An interesting documentary

In anticipation of spending three of the next five weeks with grandchildren, we went to see a movie yesterday. There is an old movie theater about 15 minutes from here that shows foreign and independent films, and we went up there to see “Amy,” a documentary film about the short and troubled life of the British jazz singer/songwriter, Amy Winehouse.

There was an impressive amount of film footage beginning in her teens, which is probably not so unusual for someone born in 1983. She had a magnificent voice and a rather soulful presence on stage. But at the bottom of it, she was a deeply troubled human being. To an outsider, it appeared she had everything going for her: a unique voice and real musical talent. But the perfectionism and the relentless publicity took their tolls, and over just a few years she deteriorated so completely that she was unable to complete scheduled performances. Was the alcohol overdose intentional? I suppose we will never really know.

There have been many tales of talented performers who suffered from severe psychiatric problems and/or addiction to drugs. Janis Joplin, Jimmy Hendrix, John Belushi, and more recently Robin Williams come to mind. It is sad to think that some or all of these may have been accidental, that they were using the drugs to dull the pain, not necessarily to end it entirely. The pressures of talent and fame are surely immense. So what separates those who survive from those who do not? James Taylor had some very rocky times in his earlier life but somehow pulled it together and now seems like one of the kindest, gentlest, and mellowest people you could ever want to know (or, it’s all an act, but I like thinking about it this way). Was that simply a matter of luck?

On a much lighter note, I came across this on Facebook this morning, and as a somewhat conflicted smartphone user, I just had to share it:

http://www.newslinq.com/smartphones-control-our-lives/#.VbjZ5oSe6Fk.email

We’re having a heat wave here in New York. Stay cool!

Love,

Rebecca

Keeping warm

In the early 1980s, Blu Greenberg, an American writer specializing in modern Judaism and women’s issues, published a book titled On Women and Judaism: A View from Tradition. This book became the basis of much of thinking around enhancing the role of women in the communal spheres that had been, and still are, largely dominated by men. Ms. Greenberg came to Dallas on a book tour, and I was thrilled to have the chance to go and listen to her speak.

Shortly before the talk began, I went to use the restroom. As I was washing my hands, I heard a small voice from one of the stalls saying “can you help me? The door seems to be stuck.” With both of us pushing, we managed to open the door, and much to my surprise I was standing face to face with Blu Greenberg. Never have I been nor ever am I likely to be given the opportunity to help someone I so admire! I have continued to hold that image with me over the years as I have had the honor of meeting and hearing her speak many times. Unfortunately, I also had the opportunity to visit her after the untimely and tragic death of her 36-year-old son in a bicycle accident in 2002.

On the Jewish calendar, today is Tisha b’Av, the 9^th day of the month of Av. Many calamitous events in Jewish history have occurred on this date, which is observed as a day of fasting and prayer. The book of Lamentations is read, along with Kinot (elegies). When we left the house to go to synagogue last evening, it was still quite warm out, and, not thinking about the possibility of too much air conditioning, I had not brought a sweater. After about a half hour I was simply frozen, and I left the sanctuary just to walk outside a bit. On my way, I saw Blu Greenberg, alone in the lobby. She asked if I was alright (a question that people often ask either because of the oxygen or because I am still a bit unsteady on my feet), and I said I was fine but frozen. Her problem was that she was wearing sandals and her feet were cold. She then said to me that there were a bunch of jackets and sweaters that had been left behind in the coat room, and despite my insistence that she needn’t worry about me, she she took it upon herself to look through the items hanging on the rack and found a sweater I could wear. I took the sweater and went back to the sanctuary for the remainder of the service.

No amount of reading lamentations can teach a lesson more eloquently than I learned from Blu last night. We have the power to make our lives better if we just stop and notice the people around us and reach out to help when help is needed. It seems such a simple lesson, something we certainly all have learned. But like so many good habits, we tend to become lax and stop noticing. Here is a person who is well known, creative, and surely has more important things to think about than my being cold. But there she was, continuing in every way to add not only a figurative but a very real touch of warmth to my life.

