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OUR LIVES; IT HELPS US MAKE TIME TO
REMEMBER
Marjorie Gottlieb Wolfe
Syosset, New York
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The Yiddish word meaning to remember is "gedenken."
With Yom Kippur rapidly approaching, Rabbi Janet Marder writes: "Yizkor serves to bring a moment filled with a flood of stories and anecdotes."
I remember my mother, Jeanette Gottlieb (AKA "The Bunka Lady"), who taught her Japanese needlepoint at numerous adult education programs on Long Island (NY). I remember--with love--my "shviger" (mother-in-law), Adele Wolfe. Oh, how she loved my three sons, Matthew, Jonathan, and Daniel.
I remember my Uncle, Harry Goldberg, a math professor at Brooklyn College. He came to dinner--and stayed 20 years. Who can forget my brother, Paul Gottlieb, who did a "vunderlekh" lip synch at the Bayswater Jewish Center and was a Big Brother to two boys. I remember my Aunt, Sally Rosoff, who almost made her 100th birthday. I remember my college professor, Dr. Tonne, who said, "the five easiest words for a novice or seasoned salesperson to speak are: "There's no charge for that." I remember cousin, Ira Goldfine, who was so active in the JWV (Jewish War Veterans). I vividly recall the words of Phyllis Diller--a dedicated hater of housework: [Diller on how to dodge cooking and cleaning]:
"Put 'Get Well' cards on the mantle. Prop ladders up, so it appears you're redecorating. Drape shirts over the furniture, so people think you're ironing. Stick your arm in a sling."
Rabbi Janet Marder says, "We remember them all today [Yom Kippur]: the ones who were easy to be with and so very easy to love; the ones who drove us crazy sometimes; the ones who brought out our best and most beautiful qualities; the ones who saw us at our worst. We miss them; we ache for them. (Note: the Yiddish words meaning to ache is "vey ton."); we wish with all our hearts that we could have them back, even for one more hour."
Today we can create a lasting memorial book for our loved ones on the computer. This is not a "bobe mayse!" Yizkor.com is a not-for-profit initiative dedicated to permanently preserving "der zikorn" (the memory) of Jewish men and women. Through the medium of online web pages, Yizkor.com enables mourners to capture the history and impact of a loved one, including biography, a "fotografye" (photo), videos, family tree, and funeral information. Family and "khaverim" (friends) can visit the site and contribute stories and memories or just "leave a stone."
By participating, individuals help to relieve the isolation that is suffered by the mourners and provide strong bonds of support to the grief-stricken.
Rabbi Samuel M. Cohon of Temple Emanu-El of Tucson, AZ, kindly gave me permission to share his Yizkor 5769 sermon titled, "The Wrong Room":
"As my wife Wendy will confirm, I often get calls at odd hours. A grandson who can't reach his Bubbie at 10 PM on a Friday night. A car accident at midnight. A death at 2 AM. It is part of the experience of being a congregational rabbi, these desperate calls at strange times, voices filled with worry or pain or confusion or sadness.
One Saturday morning recently was a little different. I was preparing to go to shul to lead services and a Tish, just tying my tie to head out the door, looking forward to normal Shabbat morning and afternoon when the call came in. 'My mother-in-law is in hospice care and she doesn't have long to live. Would you say a prayer for her? No need to come over, rabbi, we know how busy you are.'
So of course, still hoping to make it to services on time I rushed right over to the new TMC Hospice, where I had been only once or twice before. I was in a hurry now, with just 20 minutes to make the hospice visit and make it to Temple Emanu-El for services, easily a 15 minute drive from there. My odds weren't great, but I am at heart an optimist, and I zoomed into the hospice, rabbi's manual in hand. I called out to the front desk clerk for the room number, which she graciously gave me and asked if I needed someone to show me the way. But I was in a hurry, and declined while still in full stride, rushing off towards the hospice room.
When I entered I found a comatose older woman with no family present. I approached, chanted a heartfeld Mi Shebeirach, and then the vidui, the final confessional prayer. I paused for a moment at the bed, and as I quietly got up to leave a hospice worker came in.
"Rabbi," she said, 'That was very beautiful. What nice prayers. But she's not Jewish--I think the room you want is across the hall.'
You know, I have never told that story to anyone publicly before. I guess Yom Kippur is a time for public confession, no?
In fact, no prayers are really offered in vain, are they? So doing the final confession for someone who is not Jewish certainly can't hurt. And confusion of identities can be considered a kind of gift; you know that old Irish proverb? 'May you be in heaven a half an hour before the devil knows you are dead.'
At the hospice, by the way,l I eventually found the right room, and tried to help, through prayer and presence. But I thought about that moment in preparing for Yizkor on Yom Kippur, for this is the day when we combine confessions of sin with a focused remembrance of those who have passed away in the last year, and those we love who have died in years past as well. Perhaps, sometimes, like in that hospice room we are similarly misdirected...
For when we remember those we love who have died--our parents, our grandparents, our brothers and sisters, our wives or husbands, our sons or daughters or grand- sons or granddaughters--we typically focus on what we have lost. We are sad because, mostly, we know we won't see them again. We think about how badly we feel. We miss them. From Yizkor services we often take only sadness, albeit cathartic sadness.
Perhaps we, too, are in the wrong room.
For what those we love who have died can teach us is much more important than a good cry. It is far more powerful than a sense of loss. It is greater than the hollow feeling of remembering what we used to have and don't anymore.
What our dead can teach us is quite different.
Take a moment, now, and think about someone you have lost, among your family and friends, whom you loved and still love. And now remember one gift they gave you, one lovely memory, one story that makes you smile, one generous act that made your life better. Remember how they made you feel, what they taught you about making a difference in this world.
Just sit and remember the sweetness they bought you. The real lesson our dead teach us is that we, too, can influence this world in good, sweet and holy ways. We each have the capacity to make a small difference in the lives of those around us. We can each bring blessing into our world.
We, too, can create the kind of sustaining memories that become sacred--and that help us to serve God, and our people, and this troubled world. The memories we need to take from Yizkor are the memories that inspire us to be better people.
That is the right room.
May this Yizkor service bring to life those holy memories, and inspire us, in this coming year, to create our own memories of blessing and generosity for all of those we love."
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