thing the naked feeling was metaphoric and not actual. (Am I digressing? I really can’t tell anymore.)

As I set out, it is just the open road and I. Ok, and city traffic, too, until I get into Riverside Park.

I was running, with a gusto that comes from sticking it to the Man. I cannot be reached. No one can find me. Ha!! I am untethered. Wait. I am the Man (or part of the Man)! Oh, shit. I am (part of) the Man and I can’t find me. Existential nightmares start slamming my brain, even some too weird for Sartre, Camus or Ionesco. The Man is not so bad. Gee, I miss the Man.

Then, what if I get hurt? What if POB or TLP gets hurt and I cannot be reached?

I have to stop running because my hyperventilation has caused cramps and shortness of breath. See? This wouldn’t have been so bad if I had waited for the Man to get powered up and put it in my back pocket for the run. Now, my family is in need and I am turning blue. I am in the Wilderness of Riverside Park. Actually, there is a cafe within view. Ok, Wilderness is a relative term. In New York, if there isn’t a latte available within 3 blocks, that’s wilderness. No lattes at this cafe, so I am in ABJECT WILDERNESS.

Wait, what do I hear? A voice? As in vox clamantis in deserto (a voice cries out in the wilderness)? Is this the moment of my spiritual awakening? (And I am dressed like this?)

Turns out, someone was yelling at me, “Stay in the runner’s lane!!!”

Ok, no spiritual awakening, no kindness of strangers, no nothing. And I am unconnected to everyone. And I cannot even post about this on FaceBook. The horror, the horror. Even Dostoyevsky was able to get out Notes from Underground. Me, I got nothing. No iAnything. No RIM at the edge of the corporate drain. I have my driver’s license, money and a credit card. I could buy some minutes from someone, but who would believe my story? The cops would be called and then I would have to explain my circumstances, and inevitably the response from the officer would be, “you own telecommunication devices and you willfully left them home?” “Officer, yes, I did it willfully but not maliciously — call it, semi-youthful hubris.”

Ok, I can’t breathe from the stress. I am gripping my heart. Vagrants think I am giving them the “strong” sign and they pound their hearts back. Really, really? I am probably having a stress dream and I will wake up. Then I stagger past a long line of people waiting for an opportunity to kayak in the Hudson River even though there was a warning about life-threatening sewage in the water. Ok, even I cannot come up with this stuff. I am awake and my family is in peril and the police are no help and my fellow citizens want to go boating in nuclear waste.

Exhaustion sets in. How will I make it to the appointed meeting place for the picnic. Thank G-d for taxis. I am sweaty from my run/freak-out but he smells like he ran a marathon. At least I know I am not stinking up this cab. I get out a few blocks early to air out. Really. Seinfeld did not lie.

I arrive at the pre-arranged meeting place about five minutes early. I am already apoplectic about the things that could have gone wrong that will upend the rendez-vous. (How DID we survive without this crazy connectivity?) I imagine that POB got a call about her father, my father, her sister, my sister or brother or our nephews. Disaster has struck. I am clueless on 96th and Central Park West. What was I thinking not waiting until my phone recharged? That was sooooo selfish of me. My family is in need and I am standing on a street corner like an idiot.

And . . . tick tock, tick tock, tick tock. . . THEY ARE LATE. They are always late, I tell myself trying to believe it.

I see them across the street. They are smiling and waving. We all hug and kiss and walk together into the Park, to look for a picnic site. POB says, “you look exhausted!!” I say it was a hard run. We smile and hold hands as TLP runs slightly (did I say slightly) ahead to find a good place to plop down for a picnic.

I ask POB, “do you have your iPhone?”

“Yes, why do you ask?”

“No, reason. No reason at all.”

Life unscripted

Posted on August 19, 2011 by 40andover

TLP (our son the little prince) was cuddling with me one morning a few days ago and he was staring at the swaying branches of a tree outside our window.

“Whatcha thinkin’ buddy?”

“The summer just flew by. Time goes really fast.”

I think, my 9 year-old son has an old soul.

And, of course, I felt a song coming on . . . Joni Mitchell . . . ♫And the seasons they go ’round and ’round —–♫ I am interrupted.

