Happy Birthday Mom!

Today is my Mom's 91st birthday. I remember her voice very well, singing and playing the piano, which still stands in my living room/dining area. It was purchased in 1964 and has been with me since she passed in 1984 at the age of 55. I am now 10 years older than she was at the time. So, it's not easy to think of her as old.

She was ill for much of my childhood, often spending 6 months of the year, or more, hospitalized for all forms of digestive issues and cancers. Growing up was like an emotional yo-yo, which of course I didn't understand at the time.

She and my Dad met in February 1947, when he was just 17 and working at the Kingsway theater as an usher.

She had just graduated James Madison, the same school I would attend years later. She was taking voice lessons and auditioning for the chorus of Broadway shows, planning on a career in the theater.

My Dad, a year and a half younger, was still in Maritime High School aboard the SS John Brown, a Liberty Ship used by the Maritime Union to train Merchant Mariners. He was living in Manhattan at the time. My Grandmother had been forced to move from the house on 32nd off Kings Hwy after my Grandfather died. But, for whatever reason, he was still working in Brooklyn on Kings Hwy.  (The Brown currently resides in Baltimore, just near the submarine Torsk,  aboard which he also served in the Naval Reserve out of New London, Connectticutt.)

The whole courtship thing came to a head when my Mom was about to take a job in the chorus of "Oklahoma" in a road company, which would keep her away for months at a time.  Similarly, Dad was about to sign on as an Ordinary Seaman and ship out to ports unknown for months at a time. So they had a lot in common.... they were both leaving to begin their own lives.

But their hearts held sway, and love, not one to be ignored, won out. They were married in September of 1950 and together until her death 33 and a half years later in 1984.

Her last few years were spent in bed writing stories about her illness and also her childhood. Since I'd lived through the illnesses my favorite stories were her childhood ones. I hadn't been there at the time they occurred, so her stories were a window into another time, in the same neighborhood, with some of the same characters I was growing up with.  One of my favorites was the one about the "I cash clothes man", a few of whom still roamed the streets when I was about 4 or 5 years old.

Happy Birthday, Mom. I miss you and the phone calls we shared, with me calling from foreign ports whenever I could. And you, always there on the other end.

Note: Photo cropped from my Mom's girlhood album. She is 13 years old and seated    on the roof of 3619 Bedford Avenue.

Happy Birthday Mom!

Today would be my Mom’s 85^th birthday. She passed on fairly early; as a matter of fact I am now older than she was when she left us at the age of 55, just days after her birthday. She had been ill for so long it was almost a gift for her to finally be free from the pain which had become almost second nature. Her illness colors much of my childhood memories, but not my memories of who she was. If that doesn’t make sense I can’t explain it, so you’ll simply have to take me on faith.

You see, my Mom was sick; from the time I was 5 years old, until she died of the complications from pancreatic cancer 25 years later. I only knew her for about the first 5 years before she became ill. But I do have very warm recollections of those times; clouded in the haze of early childhood. 

I remember being young enough to have a "sink" bath; that is, being washed in the kitchen sink rather than the tub; so I must have been about 3 or 4 years old. I can remember her calling out to my brother and I from the 4th floor window of our apartment at 3619 Bedford Avenue at Kings Highway; even throwing down change wrapped in a paper towel for ice cream. I don't think anything can dislodge those memories from my mind.

I can also still recall her striped dress and her dresser drawer full of kerchiefs. I know that I have printed this here before, but indulge me as I remember her with these lyrics, written several years ago while thinking about her sitting at the piano; on the beach; or just sitting on the sofa reading a book. 

The photograph at the top was the inspiration for the lyrics and it is also the first family outing I remember, on Veteran’s Day, November 11, 1957. I had just turned 3 years old. In it I am discovering the mysteries associated with the clam shell.

I Can Never See You

I can still see you there,

standing by the door.

Wearing your red kechief and your coat.

And though I think I see your face

so clearly in my mind,

I know I'll never see you anymore.

I can still hear your voice

it's ringing in my head.

I can hear the words to every song.

And though I think I hear your voice,

So clearly in my mind,

I know I'll never hear it anymore.

Times a worthless master,

it will steal your heart away.

It robs you just a little at a time.

And suddenly you realize that

you've got nothing left,

she's taken all the things you once called "mine."