An unexpected journey

I didn't spend the day the way I expected to today. I was off because it was Election Day, even though there were no major races this year. My plan was to spend the day at home, cleaning out a closet or two and hopefully, getting rid of a bunch of junk. Sometimes I watch "Hoarders" to inspire myself. But after going on the computer and checking my email, which included a special offer to try a gym and noting it was at the same intersection as the Brooklyn Trader Joe's, my mind started on a hitherto unexpected path. I saw on the map included that it was two miles from my home. "Why travel two miles to pay money to get some exercise, when I could just walk there for free?" Then shop at Trader Joe's!

Embarking on a two mile walk is not something I undertake lightly. The last time I walked from home to Atlantic Avenue was during the transit strike in 2005 and it was VERY cold that day. I saw on the Weather Bug on my computer that it was 69 degrees. In November! I could not waste a day like that digging through the effluvia in my closet.

So I don a light jacket and my most comfortable walking shoes and set out on my odyssey. Walking has become something of a lost art for me and I blame the MTA for those unlimited ride Metrocards. Once it would be normal to walk ten blocks or so to a destination, but in the interests of getting the most for my money I've gotten into the habit of jumping on a subway or bus for even the shortest trips. I also had a knee that would get strained on long walks, but I hadn't pushed it for a while.

It was a perfect day for being outdoors: not too hot, not too cold, bright and sunny. I started up Fourth Avenue and noted recently built apartment buildings. When I first came here there was virtually nothing above three stories in the vicinity, but now - eight, ten stories high! And many of the stores had been transformed -- old-fashioned bodegas and diners were now trendier, yuppier types of shops.

Over a mile and no pain in my knee! Finally reach Atlantic Avenue and turn left for the second leg of my journey. It's an area I've never explored on foot, usually going past on the bus. A lot of shops with Islamic signage. One place I stop in is the Salvation Army. There used to be one of their stores in my neighborhood, but the building was torn down. It was always fun to pop in and explore and try to discover some fascinating treasure. And sometimes drop off some of my own unwanted other people's future treasures.

After my brief detour, I resumed my trek, passing the Brooklyn Detention Center along the way. Finally I spy that Health Club that sent that offer earlier in the day. And across the street - -- Trader Joe's. Forty-five minutes later, I depart, laden down with two bags of groceries, to wait for the bus for my return trip. No way was I going to repeat that journey on foot, in the dark, with all those groceries. But maybe I'll try talking more walks around Brooklyn in the future.

Trying to understand my parents' lives, part 1

Things happen when we're children that we don't understand until many years later and as grownups we know more and can put things into context. I seem to spend a lot of time trying to make sense of events from my childhood.

When I was four years old my mother spent a week in Lenox Hill Hospital undergoing a series of tests. I don't remember that at all, but after my father died, one of of the things I found was the hospital report. It described her symptoms and listed the tests and concluded with a diagnosis of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis. ALS. Lou Gehrig's Disease. Basically, a death sentence. I can't know how much of this was explained to my parents. To the doctors they were a poor, uneducated immigrant couple and maybe weren't told everything this diagnosis entailed. Or maybe they were. As a child I was never told my mother was dying. I knew she was "sick". That she couldn't get around like other people. For the last nine years of her life she was completely housebound. But I kept hoping they would find a cure for whatever it was. As I got older, she became feebler. For a while she could get around with a walker. Then eventually she could only stand and maybe take a step or two while leaning on the walker. Then she couldn't manage that much. But the prospect of her imminent death was not something that was a serious possibility. Yes, she was getting weaker, but there was no reason she wouldn't live a normal lifetime. Things in our home were always tense. My mother was invariably miserable and my father overwhelmed with the care she required.

And in the midst of her chronic condition, my mother had to undergo an emergency hysterectomy. I was ten years old at that time and had no idea what a uterus was. I was told she had a tumor in her stomach, but they did use the word "hysterectomy". It wasn't till a few years later that I learned what it was all about. It may not have been until after she had died. She was rushed to the hospital because of bleeding from what turned out to be a benign fibroid tumor and it was several weeks before she came home. I was sent to stay with relatives. My mother never fully recovered her strength and her decline progressed much more rapidly. I had naively hoped that when she was in the hospital they would figure out what was wrong with her and maybe cure her.

After a few more years it got to the point where my father couldn't handle caring for her. Just lifting her out of bed several time a day was quite a strain as she was as tall as he was and outweighed him. We had to place her in a nursing home. A few weeks later she was hospitalized after having a stroke and pneumonia. While she was there the doctors said she probably didn't have ALS because she would have died sooner. They still had no idea what was wrong and mentioned the possibility her condition was psychosomatic. If they thought that, they made no efforts to try to treat her. She recovered enough to be sent back to the nursing home, where she finally died a few weeks later.

To lose your mother when you are fifteen is an overpowering blow. I spent years absorbing the loss, trying to cope with it and understand it. Then after dwelling on her illness and death for so long I started trying to understand her life. And I feel cheated that I never had the chance to talk with her as a grownup and ask her things. Like how she really came to marry my father and leave her family and her country and come to the US to be the wife of a man she had known when they were children. Did she regret it? I always understood that she loved him more than he loved her. If he did love her. He was not one to show affection to wife or daughter and that made me angry with him. Again, it was only many years later that considering his life caused me to give him a break. When he was three years old, his mother died. Not having the benefit of a mother's love and having a stern, critical father probably kept him from learning to love and be loved. His father took him back to Europe, where he remarried and started a new family. When my father was sixteen he was encouraged to go back to America. Was this a rejection by his father? Maybe not, but he might have perceived it as such. Maybe my grandfather thought his son would have a better life back in America.Maybe his new wife didn't like her stepson. In any case, my father came back to the US in 1929, just in time for the depression.

Filling in the gaps since summer 2010

I'm a bit abashed that I've let an entire year go by without posting here. Not that it's been an uneventful year. Last September I finally got my long awaited promotion to the lofty title of Senior Court Clerk and am working in my old office in the Jury Division at New York County Clerk. Very happy to say farewell to the Bronx. A few months later a bit of a scare when the massive budget cut to the Judiciary led to layoffs and rollbacks (the polite term for demotions). Was afraid I could be sent back to the Bronx, but I was spared that fate.

Another G&S Festival in Gettysburg this summer.  A lot of fun and hoping there will be another festival next year, but as it's been a big money loser, that's still in doubt.

Last week was one for the history books. First there was an earthquake that was felt in NYC. To me it just seemed like the rumble of the subway that runs underneath my building.

Hard to believe an earthquake in NYC would turn out NOT to be the big story of the week. But we didn't reckon with a hurricane called Irene talking a turn in our direction and the entire east coast felt her wrath (why wrath? what's she got to be so mad about anyway?). Even in Vermont, which has not normally been the go-to place for hurricanes suffered major flooding. Was lucky not to suffer major ill-effects here. After the "micro-burst" tornado that swept through here last year, blowing a trunk (yes, a TRUNK!) off my balcony, I had plenty of time to batten down the hatches.

Finally, the new season of the Gilbert & Sullivan Society will be starting soon and I will once more be president. This year the Society marks its 75th anniversary and appropriate celebrations must be planned. Let's hope we can do the occasion justice.