Lasting Memories

At 18, I left home to go to college and other than a summer here or there, I never again have lived with my parents. We moved to Chicago in 1980 for a job that my husband took after graduate school, and together we built a happy and full life. Neither of us had family here, and close friends took their place in our lives on a day-to-day basis. While we made certain to visit our parents and siblings each year, a long weekend here or a ten-day trip to Florida there was more like eating tapas than sitting down to a hearty meal. When my step-father died while I was pregnant with my soon to be 22-year-old daughter, I had a tugging in my heart that I was missing out on something. But by then, we had bought our first home, each had successful careers and we had begun to plant deep roots in our adopted city. Besides, I told myself, it was the natural cycle of life to grow up and focus on the life that you were building for yourself.

The years flew by, and I can hardly believe that our girls will be 22 and 25 before 2009 ends. Happily, our older daugher has moved back to Chicago and lives in the city. We hope that her younger sister will follow suit when she graduates college next spring. And while I enjoy close relationships with each of my children, it is abundently clear that I am not the center of their lives anymore - and nor should I be. While I have had my share of sadness, I am happy in my life; proud beyond words of my children, still in love with my husband, rich with great friends and blessed with good health. And while all four of our parents are still alive, old age has made its mark on each one of them and has left me to ponder what lies ahead. I think it's natural that I have taken stock of my life now that my kids are grown. After all, there are (hopefully) many good years ahead; how will I spend them?

When my mother invited me to accompany her on a trip back to her hometown of Dresden, Germany, I began writing this blog. It was a kind of therapeutic way for me to talk about the sometimes unbelievable, often frustrating and always hilarious stories about planning the trip. In case you weren't paying attention to my past blog entries, I'll come clean now - I viewed the trip as something that was the right thing to do for my mother, not necessarily something I was looking forward to. I tried to keep the blog light and funny - I enjoy a good laugh and I love making other people laugh. I meant it all in good fun, but the laughs were at my mother's expense. I reasoned that it was OK because she would never read the blog, but there was a nastiness to it and it took me twelve days with her to realize that it was mean and that I was wrong.

We flew home from Budapest yesterday afternoon, and I left my mother at O'Hare to catch her flight to Cleveland. While I will admit that there were times on the trip when I thought that there must be a candid camera somewhere to gauge my response to the absolute insanity of what my mother was saying or doing, I will let your imagination carry you to those instances. Instead, I will share with you an epiphany that I had two or three days into the trip. Each one of us has our own unique idiosyncracies. We are all trying our best, given the tools we have. In the case of my mother, she was ripped from the only home she knew at a young age, separated from her father and brothers for two years and eventually immigrated with her mother and sisters to the US when she was ten year old. She didn't speak a word of English at the time but soon learned to fit in the best she could. My grandparents were quintessentially German and the children were all raised with strict rules and a swift rod. My mother left home at 18 and was married less than two years later. When she had children of her own, she raised them as she had been raised. My childhood years were filled with my mother's harsh words (often at decimel levels I could hear as I rounded the corner to my street on my way home from school) and frequent punishments. For my older sister especially, these punishments also came at the end of a belt.

For those of you who know me well, you have heard me thank my mother for two great things:
1. Good skin
2. Showing me by example how I never want to act towards others

Those are harsh words, but they are true. My mother is not what anyone would decribe as a "nice" person. She criticizes everyone and if a situation doesn't revolve around her, she "changes the channel" until it does. But underneath all her viribato is a scared and lonely old lady who at 83, has significant dimentia and works overtime to hide it because she is so proud. She wears bright lipstick, dies her hair jet black (because she is "too young" to go gray) and she talks non-stop. She learned at too early an age that many people thought being Jewish was a bad thing. Her first husband (my father) left her at a time when divorce was still a dirty word and she was ashamed. She remarried a wonderful man and had nearly twenty years with him before he died on his 60th birthday of pancreatic cancer. She has survived cancer on three separate occasions, underwent triple bypass surgery, has buried one daughter and has watched another be ravaged by Multiple Sclerosis. I am her one success in life. For as long as I can recall, that has been a heavy burden on my shoulders, but one that I finally understand.

The experience in Dresden was moving beyond description. One day, the group sat with the Mayor of the city, who asked each of the twelve former residents who were forced out to tell their stories. I was astounded that although they had all left Germany more than 60 years ago, every one of them spoke in nearly perfect German. It was surreal, as if they were back at that moment in time that was permanently etched into their memories. An interpreter quietly translated into English as each person spoke. There wasn't a dry eye in the room, including the Mayor. On another day, my mother and I left the group to see if we could find the street where she lived as a child. We did, and we saw that nothing had survived the bombings by the allied forces. My mother stood bravely by the street sign while I took her picture. Behind her were some boxy buildings that were erected during the communist regime. Suddenly, a woman approached us and asked if wanted our picture taken together. She and my mother started talking (in German) and within a few moments the woman took my mother in a warm embrace and told her how sorry she was. Dresden will never be the same, but this generation is trying to make it better for the future.

I met some wonderful people in our group ranging in age from 29 (our guide) to 89, and was sincerely sad to say good-bye after spending six intense days together. My mother and I then went on the Vienna, Bratislava and Budapest. In each city, she marvelled at what she was seeing, soaking in every second. Her short-term memory is severely impaired, and she would often ask me if we were going somewhere we had just been. I wonder if she will remember the details of our travels, but I don't think it really matters. She knows that she returned after more then 75 years to Dresden, she knows that she spent nearly two weeks with her beloved daughter and she knows that she loved it. Whatever she doesn't remember, I have no doubt she will simply make up. As she regales her friends with stories of her travels, who will ever know what is true and what she is making up? She will be the center of attention with her stories, and she will love the limelight.

I think it's poetic that this trip took place just before the Jewish High Holidays - the time when we atone for our sins and ask for forgiveness. In my mother's eyes, everything I have ever done has been perfect, and that has annoyed me. I have harbored much anger towards my mother for many of her actions, mostly towards others. Perhaps the person she was most horrible to was my older sister, to whom she didn't speak for several years before her death. But my sister found peace by forgiving my mother and often said to me that she did the best she could. I wish my sister was here now so that I could tell her that although I was always the one who got the high marks in school, she was the really wise one. Although I can't make any promises, I will try not to stand in judgement of my mother in whatever time I have left with her. Because she is doing the best she can in life.