“Ohhhh, Eeeee-Mom, please, not that song agaaaaaain??!!“

Ok, so I think, he has a old, yet non-mushball, soul. Also he knows I start to weep at: ♫Now the boy moves 10 times ’round the seasons . . . .♫ And it is only 7:30am and before my second cup of coffee. An intervention is necessary.

“Well,” he continued, “at least we are going on vacation next week.”

Ok, now he is back to being a spoiled NYC kid.

“Buddy, YOU have been on vacation since you were born. You are just changing locations for a couple of weeks to keep Mommy and me company while WE are on vacation.”

Thank Goodness he morped back into a regular kid. If he hadn’t broken my sentimental downward spiral, I would have arrived at the office, grabbed my assistant’s box of tissues, put in a DVD of family photos and disintegrated into a puddle.

Thanks, bud, for keeping it real.

Nine of Us, Thirty Years and Going Strong

Posted on August 17, 2011 by 40andover

I often write about my college friends. (See http://40andoverblog.com/?p=942 Us, in a Rear-View Mirror and http://40andoverblog.com/?p=2418, one of the many posts about our 25th college reunion.)

We nine friends have sustained each other through ups and downs in our lives.

One of the Nine, CAFOB (California friend of blogger) is staying with us for a few days. Another of the Nine, NYFOB (New York City friend of blogger) emailed about what CAFOB was up to. I emailed back that CAFOB was staying downtown some place that night.

NYFOB emails back: YOU MEAN YOU DON’T KNOW WHETHER SHE IS SEEING THAT CRAZY GUY? OMG! NOOOOOO DETAILS???

NYFOB was soooo right: I failed in my obligation to question her comings and goings with the detail and precision (and techniques) of a seasoned New York detective.

There are some rules we Nine live by: “you do it, you live with it” and “if you want to dance, you pay the fiddler” (both courtesy of the now much-mellowed DCFOB (DC friend of blogger).

In other words, CAFOB had a responsibility to spill her guts and break all confidences about the — hmmm — liaison. And it was my responsibility to enforce the rules.

Utter and total failure. I am sensing a group visit and intervention being planned.

Luckily, POB (partner of blogger) was available and got the whole story. POB says to CAFOB, “You have a choice: you tell the Nine or I will tell the Nine. Choose wisely.” Sad things can wait; juicy gossip among us must be revealed with great dispatch.

I love that POB enforces the laws of the Nine if I am not around. POB is a true life partner.

Thank G-d for that Haven, No-Where-istan

Posted on August 15, 2011 by 40andover

For those who don’t remember, I established the sovereign nation of No-Where-istan (http://40andoverblog.com/?p=1404;http://40andoverblog.com/?p=1425; http://40andoverblog.com/?p=1432; http://40andoverblog.com/?p=1541; http://40andoverblog.com/?p=1586; http://40andoverblog.com/?p=1599; http://40andoverblog.com/?p=1756; http://40andoverblog.com/?p=1870; and http://40andoverblog.com/?p=2001).

This evening, it is a much needed refuge. POB (partner of blogger), TLP (our son, the little prince) and I were playing a trivia game about ancient civilizations. He was beating us handily. (Tragic that I lack the factual knowledge to keep up with my 9 year-old.) If you answer correctly the question posed, you keep the card. The one with the most cards wins. There is a wild card where you can take a card of a person of your choice. TLP got the wild card twice and the first time took one from my winnings. The second time, he also took a card from me. I said all in good fun, “That’s not fair!! Take it from [POB]!! Look at all the cards she has!!” TLP responded, “I have to favor my biological mother.”

The crash you just heard is my world in pieces. And I had to keep going with the game. I excused myself to go to the bathroom and POB must have said something to TLP. TLP was very sad and felt horrible.

I said, “Sweetie, I am very sad but you need to be able to be honest and open with your feelings, and you need to be open to the response as well.”

We all hugged and I whispered, “I love you more this minute than last, and I will love you more a minute from now. Why?”

TLP responded, “because love always grows, Emom.”

“That’s right, buddy.”

It is the thing we say when I kiss him good night. Sometimes those rituals are more soothing to the adult than the child.

