"MIracle of Miracles"

A beautiful holiday Monday, the city tranquil, the weather temperate; it's 7 p.m. and all's well.

Sunday was a productive day; I submitted two essays to different places for consideration and sent a query about another.  They were in my Documents files, things I'd written years ago and left to moulder. So, some editing and cutting and out they go.

The new tenant arrived, a very nice young man who'll be working at the symphony. So the house is full once more. And last night, three hours - three solid hours - of a remake of Little Women on PBS. It was too saccharine, and why, why, do they cast a beautiful actress as Jo and then have her sister say that Jo's only beauty is her hair? Do they think we don't have eyes? But still, I watched the whole thing, because - because it took me back to those heavenly hours sitting in my dad's big chair in the living room (that's in my living room today and not nearly as big somehow), reading and reading and weeping.

The actual copy, unfortunately without its bright yellow dustjacket.

Unlike it seems all other writer women of my age, I did not then identify with Jo. I was Beth, and not just because we share a name. I've never understood why until last night, because Beth is passive and shy and selflessly sweet, nothing like me. Last night I thought - I knew I wanted to write, but I wasn't remotely fiery and rebellious like Jo. I wanted to be loved. Beth was much, much loved. That's who I wanted to be.

It took a few years, but I got there. And I didn't have to die like she did, to boot.

Today's treat - meeting Ken to see Miracle of Miracles, a documentary about the making of Fiddler on the Roof. Sholem Aleichem, the writer of the stories on which the musical is based, was a contemporary and rival of my great-grandfather's, though it's not sure they ever met. It's my great sorrow that Jacob Gordin didn't write humorous warm tales about his people that would make such a great musical that it's still iconic more than 50 years after its opening.

The doc is fantastic, showing how such an unlikely piece came to be - a musical about shtetl Jews, oh sure, said one sceptical producer. What will you do for an audience when all the Hadassah ladies have seen it? They show some of the many productions from around the world, including Japan, Thailand, and one done by African-American teenagers. There's something universal in the story of poverty; the fight against and yet the need for the suffocating comfort of tradition; the disappointments and love of parents for their rebellious children; and finally, the victimization of helpless people. As Tevye and his neighbours are being exiled from their village, the film shows us heartbreaking footage of modern refugees from Syria, from Mexico and Central America. Ken cried.

And then dinner at the pub across the street, as usual. Ken has lost two dear friends recently and is, he says, sick of death. But we cheered each other up. I gave him a magnificent cucumber, one of three fresh picked today, that he found a way to transport home on his bike.

I feel I should be gearing up for work but have another almost two weeks to go, a great gift. Lots happening - tomorrow someone coming to begin transcribing my parents' letters and then 8 women in the publishing business are here for a potluck dinner; Wednesday the Cabbagetown Short Film Festival; Thursday the huge back-to-school gathering for the Continuing Studies profs at U of T, where I get to meet my colleagues amid food and drink; and then all weekend is the Cabbagetown Festival, where the 'hood goes nuts.

Summer's over. But still - good times.

cool, and "My Favourite Shapes"

It's nearly September. Though the weather is temperate and lovely, everything is shifting, cooling down, even me - for the first time in months, I had red wine, not rosé or white, with my dinner (tho' cucumber-based.) I'm now wearing a sweatshirt, this morning wore socks on my way to the market. The corner garden store has chrysanthemums. The garden is overgrown with stuff falling over and starting to fade, though still, I hasten to say, gorgeous and lush. But, except for the cucumbers, slowly dying.

Aren't we all?

I had work this week, had to put on respectable clothes and a bra to go to a meeting at U of T about a student's work on which I'd worked as an editor. It went well. There are already 13 in my course there, with a month to go, and 11 at Ryerson with just over a week. Funny, last term there were so few.

