Pragerblog

When I worked at the Globe, I could have almost have guaranteed that my grandmother could have an obit when she died, and once I asked her if she wanted one. She said no, which is a good thing, because the obit writer hasn’t returned a single e-mail I’ve sent since I departed.

This isn’t her obit, but I thought I’d record … something … this morning. She died Saturday at 100 years, 9 months, and 20 days. It was the 39th anniversary of my bar mitzvah, which means that from here on out, in my totally subjective view of the world, D-Day is now the third-most notable thing to have happened on that date.

In the month before she came into the world, Peary set sail for the North Pole, revolution raged in the Turkish empire, and the forerunner of the FBI was established. In the month after, the first person to die in an airplane crash perished, with Orville Wright at the controls. And before she was two months old, the Cubbies won the World Series for the last time, so far. Also in ‘08: Taft beat Bryan for the presidency, and those who also came into the world included Milton Berle, Henri Cartier-Bresson (five days after), LBJ, Roger Tory Peterson, Richard Wright, JK Galbraith, Jimmy Stewart, Mel Blanc, and Ian Fleming. All of them departed before she did.

Ruth dated Eddy Duchin, who found prominence later as a band leader, but she married Sol Goldberg of Lynn on March 4, 1930. She had two daughters, Joan and Lois, and all factors considered, it wasn’t a successful family unit. Solly was the dominant member, and he did many impressive things, including starting a business in the year of the Depression that survives today. Ruth was his bookkeeper at the start.

They liked to socialize, and not seldomly went down to New York to sample the nightlife. They had a good social circle around Salem as well. For years, they were in a supper club of eight couples, and she was its last surviving member by more than a decade. In her birth family, her younger sister Evelyn of Framingham is now the sole survivor.

Family lore has it that on one trip to the Manhattan, Solly and Ruth attended Don Larsen’s perfect game in the 1956 World Series. I know that at least Solly attended the ‘61 Series between the Yankees and the Reds, because the shirt I got is one of my earliest memories. I was 3 that year.

Ruth didn’t start off loving baseball, but she later related that Solly told her she ought to get to like it, because that’s where he was going to be found. For decades after his death in 1978, baseball continued as an interest, and one of her last excursions out of the house was to a game last year in which she went onto the field, to be recognized as a fan in her 100th year. For years, I’d print out the Globe’s month-by-month Sox schedules at 150 percent, so Mama Ruth could read them, and make team rosters so she could tell the players.

Ruth was an active member of life for many years, having served as an officer in the temple sisterhood, the area’s Hadassah, and a volunteer at Salem Hospital. She played mah jongg (I have her well-yellowed tiles), played golf (not avidly, that I know of), and was still playing card games into her last year. She traveled fairly widely.

She was a knitter, and went through a needle jag a couple of years ago where she knit scarves for “everyone,” and at my request, did a blanket for our child. It sits, folded and waiting, in the baby’s crib, which is otherwise empty. We were excited, at one time, to think that they would meet and forge a link that stretched from 1908 into the 22d century possibly, but that wasn’t to be. Still, she or he will be warmed by Mama Ruth’s hand, just as I was many times.

We got to be friends after I moved back to Massachusetts in the early ’80s. I lived for a few weeks in my parents’ home, which was under agreement to someone else. Mama Ruth brought by a load of groceries as a housewarming, and when I remarked how nice that was, she said, “well, I’m a nice person.” And she was. We were close, and grew closer, from that point on.

Her funeral is Wednesday, and I’m going to speak about her for the family, an honor I don’t take lightly. I don’t know if I’ll return here to share what I say, which will be extemporaneous, but for now, for the purposes of this post, I feel finished.

We got the excited call from our facilitator on Tuesday, telling us she had a birth mom who wanted to talk with us. After 27 months without a single nibble, which had crushed our certainty that we’d be chosen quickly by an enthusiastic birth mom who’d decided we were the ones for her child to grow up with.

The facilitator had tried all the numbers she had for Georgie, so I got the details first: El Centro, Calif., 30 years old, former medical assistant who had descended far enough in crystal meth that she’d recently gotten out of jail for identity theft, a form of fraud. But we didn’t have to worry about health because she’d been on parole, and subject to drug testing, for the duration of the pregnancy. Caucasian kid, a girl, due July 11. She would be this woman’s fourth child; she gave the first one to adoption 12 years ago, and lost two others to their father when she went to jail.

As it happened, Georgie had left work and was in the subway homeward when the facilitator called, but she’d emerged from the tunnel when I tried to reach her. Our conversation was excited but brief, because the BM, Dorotha Jolena, would be leaving the hotel she’d been staying in within the hour. So Georgie caught the facilitator in the car and quickly called California.

