My Tante

      I just came back from visiting my Tante Rose in Toronto. It took me 6 hours to get there, what with the Canadian holiday traffic and customs ordeals of a long wait in line. She is what I have left on my mother's side of the family here in the western world. She has two sisters in Vienna, Austria the final survivors of a large family. The three aunts have 5 children between them, but I am talking about connections with the past.
     My Tante Rose is 80 now. She doesn't look it. Still mentally sharp, a bit slower, and limited with an old hip replacement. But as loving, caring and giving as ever. She has always laughed and enjoyed whatever she does in life. Her life has not been an easy one. She has had a hard life, losing her parents and some siblings, along with her home in the second world war. She has limited formal education and  became a young widow in Canada with very young children to raise. She persevered. Tough is what she knows. She did a fine job of raising her children. And she still looks at the positive, no matter what comes her way.
     She is my favorite aunt, always has been. And she knows it.  Shhhhhh, not a word to the other two. I enjoy her company very much. We have conversations late into the night. We hold hands and she takes my arm for support when we walk. We talk about past times, my parents who are gone,  we talk about today, about relationships, about family and friends still here and some gone. We talk about the the future. I try to see her a few times a year, and we talk on the phone weekly. She is one of the few people that I still can speak German to, that speaks the same dialect as I do. She lived with us for a short while when I was very little and we have a connection that is very close and loving. Oh what fun memories I have.
     As much as I like being with her, there is always that time when I must go back home. Each time the good-bye hug gets longer, the embrace more deliberate, the eyes a bit more watery. I know this will come to an end sometime and no matter how much I know it is inevitable, it will be so very hard when it does come.
As I drive away I carry along a huge goody bag from her in the trunk of my car. It's always the same, all homemade, a cake or two, as well as one or two strudels, along with some kipfel to enjoy later. Way too much for me and always plenty to share.
     As much as I love all she does, its the love that she puts into everything that I cherish. I am filled with her love that is so plentiful it overflows from me, and there is nothing to do but share Tante Rose's love with the rest of the world. I hope you have been touched by a little bit of her today.

From long ago

      As a teenager I used to do my mother's hair. It's been a  long time  now. People really don't do hair anything like this anymore.

      We would go down into the basement. She would sit in a painted celery green chair at a table with a plastic flannel backed tablecloth . (She painted almost everything celery green.  I used to dislike it because there was SO MUCH of it at our house. Of course, now I am drawn to it).      

     She was the hairdressee and I was the hairdresser.
A few times a year we'd do a perm.  I remember that nasty smell.

    Most often we'd do a color, or just a wash and a set. It was a time to bond. Always in the evening. And always just us two.
     I'd shampoo and curl her wet hair in the little pink plastic-snap-together curlers or the steel -colored metal clips if she wanted waves. She would sit under the giant General Electric expanding "bouffant"  cap that looked like it was hooked up to a vacuum cleaner. It blew out hot air. It had a round stwardess looking carrying case and was portable as long as you didn't go farther than the electric cord allowed . You looked like an alien gunslinger.

( To see a picture of the exact same one we had go to
 *****      www.popsucker.net/2008/05/retrophilia_general_electronic)


     After my mom's hair was dry,  out came the curlers and I'd comb her soft hair. No hair products, no spray, no high fashion . Simple and pretty.
     Every Saturday, as soon as I would come home from work, I would do her nails. She would hardly let me get out of my uniform. It had to be right now. Nothing fancy. A soaking, a filing and of course her favorite pale pink chiffon colored laquer. I had to be careful of her right hand forefinger that was mangled in her time as a prisoner of war. I never knew how to make it look pretty. and she always had to touch it up herself.

     And every once in a while, I gave my father a manicure too. I filed his nails and rubbed lots of lotion on his dry construction worker rough hands.

    We have put aside the details of grooming and bonding others, our family and friends. We go to professionals that do a marvelously wonderful job. But in that process we have lost a chance to make a memory with those closest to us. Like animals in the wild, grooming each other is a natural behavior. We'd  have idle time for conversation. To open the heart and speak the mind. Or times of quiet to contemplate a prior disagreement and then a coming around.

     Funny, I never minded doing those things.  I never loved doing them either. It was a part of what we did and who we are.

