Life / Death

Times for laughter, times for tears.

I just got a call that My Old Man, a 103-year-old man whom I've been visiting since maybe May 2003, just died. He has no family to speak of, as I've understood it. He never married and had no kids. Almost his whole family died in the Holocaust in Poland. As he grew older, he felt alone in the US. And wondered from time to time what the point was, noting that he was leaving nothing behind that anyone would want.

His birthday was February 8, 1902. The last time I visited him he asked me to remember it, and remember him on it. Now that's all I'll have. That and a painting of his that he gave me once.

There's my end-of-year update for you...

29, Going on 40

Indeed, 'tis the season to celebrate my birth and bemoan my huge dreams as yet unmet. At the new age of 29.

A Tale From My Past, When I Was Still Young

One fine day, my good friend D2 grabbed me and a few day's worth of clothes (as well as her fine husband), and brought me to spend a long weekend with her family in the Pocono mountains. We stopped first at her parent's home, where her mom packed the car to the brim with scrumptious Polish food and her husband stood agog at the amount of edibles we were expected to consume over the weekend. Then, not having exchanged more than four words to me that weren't in the form of a brusk command, her mom asked me what I had accomplished in my life.

Not a question I had anticipated, and I floundered through my memories to figure out what was worth putting in that category. I settled on telling her that I had formed important and enriching relationships with good friends and family.

That's probably still the major "accomplishment" in my life. But there are other accomplishments to celebrate, to be sure:

List of Accomplishments To Round Off My 20s...as I head for my 40s:

1. Consistently failing to remember what flights I'm on, when, and from what airport. This includes my having to rush off a South Carolina-bound flight just before take-off, having intended to board a Florida-bound one. And my fastest-ever packing job as I rushed to leave the house in 15 minutes having just discovered that my 1:15pm flight was a flight of fantasy; the flight was scheduled for 11:05am. I packed an odd selection of clothing in the dark. I don't recommend it to others.

2. Continuing a fine tradition of creating mishapen cakes and deserts for my friends, allowing them to sample cuisine that looks like it's taken a serious beating from life. My "Sweet Gunk" tiramisu, "Chocolate Frittata Crunch," and "Cheese Fluff Crater" probably take the cake. So to speak. And then my dear friend Shannon reminded me last night of my truffles. That experiment did result in some good quality chocolate, but also in an odd assortment of chocolate fingerprints throughout the house, in the most weird places...doorways, mirrors, walls...who knew I touch the house so much as I flit through it.

3. Caring for my friends and family. Like when I misheard a "tea: peppermint" request of a sick friend, and brought her "cheese" and lozenges. I recommended she toss the cheese in hot water and call me in the morning. And then there was the time when I bought my aunt a selection of gifts from Houston, and accidentally threw them (and their plastic bag) in the trash chute and gave my aunt the bag of garbage. Poor woman.

5. Sharing good times with good people. On my birthday, a friend and I snuck a bottle of wine into a Brooklyn cafe and later the movie theater, and enjoyed ourselves immensely. Even the part where we scrambled on the darkened movie floor, trying to find the bottle that had rolled away. And then there was the cheese extravaganza at my DC friends' place, ensconced with warm and lovely people. And the Cambodian feast in Texas. And the French soirree with my Ohio pals the other night. But any time with the peeps is good time.

Yup. I'm doing the math again, and still the most important thing in my life is my friends and family. Thanks for making 28 a great year! I think 29 will be even better. :)

*love*

On Remembering and Other Such Fancies

In case you are wondering where this particular blogger was last Thursday around 8:55am, I am not too shy to tell. I was lounging about in bed, updating my sparkling new iPod, while answering my mom's phone call.

My plans were simple and clear, unstress, unhurried and mellow. I would eventually get out of bed, and order a car to pick me up at 10:30am so that I could catch my 1:15pm flight home to enjoy a leisurely Thanksgiving with my parents.

A normal Thanksgiving tale, really.

Unless you then move on to wondering where this particular blogger was last Thursday around 8:56am. For then...everything changed.

Ruth Faces A New Truth

At that moment, the inconspicuous viewer would have seen said blogger suddenly jolt upright from bed, upon hearing her mom (on the phone) ask her if her flight has been delayed.

Upon hastily snatching my ticket from the floor under my jeans (what, you keep your ticket in "safer" places?), I noted an odd thing. Well, not that odd. My mom was right. My flight did not leave at 1:15 as ...imagined. No. My flight actually left at 11am. Which left me with two hours to get showered, get packed, get a car, get to the airport, get my boarding pass, get through security, get to the gate, and catch my flight.

I duly closed my eyes for a brief second before asking my mom if I could call her back.

Long story short, I managed to not only get to the airport, but also to the correct airport (after first directing the driver to the wrong one), and even on time. Only to find that my flight was delayed, and that I would be spending another Thanksgiving in the airport. And that I would be routed from New York to Florida via...well, the logical choice: Michigan.

?

Anyway, so life then continued as normal. It was lovely to be home, to hang out with my parents, to relax...and just be happy before going back to New York on Monday, and work on Tuesday.

And then on Sunday, my mom remarks in passing that she's taken off two more days. My eyebrows raise.

"Why," I ask, in my innocence.

"Because you're here until Tuesday."

I run for my ticket, this time strategically placed under my jeans in my bag. Indeed, I was a day off. I frantically called work.