Love,

Rebecca

Week 1 of the 2015 Session of Camp NanaSabba

It has been another rather long break as life goes whizzing past. We had a very busy week, and the stars aligned so that no sooner was I was ready to write, our WiFi was down. Because we had plans all of last week, we had to live without it through the weekend. Much as I complain about our overreliance on connectivity, I certainly do not want to suggest that being entirely unconnected is the way to go. For me, having only that little iPhone as my sole source of connection is a very thin string indeed. But now we have a brand new modem that is much faster than what we had before, something we should have arranged a long time ago.

Despite that, we had a FABULOUS week with Joshua. We spent Shabbat in Sharon and took off with him first thing Sunday morning to catch the Mets at CitiField. It was a really good game, with quite a lot of excitement at the end: they went into a 10^th inning and the Mets won (finally, since we have so far only seen them lose). We went back to Riverdale after the game and picked up dinner at Carlos & Gabby’s, where Joshua ordered his favorite, the breaded chicken fingers.

On Monday the weather looked reasonable so we headed off to the Bronx Zoo. We took my scooter which made this nicer for me, and I think we may have even seen some things we had not seen before.

 I'm sure this Julia's parents think the world of her, but do her looks befit the name Julia? Really?

On Tuesday morning we headed over to The Intrepid, Joshua’s request after having visited last year. He and Barry took a tour through a submarine, not suitable for schlepping oxygen, so I worked on the NYT Crossword puzzle while waiting for them.

In the afternoon we went to see the new animated film, “Minions.” If my understanding is correct, this movie is a prequel to the two “Despicable Me” films. Although the review on Rotten Tomatoes was not terrific, we actually enjoyed it, and Joshua’s laughing out loud through much of it was contagious! Barry bar-b-qued dinner: hamburgers and veggie burgers with some salads he had picked up.

Wednesday was our day at the Museum of Natural History. We had taken the children there a few years ago and have gone a number of times ourselves. We ended up doing a lot of the scheduled presentations, including the planetarium. It is all but impossible to see the entire museum in a day but we enjoyed it. Joshua requested a return to Carlos and Gabby’s for dinner.

We got up first thing Thursday morning and headed off for the highlight of the 2015 session of Camp NanaSabba: Cooperstown, New York, home of the Baseball Hall of Fame. Barry had been there when he was about Joshua’s age although he remembered little of it and there have certainly been many updates and expansions since then, with fifty years and countless changes in the teams. We walked around all afternoon until even Joshua admitted he was getting tired, checked in at the hotel where Joshua swam for a bit, had some dinner and went to sleep early. Friday morning we packed up the car, headed back to the Hall of Fame and spent a few more hours in the museum and perusing the gift shops before leaving to return to New York.

  

Joshua is almost eleven years old now, with an impressive knowledge of baseball. He is energetic and funny and a complete joy to have around. He and I have a sort of game we play: with a completely straight face, he will tell me something that sounds outrageous and then wait for me to realize that he is (yet again) pulling my leg. I tend to be a very literal person so he can easily get away with this! What I find particularly endearing about this is that he understands me so well.

In a couple of weeks we will have his sister Ella, and then cousins Maya and Eliana. We have big plans for each of them.

Stay cool – it is hot out there!

Love,

Rebecca

Our trip to Canada, part 2

I left off after describing the magnificent fireworks display on Canada Day last Wednesday evening, going out with a bang, so to speak.

We never seem to be able to sleep very late, so we took off the next morning for the Jardin Botanique (Botanical Garden). Not only was it very large and very beautiful, it had a distinct advantage in our eyes of being almost entirely flat, making it much easier to get around. We certainly did not see everything but we spent a number of hours there on a beautiful day full of sunshine. 