An hourlong call ensued with Georgie behind the closed door of the baby’s room (pretty symbolic, huh?), in which I could here more tone of voice than words, but it sounded pretty promising. I had writing deadlines to meet, but found it unthinkable to sit at the keyboard and concentrate, so I folded laundry and tried reflexively to expel the tension via frequent deep sighs.

When Georgie emerged, it was a little like seeing white smoke from the Vatican chimney: We had a match!

When we called the facilitator to report the news, she said she didn’t have a picture of the mom, but said we could go to her Myspace page to check her out. And that’s when it started to fall apart.

I couldn’t find her page right away, so I Googled her. What came up wasn’t her Myspace page but some adoptive-parent chat rooms that warned that she was a scammer, trying to coax money out of would-be adopters — for hotel space or medical coverage.

We didn’t decide immediately that she wasn’t for real, because some of her story was still possibly true — if she’d been arrested for ID theft, then some people would know that she’d been involved in that. Georgie and I decided not to share the news until it shook out a bit.

But I did start viewing our future. A girl, huh? We kinda wanted a boy, but I guess we’re just destined to be part of the girl-power movement in our family: My brother has two daughters, and Georgie’s brother has two more. One of my sister’s three kids is a girl, too. But, OK, that’s cool. And July 11 — that means summer birthdays, just like I had, when schoolmates are away on vacation. It’ll give us birthdays three months in a row, too — Anna (or Grace), then me, then G.

The shakeout took less than 24 hours. Turns out she doesn’t have a baby to offer us, certainly not under the set of circumstances she described to Georgie on the phone, and we’re not going forward. That much is certain; I’ll leave it to you to decide whether she had illicit intent.

We’re pretty sanguine about it, certain that Dorotha Jolena is a soul in trouble, deserving of our forgiveness no matter what she did. Yes, it’s a lot easier to be sanguine when you don’t get sucked in, financially or emotionally.

Perversely, we’re kind of happy — Georgie more than me, I think — that at least we’ve broken the schneid, that we’re no longer birth-plan virgins, or worse, pariahs, unchosen after more than two years when we’d been told when we were certified as adoptive parents that the average wait was six months. I still laugh, ruefully if not painfully, when I recall that I told people, “hey, those are just averages; our baby could come even sooner!” Or later.

I don’t know if this will remain a source of happiness, and if so for how long.

A friend recently told a story about how he had “put it out to the universe” that he and his family were looking for their adoptive child, and ready to welcome him or her, and how the child had appeared, via friends of friends, within days. So I close this tale with our own declaration, that we’re looking for our child, and we’re ready to receive her. Or him.

I swear the following is true, but it would have to be for me to tell the story; as fiction, it’d be horribly, embarrassingly lame.

At the home of Maria Chao, an architect living in Amherst, one of the points of interest was the Munchkin boiler, whose chief selling points are its efficiency and small size.

We visited her house as part of the renewable energy open house organized regionally by the Northeast Sustainable Energy Association, and nationally by the American Solar Energy Association. But Georgie and I did our tour (more later) in Greater Northampton because our niece, Annika, was celebrating her 7th birthday in Sunderland.

The theme of the party was … “The Wizard of Oz” and it wasn’t expressed in just a couple of posters and some four-color, printed napkins. My sister in law Val, a tireless dynamo of ideas and industry, sewed 30 costumes, engaged a local couple of women to direct, and staged a nine-act performance on the front porch with an audience of parents below. Naturally, there were lots of munchkins.

Annika, the guest of honor and the star of the show, in costume as Dorothy.

I did very little to help organize, though I was dispatched to Dunkin’ Donuts to get a Box o’ Joe. (You see where I’m going with this, no?) While I was there, waiting for them to brew the joe, a guy came in and ordered … 100 munchkins, upping his order to 150 when a few were still left. I could swear they were all for him, but I was probably just projecting.

No, nothing of import to report. But, we have redone our family booklet, which is distributed to prospective birth moms trying to decide to whom they will give up their child.

If you want to check it out, click here to download a pdf.

Many thanks to our friend, Bill Moree, for shooting (and styling, and touching up) the new cover shot. Our friend Shonna Dowers handled the design updates, as she did the original design, and we’re very grateful to her as well.

Whole Foods announced Tuesday that it will no longer offer plastic bags after April 22.

Love That!

After that date, which is Earth Day, the choice will be recycled paper bags or reusable bags, which of course will not be free.