Last night I watched something really fun and interesting on HBO: My Favourite Shapes, by Julio Torres. It's quirky, unique, and hilarious, with a very clever young man actually showing us the shapes he loves, bringing them to life as they move around him on a conveyor belt - well, impossible to describe. I loved it.

Tomorrow, a new tenant moves in upstairs, so I've been cleaning and prepping; there's a vase of garden flowers up there, mixed with sprigs of lavender, mint, and oregano. Too much to do, as always, including the nonfiction conference, which needs us to come up with a suggested list of presenters to contact; figuring out new things to do with cucumbers; work on my parents' letters, which had me phone my shrink to ask for her help to process what I'm learning; and planning for next year, which includes the San Miguel Writers' Festival in February and some kind of event for my 70th birthday in August. Yes. 70. As I said to Lynn today on our Skype call from Provence to Toronto - once you turn 70, it's only 20 years to 90.

Ye gods.

However. We're here. Dark times on earth, but young Greta is there banging the drum in NYC. Could the situation in Britain and the U.S. get any worse? Yes, it seems, yes. But Ben starts school on Tuesday. He can't wait.

In only 20 years, he'll be a grown-up of 24. And, if I'm still around, I'll be 89.

Hope so.

trip to the country and "Nathan the Wise" at Stratford

Back from a jaunt to southern Ontario, to visit friends and see theatre. Anna and I rented a car and set off Monday - first to the dentist in Mississauga, where Eli had a tooth out and the dentist told him he was braver than most adults. And then on to the very small town of Ingersoll, to visit old friends Lani and Maurice. Maurice survived deadly throat cancer, with his taste buds and some of his jaw gone, but he has recovered magnificently and spends his days in one of his two crowded workshops, carving, inventing, fixing. Like Lani, he has one of the most interesting, quirky minds I've ever met; Eli and he got along wonderfully and soon were out skateboarding, with Lani muttering darkly, trying to get Mau to stop. He also showed Eli new techniques in frisbee throwing and how to make a piercing sound with the top of an acorn. Truly, a most useful, fun friend for a 7-year old boy. As we were pulling away, Eli said from the back seat, "I'll never forget that guy."

We arrived late in Stratford, to spend two nights with more old friends, Anna (known in our family, for obvious reasons, as Big Anna) and Tom - she a film producer and he a painter and sculptor, who moved 3 years ago from downtown Toronto to a fabulous house in Stratford with a big studio at the back for Tom. It's a brave pair that will invite not just a woman and her daughter (whom they've known since childhood) but her two extremely lively grandsons to stay. Luckily, though, they have grandchildren of their own and love kids. Still, my guess is that they were not sad to see the hurricane duo depart today.

The reason for the trip was that I bought a ticket to see Nathan the Wise at the Stratford Festival, and so thought we should make it a family road trip. My great-grandfather did an adaptation in Yiddish of this play written by Gotthold Lessing in 1779, set in Jerusalem during the Third Crusade, and so I thought I should see it. An amazingly topical play about intolerance among Christian and Muslim extremists toward each other and especially toward Jews, it could almost have been written yesterday. An excellent production, well-cast with one notable exception. The lead role of Nathan, a clever, humane Jew and father, was played by the actress Diane Flacks, I guess in a noble attempt to provide more lead roles for women, who knows. Instead, the stunt casting almost ruined the play, as instead of absorbing the play's ideas and ideals, we were distracted by the spectacle of a woman pretending to be a man. Sometimes cross-casting opens up a play and sometimes it defeats it. This was one of the latter times. We need a play like this, about a good, wise man defeating murderous intolerance. I kept trying to imagine what it would be like with a fine actor bringing those rich lines to life, not watching an actress, even a good one like Flacks, struggle to inhabit the part.