Having made a decision to stay through the weekend, we stopped to pick up more food and check out the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal (International Jazz Festival). This annual festival is held at countless venues all over the downtown area, not far from where we were staying. This year over 3000 musicians from 30 countries performed more than 650 concerts, 450 of them free, over 9 days. The estimated attendance was 3.5 million people!

One highlight performer we saw was Adam Cohen, where the crowd was estimated at upwards of 100,000 people! Some of you may recognize the name of his father, Leonard Cohen, a native of Montréal who has been a poet, singer, and songwriter since the late 1960s. Some of his earlier compositions were popularized by other singers, for example “Suzanne” sung by Judy Collins, and his song “Hallelujah” performed by many artists over the years. Adam is much more the showman than his father, and the crowd clearly loves him.

Having gone to a number of crowded places and events over our week in Canada, we found the behavior of the crowds quite refreshing. If you ever wonder where all the politeness has gone, look north! There was surprisingly little garbage strewn around after that Adam Cohen performance, probably most of it left behind by patrons visiting from the country to the south, who seem to be accustomed to leaving garbage in public places. The other thing that was quite heartwarming was the number of times people offered assistance with the wheelchair or scooter. When we had difficulty on the cobblestones, numerous people asked if they could help. One evening, we had arrived at one of the outdoor performances a bit after it started, and sitting in my scooter I could not see a thing. A woman standing by us tried to offer us a path towards the front but we declined. A few minutes later another woman came up and simply said “this will not do” and took it upon herself to ask people to please move and let me through. Although a bit embarrassing, her act was amazingly heartwarming.

All good things must come to an end [Aside: the original line from Geoffrey Chaucer in the late 14^th century was “There is an end to everything, to good things as well.”] so on Sunday morning we headed back to New York on another gloriously sunny day. All I can say is that Barry has already checked out the dates for the 2016 festival!

Back to life in New York, next week is our first Summer Week with a Grandchild, and Joshua will be with us. We have some great plans for him.

Have a nice weekend.

Love,

Rebecca

A trip long in the making

The absence of posts during the past week is not because I had nothing to say, but because I had far too much to say. As I embark on this, I am not sure whether it will all be part of one post or two. I will see how it goes.

When Barry and I were married on the first of July in 1973, we talked about honeymooning à Québec (in Quebec City.) I had been an avid étudiante de la langue française (student of French) in junior high and high school, and Barry had studied la langue française for a couple of years. Québec is not terribly far from where we lived in upstate New York (Rochester), so seemed a reasonable drive. The trip was simpler then because passports only began to be required for travel between the US and Canada in 1999. We never had passports until our first trip to Israel in 1980.

In 1974 we got as far as identifying a hotel, Le Château Frontenac, long considered one of the finest in Montréal. But resources simply did not allow for the trip, and we ended up getting a ride to Toronto for a few days with some friends later that summer.  With somewhat greater flexibility at this point, the hotel selection was easy, only the name had changed: twenty years ago Le Château Frontenac became the Fairmont Le Château Frontenac. We booked a two-room suite, almost a necessity for us now because the oxygen concentrator is rather noisy, making it difficult to sleep (that does make a nice excuse, n’est pas?)

We had a little something to eat and collapsed from that long drive, most of it in pouring rain. The next day was still rather gray but at least the rain was more threat than reality. Québec is built on a large hill. There is a vertical train called the Funiculaire that goes up and down between the top, where the hotel is located, to the bottom, with many shops and restaurants along the road that snakes down the mountainside.

This turned out to be a bit trickier than we had imagined, because most of that road consists of large cobblestones that are quite old and not particularly level. We saw many young parents struggling with children in strollers, and it is all but impossible to push an adult in a wheelchair. The scooter did make it, although it was a challenge that it clearly did not like, occasionally just shutting itself down entirely (a bit scary since it is still quite new). By the afternoon we found the best ways to walk to stay away from the cobblestone streets as much as possible. It must be said, though, that without the need for wheels it really is quite lovely!