Catch a Memory

     Sometimes it's not much that catches me off guard. Even the smallest word or action can take me back in time so fast that I don't know what happened. Others around me of course aren't aware of what has transpired, but it is powerful none the less.  My mother, my father and my twin brother have all passed away, the four of us were the "immediate" family. I think about them frequently, actually it's intersting to me how I think about them almost everyday in some manner. At times all I want to do is share something with them, a bit of humor, some conversation, thoughts or feelings about something.  Just a moment to hear their voice, see their face, have an idle exchange. There is something though that I find difficult. It's the fact that I don't have anyone to share their life histories with that remembers them in the same way that I do. I feel that I am losing grasp of some of the memories, that the memories are slipping away and there is no way that I can get them back if they are lost. I want to remember everything and of course I can't. So I am pleased and thankful when an interaction, a word, a picture or an experience remind me of them in some way. And that makes me smile and be happy in my heart. It feels as good as a warm breeze on my face on a hot, still day.

ONE Family

Let's try not to forget. Make a sincere effort to show caring, patience and understanding to others even when you don't. You may grow into it.

The Emotions of Honor

I have to ready myself for this ride. I think about it for a few days before I go. A mental and emotional readiness has to occur. A preparation within myself. To my right, sits a golf course, on it are small

Having HISTORY in a relationship

As time passes, we lose friends and loved ones in our lives, to all sorts of reasons. And as life has it, we go on  meeting new people, making new relationships, new friends, you know just what I am saying,  those close and intimate and I love you for who you are kind of people. But at the beginning, you feel like you are introducing  The "you" to them,  talking about your past to people you meet. Letting them know about you, or what

Memories and Christmas Songs

Today I was shopping in a store with music was playing in the background, something that we hear but pay little attention to. We can go in and out of shops not even realizing that we have been listening to music. Oft times we're glad to get outside because it wasn't something we enjoyed listening to.  There has been a lot of study put into the types of music that will encourage shoppers to linger, feel relaxed and energized  in order to put them in the mood to purchase more. Not to forget that we celebrate Hanukkah and Kwanza at this season as well. But that is not what I felt today. Today, they were playing Christmas songs, too early for me, I'd rather they wait until after Thanksgiving, but it was playing regardless of my preferences. I found myself

Language Awakening

Some of you know and speak more than one language. Some know one single language, and are content with that. Some of you are learning more languages. Bravo to you. For some it is easy, for others a struggle. I grew up speaking German, my parents coming here as immigrants after WWII. Both with only a 6th grade education, because war has no time for such luxuries as education. And although they spoke many languages albeit some better than others, German, Yugoslavian, Hungarian, Polish, Russian  they now had to learn one more, English. They were older, exhausted from the war, in a country where nothing was familiar,and found it difficult. I often was embarassed by their accents as a child, and proud of their accomplishments when I was older.They spoke German with my

Loved ones from the past

There are days that seem to bring an abundance of  memories from loved ones in our past. You have had days like this I know. Our memory can be jarred by so much. A photo, an old movie, a song, words, seasons of the year, a conversation. It can be just about anything. Most days it makes us appreciate what is good in our lives. It makes it hard to understand why things are the way they are with much in the world. How easy it is to be hateful and opinionated against other people and their ways. How sometimes it seems that people need to have a target for that anger. And how little it takes to try to be understanding, appreciative, keep a sense

Domestic enjoyments for a Day

Sometimes I feel like being domestic. Like today. Most days I am glad to have all the modern conveniences especially about things like cooking. To open and heat up can be a fast and rewarding process when you are hungry. After years of preparing meals for a family with children, it's nice not to have to do that on a daily routine basis. Although to be honest, most days I didn't mind, and hoped that I made nutritious meals that were tasty too. I think I had a decent success rate, but you'd have to ask my kids their opinion to be sure. When you have to do something all the time it can feel like a chore, when you do it occassionaly it can seem like a pleasure. I do like to go to the store for fresh produce and ingredients and then decide on something to make based on the season's choices. I enjoy taking my time at the store and appreciating the process. Then coming home and putting some music on to play while I cut and chop and simmer and add ingredients to tast. I am not much of a