Different Slants

Copyright–April 18, 2011 

To Jews and Those Who Want To Be—for just one day:

Happy Gefilte Fish

Happy Afikoman (however you spell that)

Happy Briskett

Happy Parsely…Sage, Rosemary…oops!

Happy Lamb Shank

Happy Strange Wine

Happy Matzoh

Happy Elijah…by now, really drunk

Happy Four Questions

May we be asking them

For Another

Three Thousand Years

Happy Escaping from those Crazy Egyptians

Happy Remember the Ragged Immigrants

Who brought Passover With Them

And Little Else

Hitler’s Dead!

We’re Still Here!

Hah!!!

Happy Passover

Gut Yontiff

Hag Sa-mey-ach

To

Everyone

Who Remembers

Son of Anne & Israel

Brother of Bonnie

Grandson of Rose & Jacob

Grandson of Celia & Nathan

Great-Grandson of Osher & Etta Kasha

Great-grandson of Fannie & Moshe

Great-Great-Grandson of Yeshia

All of them gone

I remain

I write the poems

Publishing News! 

Robert M. Katzman’s Amazing Story: http://www.differentslants.com/?p=355

© April 4, 2011 by Robert M. Katzman

This is an introduction, because one thing leads to another, usually.

Helen died.

92 years old, Helen Bishop had lived with us for five years.

“Us” means Joy, her daughter, one of eight children, and me, the husband.  Our daughter, Sarah, got the call at 1 am on Sunday morning, March 13th 2011, when I was dead to the world.  Eighth graders can stay up all night, but not their 61-year-old Dads.

It may actually have been midnight on March 12th, because everyone’s supposed to push their clock ahead one hour in the spring at 2 am, and that night was the night.  So, if they did it early in the nursing home, it might’ve still been Saturday night.  This isn’t essential to know, and in fifty years who will care?

But I did wonder for a few moments, lying there in the dark with my beagle, Betsy, who continued to snore all through the brief conversation in the darkness.  I let her death wash over me, like a tide.

Her kids came to Chicago from across the United States, and from every kind of job:

Billy: (1941) 69, retired U.S. Air Force—–Florida

Gail: (1945) 65, real estate—–Illinois and Wisconsin (aka “Susie”)

Carolyn: (1947) 63, secretary in a Lutheran church—–Oklahoma  (aka “Keeko”)

Joy: (1950) 60, controller at a surgical center, retired—–Illinois

Jim: (1951) 59, engineer—–Illinois

Elaine: (1953) 57, registered nurse—–Arkansas  (aka as “E”)

Russell: (1955) 55, carpenter, lumberjack—–Wisconsin  (aka “Buster”)

Charlie: (1959) 51, retired U.S. Air Force; now Aurora, Colorado cop (aka “Chickie”)

Some came with wives, husbands and/or children. An army of descendents.

Bill Bishop, the man she married in Chicago on Christmas Eve 1939, died March 9, 1999, after nearly sixty years of marriage.  He was a railroad man his entire career, The Rock Island Line.

Her one surviving brother, whom we call Uncle Donnie, 82, came from Pelican Rapids, Minnesota along with his two sons, David and Paul.

Helen herself, originally from a Norwegian/Danish farming family named Ness and Petersen, and who lived in Wolverton, Minnesota was born in 1919.  But I also heard she came from Comstock, Minnesota, about five miles south. I think this is an unresolved issue.

But what do I know?  I’m just the husband. I don’t even have blue eyes, so I keep out of any Scandinavian controversy.  I hear they all still carry big axes.  Better silent than axed.

Both these obscure hamlets, hard by the North Dakotan border are just south of the Red River-traversing metropolis of Fargo-Moorhead which includes both states.  You go out there, don’t miss it.  Nice people, a stunning museum and an incredible number of snowplows.  Really.

I, ah, wouldn’t chance it in winter, which in this part of the North-Central USA runs from October to April.

Is this a eulogy?

Well, not exactly. Some of her kids and grandkids already did that in the Lutheran church service, including my wife who pleaded with all of her siblings to stay in touch and not drift apart.  I watched her and was very moved.  Will there ever be anything important enough to get them all together again?  Was Helen the one great bond?  Do they individually realize this?

Nope, this is a more permanent remembrance of her and about something remarkable that happened just after she was buried. Spoken words, however heartfelt and loving, drift away into the ether.  You write it down, there’s a chance they’ll linger.  Maybe even still be here when the great grandkids want to know about their nice Grandma and all the rest of us are no longer available.

I read my stories in public sometimes, except the ones I can’t read because they are too loaded with emotion.  This is one of those stories, so read it, people.  Helen deserves it.

(Read on …)