100 Years

Last October, I wrote about my mother-in-law, Linda Gerstenblatt, who died of cancer at the age of 63.  When people spoke to me about that article, they offered their condolences and shared in my frustration with the over-pinking and commercialization of breast cancer.   My 99-year-old grandmother, however, who reads all of my writing, responded quite differently to that particular piece.  “If you ever want to write something nice like that about me for the newspaper, I wouldn’t stop you,” she said, looking across her dining room table at me with a sly smile. 

           

I’d like to introduce you to Rose Katz, who I call Nanny. 

Many of you already know her, since she worked as a bookkeeper in Scarsdale village for almost 30 years and because she likes to talk to just about everyone.  Walking around town with my grandmother is like taking a stroll with a cute puppy or a new baby.  Everyone stops to chat with you because of the marvelous companion on your arm.

me and Nanny

Nanny is a unique person, who is as tall on opinions as she is short on height.  She has more viewpoints on a variety of topics than someone half her age.  She’ll tell you if you look good, if you’ve put on weight, and if that lady over there has put on weight.  She likes to compare herself to the second-oldest woman in the room – who is 80, most likely – and tell you that the octogenarian looks much older than she does.  She might mention that a particular child at a birthday party is cute, but the mother?  Feh.

She has a great collection of sayings, my grandmother.  One that I particularly like has to do with women who dress provocatively (or people who call attention to themselves in any way) and then get upset when people notice or react.  “If you don’t want to be saluted, pull in your American flag,” she’ll dismiss.

“A committee put together that person’s face…” she’ll begin, shaking her head sadly.  “And the committee didn’t agree on nothin’!”  Ba-doom, tsz.

What?  She asked me to write about her in the newspaper, did she not?

At the time of this request, Nanny and I were sitting in her apartment in White Plains – where she still lives independently -- drinking coffee that I had brought from Dunkin’ Donuts.  I bring my own coffee when I visit because I don’t trust her Parmalat milk.

“The milk is good for weeks!” Nanny told me once.  “Look at the date stamp.”

“That’s only before it’s opened,” I said, unable to explain why this was the case, but just knowing it to be so.  “After you get air into the container, it’s good for a week just like everyone else’s milk.”

“Well, not mine,” she decided. 

And so I decided to stay away from that milk, even though it seemed to be doing no harm to Nanny.  (Perhaps the active cultures are acting as some sort of life preservative?  Like whatever secrets they uncovered in the movie Cocoon?)

            

The thing is, of course, that we cannot know what secrets keep one person alive and healthy for a full century while others struggle and face a much shorter existence.  In just the past few months, I have seen examples of lives cut way too short.  I have seen families watch a loved one’s health decline over time and I have seen others surprised by the suddenness of death.  As I’m sure you know from whatever your own life has dealt you, we don’t always take the opportunity to speak our hearts while our loved ones are alive and well.  (Even if we end up publicly roasting them a little bit in good fun.) 

            

Sometimes, when my kids are running late in the mornings and the lunches I’ve packed aren’t nutritious and it takes Andrew 6 minutes to tie his sneakers (why? Why?!) and Zoe wants to wear head-to-toe sparkles and hates her new leggings after ripping off the tags (why?  Why?!) and Brett is rolling his eyes at something one of us said or did or didn’t do and THE SCHOOL BUS IS COMING, PEOPLE! it’s hard to stop and smell the roses and appreciate all that’s wonderful.  Once my family is out the door, I just want to cheer my state of sublime aloneness.

            

And then I call my grandmother to vent or get sympathy, and she’s calm, and relaxed, and she can’t hear that well, but still, she offers an ear.  “Whatsamattah, sweetheart?” she asks, probably while toasting a nice Kaiser roll and putting some (definitely expired) milk into her morning coffee.  “You’re such a sweet and precious Mommy,” she tells me.  This comment, which she says often, makes me feel both validated in my choice to stay home with my kids and guilty about sometimes wanting to run away from home. 

Then she’ll launch into a story.

           

“Did I ever tell you about what Pop-Pop and I did when you were born?”

            

Only, like, ten thousand times. “I’m not sure,” I’ll say.  “ Maybe you should tell me again.”