But I'm glad I saw it, and I'm glad we all went to the country together. Though yesterday, when it dawned pouring with rain, predicted to last all day, and us with the Wild Bunch - there was despair. How to pass the time and burn off steam in the rain? We went to the Stratford museum which has some interesting stuff including - scream! - the Justin Bieber collection. We went shopping at Giant Tiger, one of Anna's favourite stores, which killed an hour. Anna took them to a train museum in St. Mary's while I was at the play. And finally the sun emerged and the beasts were unleashed. Their energy is almost frightening, especially Ben's, as his is not just physical, it's verbal. He never stops talking at top volume. He's very interested in death these days, and the word 'hate,' testing the word constantly. As we were looking to buy a ball, he said, "I hate balls!" Or even, to me, "I hate you."

It takes some getting used to, but mostly, he is sunshine itself. When we got back, he exclaimed at the top of his lungs to his dad, "You should see their house, Dad. IT HAS STAIRS!"

 
Bieliebers, not so much. But Justin is a talented young man, no question. We saw video of him drumming and playing the guitar with skill at four.

Throwing stones into a body of water - what makes this such a compelling practice?

And now, back to reality. A few more weeks of summer. What day is this? I'm lost.

Saturday night, no fever

Suddenly it's cooler, though they say September will still be hot - needed a warmer comforter on the bed last night. Just had supper (cucumber based) on the deck, marvelling, once more, in the extraordinary quiet - no neighbours out jabbering for once, nothing except an occasional plane and lots of birds. I can't even hear traffic. The gardenia has produced a new bloom and the lavender abounds, wafting scent into the air; the Rose of Sharon is exploding with bloom and bees - well, you've heard it all before. Plus cucumbers.

Another of the blessings of my life, besides my own personal very small park, is having friends of many different ages. Last week, I had lunch with two dear friends and writing students, Ruth and Merrijoy, one 80 and the other nearly 91, both recently widowed. How lively and beautiful they both are, Merrijoy just back from a trip to Croatia, Ruth just back from an evening of experimental opera in the Globe and Mail building. Between them they know just about everybody who's anybody in this country. May we all age with such eager curiosity, dignity, wit, and sagesse.

So then I called my father's cousin Lola in New York, exactly the age he would have been if he hadn't died long ago - nearly 97. Though her body isn't doing what she wants, her mind is as sharp as ever and her sense of humour acute. I asked her about my parents; she knew my father as a small boy and connected with my parents and New York grandparents throughout their lives. What treasure. I took notes. But mostly, we gossiped about family and laughed a lot.

The good news is - my back is better. I think the pain came from the way I was sitting, endlessly; am trying to stand more and sit straighter, and it's helping. The bad news is - that my body is still disintegrating. I went for a jogette today and was appalled at how little I could do. I used to be able to go at least a few blocks before stopping for breath; today, half a block. Everything hurts. NEED TO UP MY GAME. Or I will not be marching about Croatia in a few years.

Still reading my parents' letters when I can get to them and have found someone who's coming to transcribe, which will speed up the process. Found a vicious letter from my American grandmother Nettie to my mother in 1951; Nettie came to visit us in Halifax while my father was in hospital recovering from polio and complains that my mother was not friendly and did not have on hand white bread and eggs, which apparently was all she could eat. My mother, of course, dealing with a desperately ill husband and an adorable one-year old - moi - who my grandmother describes as "a cute trick."

She writes about the day in New York, shortly after my birth, she "came to see to see the baby with your permission. I came laden like a truck horse with a completely cooked dinner. I stopped at Schraffts for cake for you etc. Your reception of us was something I've never seen in my life. No welcome, no pretense of friendliness ... I think you're very fortunate and very rich in having my Gordin for your husband. His warmth and good cheer is surely enough for you both!"

Can you imagine writing this to a daughter-in-law, on and on? It's 10 handwritten pages long!

"Oh, Nettie was prepared to be negative about your mother before they even met," Lola told me. "Can you imagine - her Gordie bringing home a great big shiksa?"