We’ve been trying to use only cloth and/or polymer mesh bags for several years in our house, but I have to say, we have been far from perfect. It’s too easy to forget to get the bags bag into the car, or to put them in one car and then happen to be using the other when we stop into a market, or whatever.

So even in our eco-semi-conscious household, we have reams of paper and plastic bags, since once we take them, we at least want to get second and third uses out of them. As they mount up, they are like a scorecard of our grocery inefficiency.

At least regarding the plastic bags, we have a different secondary use, to pick up Emma’s poop, both in the yard and at the park. (You know how archaeologists sift through a lost civilization’s trash to get clues about how they lived? Future archaeologists will wonder why we were saving all that poop!) (Uh, that’s someone else’s line, not mine, but I like it.)

I’ve pointed it out before, but like doing so whenever possible: My sister-in-law, Bev, has in many cases been my ecological guide via personal example and quiet suggestion. She gave me my first mesh bag, years ago, and the world (China is cracking down on the use of plastic bags, San Francisco has regulations on them) is catching up to her.

Link via Treehugger.

I spent Thanksgiving eve and day with cousins in Vermont, and in an act of shameless and surreptitious self-promotion, I persuaded folks to play the ABC News website “game” that identifies presidential candidates who best represent players’ views.

I already knew in general terms that I was hanging with a nest of lefties, but I didn’t know the extent until perhaps a dozen of us took the quiz. Gravel, Kucinich, and Ron Paul were the most common answers (apart from Steve, God bless him, who seemed poised to scurry off for information on his number one choice, Duncan Hunter — “Dun-can Hunt-er?!?!” he said).

I know. I know. It is wrong to draw any conclusions from any informal survey, and this couldn’t get any more unformed. Just a tiny gaggle of people, using an imprecise tool to measure general drifts of opinion. But with that disclaimer, here are two thoughts that arise:

A common reaction I heard was, “I don’t care if he comes up on my list. I’m not going to waste my vote on someone who can’t win,” and I just wanted to scream! “He” (or “she”) can’t win if you don’t vote your conscience! Winning with the wrong candidate is barely a win at all. Especially now! This is the time to build support for those who might win, or at least to draw more attention to their positions. You can vote strategically and defensively later, when that seems the only course.

Concomitant to that is, of course, the press’s covering the horse race. No wonder people only want to know who’s going to win, instead of who has different ideas that might save our sorry statehood. The press says it is, among other things, following the money, and it’s true — obviously, painfully, and injuriously to all of us — that money is a key determinant in the outcome. But I say that once someone scores an “unexpected” victory in an early race, the money will be there to continue the fight. Lots of candidates have been great fund-raisers, but have failed. (Pete Wilson. Phil Gramm.)

The other obvious takeaway is the absence of Hillary. Obama has come up once or twice, including on my list. Biden has appeared a couple of times. But Hillary has not come up once, in, say, 30 or 36 opportunities (roughly a dozen people I know have tried it, and the thing lists three candidates each time). It means nothing in the broad perspective. But not once.

I just took five days off from my horribly busy professional life to visit with cousins in Vermont and even nuclear-er family in Connecticut. Not sure I would have posted anyway, but after my 48 hours in Vermont, I was unable to: I left without my computer, cellphone, iPod, and camera, all of which I carry in my backpack so I’ll know where to find them. That strategy works great, except when I leave the central repository behind. So I’m gonna lean on that separation to explain the most recent lag in blog production, which was noted by one of my readers, with whom I spent part of the holiday weekend. It’s nice to be missed.

[ I took this from my vantage point in the second row, right behind, from left, Ed, Debby, and Evelyn. Using a mechanical device in the sanctuary, on the sabbath, in the middle of the service, was mean affrontery, and after this attempt (for which I thankfully disabled the flash and palmed the device so few if any could see it), I realized the gravity with which others would view my snapping, and stopped. That’s Benjamin, blurred, on the bimah.]

The grandson of my grandmother’s sister was bar mitzvahed on Saturday, and I was able to attend for the entire three-hour-plus ceremony which, among other things, allowed me to observe that coming fashionably late is still a very temple thing to do. I would say that no more than 10 or 15 percent of the guests were present from the beginning.

I wasn’t pleased that it took that long, but it was fine nevertheless. I found I was able to meditate a bit, which was nice, but unable to get very far in trying to work out my book problems, which wasn’t. Meanwhile, the prayer book had English translations on the left-hand pages, so I was able to read along, which has remained in long memory as one of my complaints of my intensive (for Conservatives) Jewish upbringing. When I was bar mitzvahed myself, for example, I sang syllables to tunes, without knowing what I was saying. Same for my haftarah portion. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that at least some of the prayer books back then also gave translations, but if they did, I had no curiosity for them or they left no impression.