There are few people that I love more than my grandmother, who will turn 100 on November 1^st, and there’s certainly no one older in our family or maybe even yours.  She has not asked for a party to commemorate the occasion so much as what she calls “a celebration of a life.” 

“I don’t want a big funeral,” she has said more than once, even though she’s probably going to get one and there won’t be anything she can do to stop it.  But, I know what she means: why put all that money and planning towards having the Jersey cousins come all the way over the bridge when it’ll be too late for her to hear them complain about the traffic? 

Instead, although Nanny hasn’t used these words, I believe she wants a living funeral, a gathering of people around her -- the same (kvetchy) group that would attend her eventual postmortem funeral, mind you, Jersey cousins and Long Island cousins and maybe even a few strays that we haven’t spoken to since the big blow-up at Roey’s funeral in 1990 – that would come and talk about her to her.  Knowing my grandmother, the main event at this celebration would be her standing at a podium talking about herself to us.  Nanny is a very enthusiastic storyteller. 

She would tell you that I get all my creative writing talents from her.

She would also tell you that she’s singlehandedly responsible for the Rosh Hashanah/Yom Kippur break enjoyed by all public schoolchildren in the state of New York.  (Long story short: she was the PTA president in Park Slope, Brooklyn in the 1950’s and spoke to someone of influence and from there it gets a bit nebulous.)

And so that is why I have officially kicked off this year’s “celebration of a life” by writing about my Nanny and sharing my love for her in the newspaper, while she’s here to see me do it. 

Because - in this unique case, at least - I can.

To borrow a phrase of my grandmother’s, may we all be so lucky.

Weather or Not

I come from a long line of Women Who Dress. No matter how insignificant the occasion, we make sure we have just the right thing to wear for it.

Take my grandmother, for example, who never learned how to swim. But did that stop her from getting all dolled up in a bathing suit costume for 1920’s Coney Island? I should say not.

“I wore black stockings, rubber dress shoes, and a bathing suit that hit my knees,” My grandmother explained on the phone to me one night.

“Sounds hot,” I replied.

She laughed, reminiscing. “Yes, well, I was quite a beauty back in the day.”

“No, Nanny, I mean literally. Like h-o-t hot. On the beach in summer, in stockings and rubber shoes!”

“Did I mention that the bow on the bathing suit had to match the bow on one’s head?”

“Now that’s cool,” I added, confusing her completely. In the 1920’s and 30’s, my grandmother was absolutely “in” on the beach, even if she never actually went swimming.

Jump ahead to New York City, circa 1988. My parents moved in to the city from Scarsdale as I headed off to college. My mom had to adjust a little bit to urban life after years in suburbia. Walking the dog was a relatively new concept, for example. In Westchester, my mom could just open the back door and let Ellie out in the backyard. But in Manhattan, my mom had to take her out for actual walks.

Which begged the question, What to wear when walking the dog?

I mean, my mom was out in public. On the Upper East Side. In broad daylight. For a good ten minutes, a few times a day, in all seasons, all types of weather. What was a woman who dressed with shoulder pads supposed to do?

Walk the Dog Outfits were required.

Many of them.

Every time my mom and I would shop, she’d be looking for more appropriate clothing for this specific purpose. The barn jacket that wasn’t too long or too short? Perfect for walking the dog. The new Hermes scarf? Throw it on over any sweater and you can walk the dog in it! Ballet flats that looked like her Chanel ones but weren’t the real deal? Walk the dog in quilted fabulousness!

Now you will understand me. You will understand why, when I heard that torrential rains were forecasted a few weeks back, I did not think, oh, maybe I better stay home and hope that a tree doesn’t fall on my house. No, my first thought was, it’s a perfect time to get those Hunter rain boots I’ve been stalking.

After all, one must be prepared, no matter the occasion. And this occasion was calling for some really bad weather. Like the Katz-Goldberg woman I was, I hoped to weather the storm in style.

So you don’t think me callous or shallow, my shopping excursion took place on the Thursday before the now-infamous Saturday hurricane/Nor’easter. I had no way of knowing just how devastating this storm would be, or how seriously it would affect the Village and its inhabitants.

I merely did what any fashionista would. I got all excited deciding what color rain boots to get.

