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Marking Jewish Time
June 6, 2008
Holidays | Jewish Living | Lifecycle (5 comments)

By JanetheWriter
Today is the 47th day of the counting of the omer. And, although I do not possess David A.M. Wilensky's "hyper-awareness of Jewish time," I do, in my own way, mark Jewish time.

As much a part of my growing up as lighting Hanukkah candles and fasting on Yom Kippur was the pilgrimage my mother, my grandmother and I made each summer to Beth David Cemetery in Elmont Queens.

Preferably on a relatively cool day, always early in the morning, and before it got too crowded or too close to the high holidays, we would set out, my grandmother armed with a jar of water (a gefilte fish jar in a previous life) and sharp kitchen scissors for trimming the ivy she invariably knew would be overgrown since the last time we visited, especially on the headstones that lacked a blue "Perpetual Care" sticker.

"Ma, do you want to pick up 'a man?'" my mother would ask upon entering the cemetery gates. With my grandmother's affirmative response, my mother would pull the car to the side of the cemetery's main road and motion for one of the white-bearded, Orthodox men standing nearby to get in. With him in tow (and me crouched as close as possible to the opposite window in the back seat), we'd set off, feeling our way down the narrow roads first to one grave and then to the next...Tante Laura, Uncle Max. Aunt Gertie, Grandma's parents and, of course, Carla, Lunka and Rose Skaletzky--never just "Rose," but always "Rose Skaletzky." I'm not sure exactly who these last three women were, or how we were all related, but obviously they were kin--if not by blood then surely in spirit. At each grave, "the man" would recite El Molai Rachamim, we'd brush away the dirt and leaves that had accumulated since our last visit, place pebbles on the headstone (Carla and Lunka have footstones), and trim the ivy before moving on reluctantly. At the end of the Fischer-Skaletzky graves, we'd go to my "other" grandparents. To me, even then, they were distant memories mingled with family lore--Grandpa, kind, a crinkly-eyed, smiling man whose white-haired ridges in the back of his head mirrored those in the back of my own auburn curls, and Grandma Hattie, a woman with deep, dark circles under her eyes, over-rouged cheeks, and a penchant for repeating herself.

Over time, my mother convinced my grandmother that we didn't need to pick up "a man" and that she and I could be "the man." And so it was that every year we marked time by clearing their graves, placing small pebbles atop the space we'd spruced, and reciting El Molai Rachamim for Tante Laura, Uncle Max, Aunt Gertie, Grandma's parents--Clara and Fievel--Carla, Lunka, Rose Skaletzky and my "other" grandparents, Abraham and Hattie.

Soon it will be time to visit the cemetery again. But we rarely go to Elmont anymore. Now, a quick drive up Route 1 from my parents' house takes my mother and me to Beth Israel in Woodbridge, NJ, to mark time. Once inside the entrance, we don't pick up "a man," but we do still feel our way through the cemetery's narrow roads, first to one grave and then to the next...Grandma and Grandpa and then to Uncle Irv. And, while we often have plastic water bottles in our purses along with flowers for Grandma and Grandpa, and a fresh American flag on a stick for Uncle Irv, we don't usually have sharp kitchen scissors with us. That's really too bad because even though the headstones all have blue "Perpetual Care" stickers on them, the hedges always need to be trimmed.

Tags: cemetery, death

Comment

Comments

David A.M. Wilensky said:

Thanks for this post, Janethewriter. I like cherished childhood memories of relatives. I wish I had more of my grandfather.

Shanah Tovah.

June 8, 2008 2:47 AM

Larry Kaufman- said:

Jane, I will cherish your story of Rose Skaletsky for two reasons -- because we too had "family" where we were never quite sure how they were related. In particular there was Rose Berman. When, as a child, I would ask my mother, the standard answer was, She's a cousin. Presumably if she was a cousin, somewhere there had been an aunt and uncle, but nobody seemed to know about them. And I don't recall her addressing my grandmother, whom she visited every Shabbos afternoon, as Tante. (By the way, that visit involved two streetcars and a bus, plus a 10 minute walk to and from.)