By reading along, and ahead (skimming English goes more quickly than singing in Hebrew), I felt as though I was learning, or in some cases being reintroduced, to Judaism. Some portions I found consonant with my view of spirituality, which impressed me, but others, such as those that described Jews as God’s chosen people, clanged harshly on my ear. (Our cousin Wrenn has a bumper sticker that comes to mind, “God bless everyone. No exceptions.” Love that.)

The rabbi, cantor (I think that was her position), and congregation president are all women, which I know is a well established trend in the religion, but especially given the conditions when I was a regular temple attendee, the troika stood out. Benjamin’s mother, Debby, and an aunt of his both read from the Torah as well. They didn’t just have aliyot; they did the actual reading. Very impressive.

Benjamin held up his end very well, too, if a bit shy when it was his role to lead the congregation is songful prayer. The descriptions of him by those who parented, taught, and honored him were consistent, of a very smart guy, warm-hearted, quiet but with an adult sense of humor. He clearly had learned his stuff, and whatever anxiety he had seemed imposed by having to be up in front, instead of doubt over his command of the material.

For myself, I felt every bit of the old, distant, vaguely familiar cousin who I’d previously experienced only through the eyes of the bar mitzvah boy, 37 years ago. And as they were to me, I was good for a middling check and not much else; I tried to engage him in conversation, but on this day, I was certainly tied at the bottom of the priority list.

I was grateful that he acknowledged in his speech not only his two living grandparents, but also Mama Ruth, who attended with the Millers. During the luncheon afterward, she not only said she was glad to have attended, but she seemed as if it were so as well. She seems to do this: Decline to go out, fret about going out when she does agree to it, then enjoy when she does.

Of course, she sat wheelchair to wheelchair with her sister Evelyn for the duration of the luncheon, but it was hard to imagine that they were able to communicate much above the din, with Ruth’s loss of hearing and Evelyn’s spotty ability to complete a thought, which was sad to observe. Perhaps the chance to be together again transcended the observable difficulties.

Though I skipped the evening party, I did attend a brunch the next morning that seemed planned for the out-of-town contingent, and I was graciously kept company by Howie and Maribeth (sp?), uncle and aunt to the celebrant. I’d hoped to chat with Matt, their aspiring-writer son, but he cut out of the Saturday event after the ceremony, and didn’t attend the brunch. Still, my discussion with Maribeth was broad and warm, and I was glad for the chance.

Left: Brothers Howie and Eddie at the Sunday brunch. Right (from left) Jim, Robin, and Larry Miller at the Saturday luncheon. To my eyes, Howie more strikingly evokes Uncle Ben, and I’ve been struck before by how much Jim evokes Papa Solly. I had a twang of pleasure and poignance when I made out the check to “Benjamin Gaynor”; I didn’t know the celebrant’s namesake that well, but have pleasant memories of him.

[The man himself, Sunday morning.]

My niece Sarah and I are having lunch today, the first of what we intend to be weekly events during this, her senior year. We’ve met regularly for lunch or coffee at other times during her BU years, and I can’t believe we’re already in her last year. I feel sad that we lost out on a year of hanging out while she was off selfishly gallivanting across Europe, but what are you gonna do about kids these days?

Famously — well, to me, alone, in my head — Sarah is the blogger who kept up only for that year abroad and then decided to shut it down. She explained in her closing post that she had sought only to be less intrusive in her trip updates than she felt broadcast e-mails would be, but that she felt blogs of day-to-day life are exercises in conceit.

That’s where she got famous in my mind.

I, of course, did the same thing she did — started a blog to keep people informed about a travel adventure — but arrived at a different conclusion at trip’s end. I’m endeavoring to continue.

I think she’s right, that personal blogs like this one can be pedestrian and self-centered, but I believe they can also be more — or more specifically, that mine can be more, even while I concede that most people who were ever motivated to tune in lost interest when the travel concluded; they were interested more in the trip I was taking than in me alone.

As time goes on, we’ll all get to see if she’s right. But for now, I can tell you she’s with me most times I sit down to prattle on.

G., as she left for work this morning.

The first topic all day long is Georgina’s birthday. She has now completed her 30s! I gave her tickets to a Tori Amos concert next month this morning, but she’d already known about them; I felt I needed to tell her about them when scheduling issues arose around them.