Treasure.

the Israel dilemma

The hurricanes continue. Yesterday my brother came for lunch with his nice new girlfriend and his 12-year old son, on their way back from a trip to Israel. He is exactly as Jewish as I am - not, since our mother was not, or 50%, if you go by my dad's Jewish blood. But he feels much more connected to that side and has always been an unquestioning anti-Palestinian supporter of Israel, which has led to many disagreements in the past.

He went to Israel to see the situation for himself, he said, and I urged him to keep an open mind and try to speak to or visit Palestinians as well as Jews. He said he would. Anna, preparing for our lunch, said she knows he likes to bait people, so "I will not be baited," she said. My leftie daughter of course has strong views on Israeli apartheid and a good friend who's Palestinian.

But she was baited. He launched into a diatribe about the wonders of beautiful Israel, "like a breath of fresh air" surrounded by murderous Arabs. "Your Islamophobia is showing; you should be ashamed," Anna said. And the shouting began. He yelled that she "should take care of your own backyard first, before criticizing Israel." What did that mean? That First Nations people are as badly treated as the Palestinians and she should focus on that situation rather than the Middle East. (Which in fact, if he'd cared to listen, she already does.)

I told her to ignore him, and his son urged his dad to settle down, but the fight escalated, got very loud, until I shouted at him, "How dare you speak to my daughter that way?"

Needless to say, it did not end well. Unfortunately, the French conversation group I was once part of broke up for the same reason - one of our members was blindly pro-Israel, the left-leaning side could no longer abide his views, which were pro-Trump also, and vice versa. We had to stop meeting because somehow we always landed there and the arguments grew personal and ferocious.

Happy families, indeed. It has always made me sad that he and I, sharing DNA and upbringing, are so far apart on so many things, this being only one. I celebrate that we managed to take care of my mother and my aunt for years without much disagreement. But perhaps there's not much keeping us together now.

Ironically, I'd just finished a marvellous book, The Spiral Staircase, by Karen Armstrong, about her journey from the convent, which she entered at 17 and left 7 or 8 years later, to becoming one of the world's major writers about religion, especially about Islam. The book ends with her talking about compassion - that every religion at its core is about compassion, and any adherents who twist their faith to divisiveness and violence are deeply flawed. All that matters is leaving the ego behind and feeling compassion for the other.

But then that's the polarized world we live in now - really a lot of people screaming at each other, in person or on the screen.

The treat of my work life, when I can get past family trauma to get there, is exploring the past lives of my mother and father through their letters to each other. What a gift to discover the lively engaging letter writers they both were, my dad especially writing with humour and warmth, at least, in these early ones. I am getting quite a different picture of their courtship and our early years as a family. Later we were not happy, but at the beginning, it seems, there was laughter and love.

Though not always. Here's a very short letter written by Sylvia in London to Gordin in New York, both aged 25 in October 1948. They'd arranged for her to sail over, to visit her sister Margaret who'd emigrated the year before with husband Stephen, and to visit her Yank. I sense my dad was getting nervous about the impending visit, perhaps prevaricating about the paperwork she needed for her passage, and so she sent him this:

London 19.10.48

Gordin

Wot the heck are you doing? If all the form-filling’s too much for that brain of yours, send it on to Margaret and Stephen – otherwise how the blazes do you think I’m going to get a passage before next summer while you go on like this? Or do you think I can anticipate with a thrill visiting some non-existent body who may not even be in the States for all I know?

            There’s not enough of my mind in this letter to warrant 20 cents postage, but there are times, Gordin Kaplan, when – to coin a New World phrase – you make me real mad – and this is very definitely one of them. Now for Pete’s sake pull a finger out and let’s have the score.

Sylvia.

You tell him, girl! He did what he had to do and she was there by Christmas; they lived separately, then together, and got married during a camping trip in August 1949. But luckily for me, Dad travelled, and then they separated in 1956, and so there were letters. I am uncovering fresh facts about my family's past as I read them, and I wish I could share what I'm learning with the person who shares my DNA. But I doubt I will. As important as compassion is, we appreciate very different things.