As You Like It: Happy Birthday Mom

I’ve been dreaming about Mom lately, probably because her birthday is coming up on June 10. In my dreams she’s full of energy, laughing, running ahead so quickly that I can barely keep up with her. She was always larger than life, irrepressible, impossible to keep down. I’m only sorry that my girls don’t remember her that way.

They remember her when she was older and sadder. They never knew the vibrant woman that I adored. I’m going to have to show them our old family videos. I want them to see the young grandmother that they never experienced.

Rose and Murray Florek

We were close. We never stopped talking. My dad used to say that the two of us could be locked up in a prison cell for 100 years, talking the entire time, and then once we were allowed out, one of us would still say, “Oh, I forgot to tell you…” He was a quiet man. He left all the talking to us.

And oh did we talk. Mom worked in the family cleaning store alongside my dad every day but Monday, her day off, when she would do all the home chores. She came home from the store “early” at 5 p.m. to cook dinner. She would be exhausted after a long day dealing with customers and, unfortunately, I would inevitably pounce on her with one of my problems. She would plead with me to let her rest. I can still see her napping on the living room carpet for a whole 10 minutes before getting up to deal with the rest of the evening.

It was only later in the evening that Mom and I would finally get the chance to talk. Or rather I would talk and she would listen. She would listen patiently to all of my life problems — my struggles with math, or a tough teacher, or the many loves that I always seemed to be entangled with. She was one of the most patient listeners that I have ever known. She never rushed me, never looked at the clock, despite the fact that we would sit there ridiculously late and she had to get up early to go to work. Years later I asked her about that and she told me that talking to me was the best part of her day.

I remembered that when Lisa or Mariel would come to talk at 10 p.m. and I’d be wanting to go to sleep and not be bothered. Then I would remember all those nights with Mom and be ashamed of myself.

She was always there when I needed her. She helped me through the everyday and then through one of the darkest nights of my life. My first husband, Mark, who had lived through two wars, was killed in a traffic accident. She sat with me in the hospital, hoping he would awaken, then took me home to heal when he didn’t.

I had moved out of my apartment and in with my folks. I slogged through the days in a numb haze, my nights filled with dark dreams. We tried to be normal, and every now and then we succeeded for a short while. And then one evening I stood in front of the window looking out and I was filled with panic. How could I live my life without seeing Mark’s face? Without hearing his voice? Who would help me with life? Thoughts of suicide became very real. I began to scream and then sob when suddenly I felt Mom’s arms holding me.

We stood there for a while until I calmed down and then she began telling me a story I had never heard before. After she was liberated from Auschwitz, she was taken to a hospital to recuperate. She spent months slowly coming back to life. On the day that she was due to be released, she also stood in front of a window thinking about whether or not she could bear to go on. She had lost her family, her friends, everything. She had been starved, tortured, made to feel less than human. What did she have to live for? Surely it would be easier if she left the earth. But then a new thought came to her. She would not let the Nazis win. She would live and survive and thrive. And then she remembered that she had promised her father that she would live for them all and eventually get to Israel.

She told me that if she could live through that hell and move on, so could I. She believed in my strength even if I could not. She reminded me that Mark would want me to be happy. And then she made me promise that I too would live and thrive.

She was so strong. She called herself the Unsinkable Molly Brown, and she did seem to have at least nine lives. I was lucky enough to live them with her. Her spirit was unsinkable, until Dad became ill. But still she never gave up.

Our last visit was so sweet and I was sure that she would live forever. But life is full of tricks, and though Mom was with me whenever I needed her, I was not there for her when she died. That is my greatest heartache.

But for now I have these wonderful dreams and thanks to the promise I made to her, my life.

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Posted by Joan Florek Schottenfeld on Jun 3 2022. Filed under As You Like It, Featured Content, Opinion. Both comments and pings are currently closed.