Of course I fell in love with the one color that was out of stock. They were coming in Monday or Tuesday, at the very the latest, I was informed by the saleswoman. Our eyes met. “But you probably want them before that,” she acknowledged. “Like for this weekend’s rain.”

“Yeah, that was kind of the plan,” I agreed, picturing myself dancing through puddles on the streets of Scarsdale Village, a jaunty umbrella in hand, humming “Singing in the Rain.”

I sighed and left the store, my name on a waiting list, trying not to be too disappointed. The brown Hunter rain boots were not meant to be, not yet at least. I would have to weather this storm in my Uggs.

Of course, the last thing I was thinking about was footwear, when, 48 hours later, I found myself driving across the George Washington Bridge, returning from a bar mitzvah in New Jersey with 50 mile an hour winds whipping my car from side to side.

I had precious cargo with me, in the form of my son, Andrew, in the back, and my former bathing beauty of a 97-year-old grandmother in the passenger seat next to me.

We now all know what happened that night, as the rain and wind wreaked havoc on our local area. My family was very lucky, as we never lost power, and no trees fell on our house, property or street.

Without plans for my educationally-deprived children on the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday after the storm, we ended up frequenting the diner, strolling the mall, and finding other, similar places to hang out and pass the time lest we go completely mad.

But with so many tress down and traffic lights out of commission, it was hard to reach the ice cream place. As I circumnavigated Edgewood and parts of Heathcote, I felt like Magellan, on the verge of charting a course westward to find the Spice Islands. Only my ship of sailors and I were bound for the land of chocolate covered gummy bears.

Land ho, we eventually made it! And what did we find when we arrived? The Last Licks Refugees.

There is really no other term to describe the homeless, powerless mothers and their sugar-high kids, wandering the Golden Horseshoe, left to their own devices without a school schedule to keep them sane.

Here were moms forced by circumstance into living with their very own mothers-in-law, with no discernable end date in sight. From wherever they were temporarily housed, be it the remote corners of New Rochelle to a luckier block of Scarsdale proper, it was Last Licks to which they came and congregated each day, telling tales and licking cones of fat free soft serve. Tales of frustration and spoiled food, of sleeping on couches, raising their voices at the people at village hall, begging, please, get that 1000 pound tree off my street. I cannot live with my in-laws another moment. My children must attend school. We love school!

My heart went out to these powerless masses, to the mothers and fathers who felt so adrift without their home base.
My cell phone rang as my kids and I were finishing off a pound and a half of candy while learning card tricks from Magic Al.
The shoe store had my boots!

We walked the few paces from Last Licks to retrieve them. My post-storm reverie had me wearing the new purchase while shin-deep in water in a neighbor’s basement, helping to bail them out. Forget singing in the rain!

But, alas, upon inspection, the Hunters were damaged. “We expect the re-order to come in about three weeks,” I was told. “We’ll call you when they arrive.”

I smiled and left the store, my name on another waiting list, not at all disappointed on this sunny day. After all, there would be other storms, other chances for rain. No one wants bad weather, but we know eventually it will come.

And next time, when it does, my boots and I will be ready.

Grow Old With Me

Do you remember where you were for New Year’s Eve, Y2K? Then good for you! Maybe you could help me remember where I was that evening. Because a whole decade has passed in the interim, and suddenly, my memory is not what it used to be.

In order to find out the answer to my Y2K mystery, I turned to my slightly younger and therefore perhaps more sharp-witted husband, Brett. He was of no help.

“Was that the year we went to San Francisco?” I asked.

“Perhaps,” he shrugged, returning to his newspaper. It was the morning of December 31st and I was recalling New Year’s Eves of yore.

“We saw Titanic out there. Was Titanic released in 1999?”

“Don’t know,” Brett shrugged. “Perhaps.”

I quickly went over the computer and checked on imdb.com. “No, Titanic came out in 1997.”

“Huh.” Brett replied. “Interesting.”

“Fine. You don’t care.”

“Not really, no.” Then he looked up from the paper and smiled reassuringly. “We were probably at Jodi and Evan’s, like we are every year.”

“Impossible. We didn’t even meet them until New Year’s of 2000.”

“Oh. Well then, there goes that theory.”

