The Last Posting

I'll be taking this blog down in a month or so. Fay passed away peacefully on December 15, 2009. Her nieces, nephews, great nieces and great nephews, great-great nieces and nephews, and some friends bid her farewell. Margie, Evan, and Wendy joined me for this final mitzvah on her behalf.

Here are the remarks I prepared for the funeral. The rabbi who officiated read them.

Ask anyone who knew Fay what was most important to her and he will answer “family and friends” before you finish the question. She loved her sisters and brother and her nieces and nephews. To say that she was proud of me would be an understatement hard to top. She loved being with her grandchildren and their children. Some of my favorite pictures are of her holding Simon and Alice in a bear hug, gritting her teeth and kissing them. She was proud of each and every one of her extended family and loved to tell them so.

When I was a young boy I remember often having my cousins in the house. For the most part we all lived close together in University City. My memories are of a group of us sitting around the small rooms of our small house laughing and telling stories. I don’t remember the topics of the conversations; only that everyone was laughing. My mother and her brother and sisters were more like friends than siblings. My mother and her sister Anne often traveled together for vacations. My dad and I had our own adventures eating the meals that my mom prepared and otherwise taking the liberties that two men on their own find attractive. My mother’s brother Hy was her special confidant. They would console each other at times. When my mother decided to try her hand at volunteering, Uncle Hy would review the drafts of her newsletter articles and speeches. He would offer her advice on how to manage her Medical Center club, of which she became president.

My mom made friends everywhere. After my father died, she decided to take a cruise. She went by herself and was seated at a table of unconnected passengers. This group became the closest of friends. One couple from South Caroline remained one of mom’s closest friends the rest of her life. I kept up with Johann over the past few years when my mom’s health was failing. Johann always mentioned times when they helped each other over life’s inevitable rough spots.

When my mom could still travel, she loved to come to Maryland for Pesach and Rosh Hashanah. She loved our seders and particularly liked to schmoose about St. Louis with our Washington U friends who had settled in the Washington DC area. I was afraid that our seders would have to end with “Next Year in St. Louis” rather than Jerusalem. My mom formed a bond with the mothers of some our friends who lived in or near Maryland. When she came to town, our friends got excited about the chance to pair my mom up with their mothers for a lunch out or a trip shopping. These ladies also became part of my mom’s group of closest friends.

Rosh Hashanah was another special holiday for us. Mom would come to town and love to schmoose with her Temple Isaiah friends. She was never good at names, so we would end up playing a version of “20 questions” where my mother would try to describe a friend of ours so that we could be sure to bring her over to them. Most times these friends would find her first for a hug and kiss, so that finishing the guessing game was unnecessary.

For most of my mom’s life she was full of energy and drive.She worked at a time when it was unusual for women to have full time jobs. I remember her coming home from work while I was doing homework and running to the kitchen to make supper. She took classes in arts and crafts (Margie still has the ring my mom made from a silver baby spoon), public speaking, golf, and even lunchtime learning classes in Talmud.She threw herself into her club work with AMC, assured that she was playing a pivotal role in curing cancer. She went to conventions, stood in super market parking lots raising money, and took leadership positions in her chapter.

When I was in the Navy, she traveled to California where I was stationed to spend some time with us in the California sun. She wasn’t afraid to travel by herself.Later, when I went to work for a university research facility, she traveled to Cape Canaveral where I was working so that she could spend some time with our young family.

It was about 12 years ago that Parkinson’s Disease started to take its toll on my mom.Diabetes and other maladies joined in their assault on her body. Finally it was dementia that proved too much for her. During that time, while these diseases slowly took away her independence, my mom’s spirit always showed through. She became attached to her caregivers and they to her. When it was time to leave the Cedars and come to a skilled nursing facility in Maryland, I saw the staff cry as we took mom out to the car. At her new home at the Jewish Convalescent and Nursing Home in Baltimore, people would yell “Fay is OK,” and “Hi St. Louis” whenever we moved around the premises. Mom would stroke them and tell them how beautiful they were and they would respond with their own kindness.

My mom’s life was an object lesson for me and all those who knew her. If you want friends, be a friend. If you want to be loved, you need to love.