He is now listening to an audiobook about Darwin and evolution and reading a book about trains (multi-tasking seems to work for him). I am sitting in our living room, with my guts kicked out and tears streaming. I can never be his biological mother. But it never occurred to me that I would love him any different.

Now, as this is the second time he has said this, it occurs to me that he loves me differently, and in a lesser way. I know he is processing our nouvelle famille nuclear and that time will tell all. I have to give him that time.

But right now, I am grateful to live in that comical creation in my head that allows me to set the rules of love and life (and health care) along with a national flag and stamp.

And, a mythical place where loving a little boy with all my heart doesn’t break my heart.

It’s raining, it’s pouring

Posted on August 14, 2011 by 40andover

Today is a wet, wet day in New York City. We don’t need the rain, but the rest of the country does. This is what happens when you mess with Nature. Nature messes right back.

We did a drive-by to visit DOB (father of blogger) and had brunch. The usual comfort food: bagels, nova scotia salmon, cream cheese. Of course, because POB (partner of blogger) did the food run, there was no matjes herring or white fish salad. Really? There wouldn’t have been enough food had I not held back. This, in my mother’s (may-she-rest-in-peace-her-memory-be-for-a-blessing) house? Ok, so I do a self-serving calculation and determine that most people Mom and Dad knew are dead so there is no one to talk about the fact that there wasn’t enough food. But if these people are Heaven, do they know and is Mom embarrassed? Exhaustion sets in just from the emotional and tribal toll this takes on me. I have just enough energy to text SOB (sister of blogger) who is on call at the hospital “Drive-by successful, taking nap.” I get a text back, “strong work.” Nothing like elder sister approval, in the absence of my mother. I am happy, if hungry.

I should not have given the task to POB. When we started to date, her parents had to buy more food because I would gnaw at the antique table. If there were left-overs, her mother instructed that they be passed to me so I could Hoover it up. POB has come a long way. She has food crises (what if an army comes knocking?) but sometimes she forgets about the joys of matjes herring (no cream sauce) and white fish salad. I love her and frankly I don’t need so much of the comfort food since it occludes the arteries, however, deliciously.

Then, there are those rainy day tasks we have all planned, like scan photos into the family archive. I look at some, and then sigh. Rainy days, with their poetic sorrow, only magnify my feelings when looking at long dead family members when they were young, strong and undefeated. I remember them this way. Not the later pictures when time and disease did their violence. I can’t look anymore. Nope, going through family photos is NOT a rainy day activity.

I need to hug and kiss my child. Will he remember POB and me as strong and solid? Or will later pictures of when we are frail form his lasting memory? I guess, as long as he remembers the love, it’s ok.

The conversation turns, updated

Posted on August 11, 2011 by 40andover

My conversations turn, invariably, to how does [insert issue] affect me?

So, as we were remembering Cousin Bernie (see prior blog), SOB (sister of blogger) and I started talking about buying cemetery plots. Actually, we have been talking about it since Cousin Gentle told us (over dinner, of course) about his trip to visit his plot. He even did a video that he showed us. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45bMpw5CByM SOB and I think that this video captures the humor, the eccentricities, the sweet zany-ness and the bonds of our greater Blogger clan. We could easily see ourselves doing this, too.

SOB and I weren’t sure whether the location of our remains mattered much, assuming our souls go to Heaven (or the other place). But we don’t know about the transportation system for souls visiting each other across the vast universe. TLP (my son the little prince) would probably imagine a train system. Ah, I knew Soul Train http://www.televisiontunes.com/Soul_Train.html would find its way back into vogue. What if SOB and I wanted to see Mom or Dad or our grandparents? Would it be a schlep?

So, just in case, we may need to be buried somewhere along the Long Island Expressway (traditionally a Jewish stop on the road to Heaven) to be close to our family and as well as an easy drive-by visit for the living.

This is very complicated. Should we buy a large plot so we have space between us and the neighbors? Or should be huddle together because it could get cold at night. I might bring a sweater under my kittel (funeral gown) just in case.

Also, what with perpetual care? TLP is our perpetual care. Weren’t POB (partner of blogger) and I good mothers? Certainly good enough for him to make sure that the eternal resting places for our bodies are properly maintained. And that goes for Aunt SOB and Uncle HOSOB (husband of SOB), too.