On Tuesday morning we headed off for one of the main attractions on the lower level of the city, the Musée de la Civilisation

 https://www.mcq.org/en. Here is an overview from the museum’s web page:

Musée de la civilisation is a government corporation. It was established on December 19, 1984 under the National Museums Act, which sets out the museum's major functions as follows:

·        to make known the history and the various cultural elements of our civilization, particularly the social and material aspects of the cultures of the occupants of the territory of Québec and the cultures that have contributed to the enrichment of those cultures;

·        to ensure the preservation and development of the ethnographic collection and other representative collections of our civilization;

·        to ensure the participation of Québec in the international network of museological events through acquisitions, exhibitions and other cultural activities.

A good deal of space is devoted to pictures and films. It would have been easy to spend an entire day here. They were screening a series of animated short films, and we watched quite a few. One in particular that we loved was called “The Danish Poet,” which won the 2007 Oscar award for Best Animated Short Film. It was only when we read about it later that we realized why the narrator’s voice was so familiar: it was narrated by the actress Liv Ullmann who starred in many of the Bergmann films to which Barry introduced me in the early 1970s.

We also watched a lengthier film about life in Québec, and agreed that it portrayed a more even-handed and honest view of the country – including not only assets but problems - than would normally be seen in a film at an American museum.

After the day at the museum, we took off for Montréal.

Wednesday, the 1^st of July, was Canada Day.

Canada Day (Fête du Canada) is the national day of Canada, a federal statutory holiday celebrating the anniversary of the July 1, 1867, enactment of the British North America Act, 1867 (today called the Constitution Act, 1867), which united three colonies into a single country called Canada within the British Empire. Originally called Dominion Day (Le Jour de la Confédération), the holiday was renamed in 1982, the year the Canada Act was passed. Canada Day observances take place throughout Canada as well as among Canadians internationally.

We started the day at the Musée des Beaux Arts (Museum of Fine Arts). A highlight now is an exhibit of Rodin sculptures called “Metamorphoses: In Rodan’s Studio,” including the two most well-known, The Thinker and The Kiss. We also explored the “Decorative Arts and Design Section,” and took a few pictures of some very interesting furniture, if anyone is looking for ideas.

In the evening, we had arranged to do something we did once in New York some years ago, going out on a tour boat to watch the fireworks. Fireworks seem to be enormously popular in Canada. Many years ago we saw part of an international fireworks competition in Vancouver, British Columbia. This year, one of the competitive events was on July 1^st in Montréal. It was quite a display! It seemed that the music was broadcast on a local radio station so that we were actually listening to the music to which the display was choreographed, so to speak. It must have gone on for over 30 minutes, and was simply spectacular. Some videos have been posted to youtube but they simply do not do it justice.

I have been at this almost the entire day, between uploading the pictures and selecting those to keep, writing this narrative, and figuring out how to get the accent marks in French. Well, I tried to do the latter but could not seem to get it to work, so resorted to cutting and pasting from web sites in French.

I will work on the remainder of our trip over the next couple of days, so stay tuned!

Meanwhile, enjoy the summer that has finally arrived!

Love,

Rebecca

A date full of memories

I sat down at the computer this morning prepared to talk about the concert last night. But allow me a brief detour. As I typed the date on the top of the page, a wave of memories came over me. It was on the 26^th of June in 1969 that we left our home in the suburbs of St. Louis to begin our move to West Hartford. Ten years later, on the 26^th of June in 1979, I entered Northshore Hospital in Manhasset, Long Island, where I would spend the next three weeks in the hopes of delaying as long as possible the need to deliver our second child, Dina, who was born on the 17^th of July at 36 weeks gestation. On the 26^th of June in 1989, one of my dearest friends, who had thought he was entering the hospital for some back surgery, was diagnosed with a tumor at the base of his brain; I am glad to say that he is still around and has been a great source of strength for me as I have gone through this odyssey.

Once challenging events happened on June 26^th for three consecutive decades, I was concerned that this might be a permanent event in my life.