We, of course, already had our big celebration, a week ago Saturday. Tonight, we’re going out for sushi, and I’ll give her a few more gifts:
• “Home Town,” a book about life in Northampton by Pulitzer winner Tracy Kidder. I haven’t read it myself, but I will, after her; she’s still pretty focused on the idea of moving there, and rarely is there a book like this for a place one is considering moving to.
• A mirror for her bike. This is more for me than for her; I want to know she has one when she’s out riding, rare as that is.
• A loose-tea pot we saw at Crate and Barrel Saturday night, when we were purchasing our new coffeemaker. Wasn’t in the plan, but what the hell, she only turns 40 once. I’m glad for the idea of something I know she’d like.

I’ve said it before: I feel like I’m getting better, and my life is getting better, practically every day. I feel so fortunate, and entirely outside the bounds of sentimentality, Georgina as Evidence A of the phenomenon. It’s her birthday, and but I get the gifts of her most every day.

My niece Sarah blogged during her 12-month, 1-week junior-year-abroad, and she did a fabulous job, imho. Perhaps just ’cause she’s younger/hipper/savvier, or perhaps because I’ve been too lazy/unmotivated to investigate, hers is much more sophisticated than this is.
* She used links to great effect, pointing not only to her companion photo site (something I’m hoping to set up, on Flickr perhaps, or on whatever she used), but to wikipedia to provide background on the incredible number of places she visited.
* She even has video, posted on YouTube and linked in the familiar YouTube fashion. I am pretty sure I can shoot video as well, and probably shoulda looked into that before my trip. But since I have never posted to YouTube, video just wasn’t in my view. I see that as an expression of age, among other things. I assume she used her one camera to shoot her video, as opposed to carrying a second, video-only camera.

Yes, I’m a proud uncle, but I wouldn’t post just for that. She has some terrific travelogue about places I’ve never been, and places I’ll wager you will never go, and for that alone, I feel objectively justified in passing on the link.

But also, she is relatively internationalist in her views, and especially after having spent a year abroad, her view of America is very worthwhile.

If you want to go, here’s a link. (My first!) In addition to her other qualities, she’s an inspiration!

I think it was my mother who pointed this out…

Recently, my family was particularly far flung around the globe. In addition to my trip:

* My brother and sister-in-law were in Costa Rica on a trip celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary. (This is the same sister-in-law who walked 500 miles across Spain last summer.)

* My mother was sailing the Danube.

* During her trip, she met up with my niece Sarah, who is spending the summer in Sofia, Bulgaria, on a sociopolitical internship, after spending her entire junior year abroad, based in Burgos, Spain.

* My nephew, Avishai, and his wife, Tali, were in Indochina, completing a monthslong global honeymoon that had brought them to stay with us for a week in May.

My sister and her husband, meanwhile, apparently didn’t get the scheduling memo: They are about to depart for Copenhagen and Iceland.

ETHEL WALKER SCHOOL, West Simbury, Conn.

[this was written Monday morning, but I didn’t get Internet access until Wednesday morning.]

The timing of the trip was determined by the graduation festivities for my niece, Alex, a fabulous, wonderful, intelligent, determined woman who was recognized four times at class prize night, proving that what I perceive through my proud uncle’s eyes is visible to all. She shared the choir prize with her best friend, and won the English, French, and history prizes.

Georgie and I were there for the awarding of those prizes, but decided not to attend the full complement of Saturday events, which included Alex’s singing at the baccalaureate service, after having been given dispensation by her and her mom, Bev. We’d been invited to two other graduation events in Mass. and tried to squeeze at least one of them in, but missed both the graduate and his dad, who were out tending to others for the early portion of their party. Oh well; at least the kid scored on a gift.

The drive down together was great; we were both treating it as our last time together for a long time, though the truth is, we’ll see each other in six days, in Seattle, and thereafter for a week.

Georgie wanted to drive, which hasn’t always been the case, but she’s infatuated with the Prius. We finally had to put gas in the car, and some of the circumstances around it were a little disappointing. First, at a half a tank, according to the gauge, we had gone about 350 miles, so I was expecting 700 miles per tank. But the gauge made it seem as if the last quarter disappeared in a flash, and the total was more like 530, which is not merely a little less.

That gave us mileage of 39 mpg, which is very nice, but not the 50 the sticker said (yeah, I know that system is broken, but still), and not the 50 my sister-in-law, Bev, has been getting in hers.

With all the mileage I’m putting on over the next week, I’ll get to see a few more cycles to see if this is how it’s going to be.

Today’s destination: Lumberville, Pa.