Dear TLP, you may have to give up your day job in order to tend to our graves and show gratitude for all we did for you in our lives. And when you do win that Nobel Prize, you’ll bury near us so we can qvell and brag to the other mothers in our section of the universe. It is the least you could do, my sweet.

Ok, maybe I will get cremated.

RIP, Cousin Bernie

Posted on August 8, 2011 by 40andover

Cousin Bernie died yesterday,

Cousin Bernie wasn’t really my cousin. But I didn’t find out that Bernie wasn’t related until my mother’s shiva. Trust me, that’s when you learn everything about everybody, whether you want to or not.

It turns out that Cousin Bernie was the cousin of Betty, one of my mother’s closest friends from college. Betty and my mother married two brothers, so Betty was my Aunt Betty by the time I was born. Cousin Bernie also was (for time enough to have two children) the husband of Blossom, one of Aunt Betty’s and Mom’s other close friends. For the record, Aunt Betty’s only successful match was Mom and Dad. The rest were, shall we say, short-lived.

Not only was Cousin Bernie, and therefore, his wife Susan not my cousins, but Blossom wasn’t, and Blossom’s second husband, Aaron, wasn’t and his third wife, Marjorie, wasn’t. All of which I found out at Mom’s shiva. And Marjorie was the only one who asked POB (partner of blogger) if we were having a child by a known donor or unknown donor. You mean she asked that and she wasn’t even related??? You have to admire a woman who picks up the beat of the Blogger family. No boundaries, ever.

What makes them my family is more important than blood or marriage. They are related by love. And if not, love, then time. After a few decades, even my mother, who would cringe at Bernie’s cursing like a sailor (he was one, in World War II), loved him even though he divorced Blossom and swore in front of her children. Family is family, however it is constituted.

And so my heart is breaking for his wife Susan, Aunt Betty and Bernie’s kids. Bernie, my Mom, Aunt Betty, Uncle Willy and my Dad were among the generation that bridged the divide between immigrant children and Americans. They were the generation that fought in the war that American won. They all put their foot on the gas pedal and roared into the American dream. They laid the foundation for my generation’s successes.

And they were characters. In his later years, Bernie was a caricature of himself. And we lovingly laughed at his meshugas (craziness).

He used to be president of the New York Runner’s Club. I ran in one of the New York City Corporate Challenges and, as I crossed the finish line, Bernie was there to hug me. I said, “Bernie, it is great to see you!” He said, “[Blogger], is that you?” So, in fact, he was hugging any sweaty, young woman who would hug him back. “I won’t tell Susan,” I said as I kissed him. At the next family function, OF COURSE, I told Susan. Bernie’s response: “Jesus Christ, all of these f*%$ing young beautiful, sweaty women!! What the hell do you want me to do? Wave? How else would I get anyone to hug me. [more profanity].” That was Bernie. (You should know that he hit the jackpot with Susan. He knew it, too. To use his parlance, he would have been a schmuck to do anything untoward.)

I drove Bernie and his wife Susan to Uncle Willy’s unveiling a few years back. Bernie called and said he hadn’t seen Willy in a while and would I include them in the Great Schlep. SOB (sister of blogger) and I didn’t know whether he remembered that Uncle Willy had died. So, during the Great Schlep, we asked leading questions intended to elicit some acknowledgment that Uncle Willy was dead. We were afraid that Bernie who had a defibrillator and pacemaker in his chest might go into cardiac arrest if he thought he was actually going to see Uncle Willy and then we pulled up to the cemetery. Thank G-d, he knew.

We saw Susan and Bernie at Dad’s 90th birthday party in October. He looked frail. He was cursing about all the doctors he needed to see and how he had no more room in his schedule. He also was singing the praises of prune juice as an elixir he recently discovered. Cousin Bernie never changed.

I just called my Aunt Betty to express my condolences and I started reminiscing about the prune juice and the cursing and the doctors. She has buried a son, a husband and countless other loved ones. It was good to hear her chuckle as she mourns another loss in our greatest generation. As we mourn right along with her.

Rest in peace, Cousin Bernie.

40 — oh wait, yikes!! 50 — andoverblog

Aging and living in urban US

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