“I think I’m losing my mind.” I challenged, my voice rising slightly. “You don’t care that I’m losing my mind!” You see, I just finished reading Still Alice and now fight off troublesome thoughts of early-onset Alzheimer’s whenever I cannot recall a chunk of my own life’s information or when the words I need hover just beyond my mind’s reach.

Brett put down the paper and came around the kitchen island to give me a hug. “You’re not losing your mind, Julie. You’re just turning 40.”

Well.

There you have it.

2010 is the year I turn 40, everyone. I’m coming out. Loud and proud. And somewhat stunned.

“How did this happen to me?” My 97-year old grandmother asked me recently, staring into my wrinkled eyes with her own wrinkled eyes. “How did I become someone with a 40-year-old granddaughter?”

“I like totally don’t know, Nanny!”

Could time just slow down already? It was scaring my poor old grandmother.

Looking back, there were some neon yellow signs along the road of life telling me that I might be more than just older than I was last year. These were signs that I might actually be aging. This last year of the decade, the one that signified my upcoming movement from my late thirties into my early 40’s, was particularly telling.

It began with a phone call to my father last spring. He’s an ophthalmologist who always tells me not to worry when I call to describe an ailment – any and all ailments -- to him. Like, “Dad, my elbow hurts when I bend it.” His response? You guessed it: “Then don’t bend it.” Other treatments of his include ice packs, cold compresses, sleep, and time. As in, “just give it some time. You’ll be fine.” In short, he’s not an alarmist. So, when I realized that in order to write articles on my computer and actually see the words written on the screen, I had to squint or use 18-point font, I called my dad for some reassurance.

“I can’t see,” I told him.

He required clarification of my sweeping overgeneralization. “You mean, you can’t see where? When you drive at night at try to read street signs?” He asked.

“Yup. Can’t see.”

“How about when you look at the computer?”

“Can’t see.”

“What about reading a book or magazine?”

“Can’t see, can’t see, can’t see!”

“So come into my office and I’ll examine your eyes. And, Jules, do everyone a favor and take the train, please!”

And that’s how I ended up with one set of progressive lenses and umpteen pairs of reading glasses. I never really adjusted to reading with the progressives, you see, so now I have a pair of colorful reading glasses in every room in the house and in every pocketbook I carry.

I’m one of those ladies now. One of those, “Wait, just let me get out my glasses…I know they are in here somewhere…oh, where oh where did I leave them…ah!” ladies. When I saw the Meryl Streep movie “It’s Complicated” last week, I laughed at all the jokes about aging and thought, wow, Meryl’s character has some really snazzy purple reading glasses…I wonder where she got them? (A shout-out to all the hip, older women out there: La Dentelliere at home has some great, Streepworthy readers!)

When I accidentally left my glasses at home this past summer and found myself with a book and a beach but no way to read, I called my mom in a panic. “I need reading sunglasses!” I cried, desperately. “Do such things exist? Cheap and quick!” She relayed the magic cure: Eyebobs. Eyebobs are a miraculous invention for the mildly reading handicapable among us. They are over-the-counter, moderately priced, moderately chic sunglasses with a magnifying reading lens built in on the bottom. I even wore them in the Hamptons.

Yes, the Hamptons.

Because here’s one amazing part of growing older: I didn’t care what anyone thought of me in my slightly uncool, certainly not Chloe sunglasses.

Okay, maybe I cared a little bit, but being able to see was finally more important than being seen.

In the past decade, I’ve learned how to shift focus. True, my memory might not be what it was, and my eyes have become a little blurry, a little more mellow in their intensity. But I’m starting to see that these are all metaphorically good things. Because if I cannot remember what our argument was about, then I’ll be hard pressed to stay mad at you for very long, Brett. And if I can’t see perfectly clearly, then I cannot judge the extent to which my wrinkled forehead is truly, horribly, in-need-of-injections, wrinkled.

I know I’m not the first to write about aging in this way; Nora Ephron did a lovely, comic job of feeling bad about her neck. I’m just the first one to write about me aging in this way.

Welcome to my new column for 2010: Julie, on the verge of turning 40.

I’m interested and excited to see where this topic will lead me. I hope you are, too.

Wishing you a very happy and healthy New Year, however many candles may top this year’s cake.