And this somehow cousin was also always referred to by full name -- Rose Berman. But that was easier to explain -- there were three other Roses in the immediate mishpocha, including another Rose Berman. The other Rose Berman, however, was always Raizke. Just Rose meant my mother, and the youngest Rose, my first cousin Yudy's wife, was Rose Yudy's.

But now let me ask, since we are supposed to be blogging about Reform Judaism -- how many of us Reform Jews today visit the cemetery? And does anybody still pay Shabbos visits?

June 9, 2008 3:31 AM

josie benker said:

Janethewriter's post moved me exponentially. My parents were Holocaust survivors, so there were never graves to visit in America. My mother told me stories of taking the trolley with my grandmother in Vienna, before Hitler, to the Jewish cemetery, which was beyond the end of the streetcar line. They would regularly clean up the grave of my grandfather who died when my mother was a child, and leave pebbles to mark their visit. My mother had a stone erected in the same cemetery for her mother, who was exterminated in Auschwitz. My mother never saw that stone; I visited these graves on her behalf just once, in 1973 as a college student. It was enough for her.

My father, who abandoned his Orthodox religious roots after the Shoah and embraced Reform Judaism in America, never spoke of the graves left behind in Germany. Until, in 1993, he too had stones erected in the name of his mother, murdered in Auschwitz and his father, who died on the eve of deportation, in the cemetery in the little German town. My father never saw these stones; I visited these graves on his behalf with my family in 1994. It was enough for him.

Now, both my parents are gone, buried in a cemetery on the other side of the country from where I live. I am a committed Reform Jew, who believes that there is no need to light a candle or visit a grave to honor their lives and their memories, because I think of them with reverence and love each and every day of my life. That said, when I find myself on the side of the country where they lie, under a double headstone, I do go to the cemetery. There's not much to tend to at the barren site, so I don't pull weeds. I bring flowers (my mother loved roses), I leave pebbles, and last year I read them a speech I was going to give at the endowment of a scholarship in their name at my alma mater in the area. So, truth be told, if there was a cemetery to visit, I would visit it even though there is no explanation as to why. It's another way of loving and giving honor, and that's the essence of being a Reform Jew.

June 10, 2008 12:45 AM

JanetheWriter said:

Josie,

Your comments brought my post full circle. Like your maternal relatives, my grandmother and the rest of the Fischers in my family hailed from Vienna, which they left in the 1920s. However, my grandmother's brother, my great Uncle David, killed in WWI, is, I believe, buried in the Jewish cemetery there.

Nearly a year ago as part of a trip to Prague and Poland, I visited Auschwitz and Birkenau, as well as countless empty and echoing synagogues, overflowing cemeteries, and a mass grave in the woods. As you suggest, each was a visit made with love and with honor by all of us there to witness our history.

June 10, 2008 3:20 AM

Barbara Shuman said:

To answer Larry's question, YES, this Reform Jew does visit the cemetery, albeit infrequently. My mother died and was buried 200 miles from our home. The cemetery is near where my in-laws live, so when go there, I try to visit her grave.
Sometimes I am silent, except for the tears, which still flow after 10 years. Often I speak to her of our family, the marriage of her granddaughter, the birth of her great-granddaughter, and of how we missed her at these times of celebration. Once my adult son was able to join me; he brought a small musical instrument and quietly played at the gravesite. The cemetery is well cared for, and they provide wooden chips to leave on the metal memorial plaques, suggesting that these will not scratch like stones. But I always find a small pebble to leave. My grandparents graves are even further away; the few times I have visited them has been on the occasion of another family burial. Now no one lives in the towns where they are buried and sadly, no one visits their graves.

June 12, 2008 4:39 PM