According to Jewish law, once something is done three times it is considered a permanent thing. This is called a “chazakah.” Let’s say you decide to take on a new good resolution. If you do it once—beginner’s luck. Twice—still beginner’s luck. If you do it three times then we can trust you. So the number three represents permanence. That’s why we do things (e.g., many rituals) in threes, since it adds strength to our acts.

But I am hopeful that I am off the hook on this one. To the best of my memory, June 26^th of the next two decades (1999 and 2009) passed uneventfully. I will need to let you know in four years from now whether a new chazakah has replaced the old one.

So now, on to David Crosby. First, I spoke incorrectly yesterday – the liver transplant was 20 years ago, not 10. The only negative thing I can say about last night is that neither of us was familiar with most of the songs he sang. But the positive thing is that he looks and sounds pretty good at 73 after all those years of hard living. It was just David and his guitar the entire time so there was no need for earplugs. He’s still railing against “the establishment” but with more disillusion than anger.

[When I typed that last phrase, I wanted to make sure I had gotten it right. And low and behold when I googled it I came across this:

http://www.csny.com/press/crosby,-stills,-nash-and-young-still-railing-against-the-establishment.html ]

Bottom line:

  1. Did we enjoy the show? Yes

  2. Would we likely go see him again? No, probably not

  3. Other comments? YES – bring back Stephen Stills and Graham Nash! 

      No one can do harmonies like those three guys!

Here is the full set list:

Set 1:

Tracks in the Dust

The Lee Shore (Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young song)

Naked in the Rain (Crosby & Nash song)

Time I Have

For Free (Joni Mitchell cover)

Dream for Him (Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young song)

Triad (The Byrds song)

Carry Me (Crosby & Nash song)

Thousand Roads

Set 2:

Everybody's Been Burned (The Byrds song)

Rusty and Blue (CPR song)

What Are Their Names

In My Dreams (Crosby, Stills & Nash song)

What Makes it So

Somebody Home

Laughing

Déjà Vu (Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young song)

Guinnevere (Crosby, Stills & Nash song)

Encore:

Cowboy Movie

Have a great weekend!

Love,

Rebecca

Dog and pony show

I should have known better. You would think that after over 63 years of living with myself I would, for better or worse, have a keener ability to predict how I will react to things.

On Tuesday evening, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center put on a fantastic dog and pony show. I looked to Wikipedia to confirm my understanding of that expression before using it here:

"Dog and pony show" is a colloquial term which has come to mean a highly promoted, often over-staged performance, presentation, or event designed to sway or convince opinion for political, or less often, commercial ends. Typically, the term is used in a pejorative sense to connote disdain, jocular lack of appreciation, or distrust of the message being presented or the efforts undertaken to present it.

Yep, that explains it.

While we were waiting for the presentation to begin, a woman sitting next to me started up a conversation. The woman was morbidly obese, and she complained that she had a hard time finding a doctor who would treat her because of this. Then someone told her that at MSKCC they would be willing to take on the challenges of treating such a patient, and she is still here five years later.

To start the program, two former MSKCC patients, both relatively young, spoke of their experiences being diagnosed and treated for cancer. The first recalled being diagnosed at a local hospital, where the doctors provided her with rapid-fire information while all she could hear was “blah, blah, blah.” At MSKCC, the doctors took the time to explain everything to her. The second was a medical student at the time of his diagnosis and treatment, and is now planning to pursue post-graduate training in oncology.

The keynote speaker was neonatologist and cancer survivor Dr. Jennifer Arnold, co-star of “The Little Couple,” a television show which airs on TLC but we had never seen. She told a 30-minute version of the story of her life with the theme of “grace,” using each of the letters to represent something important she tries to include in the way she lives each day. Sorry, but despite the fact that we were given nifty little writing books, I did not write these down and cannot seem to remember any of them.

By now you are probably getting the feeling that I did not particularly enjoy tis event. Barry was not surprised; he was not sure why I wanted to go in the first place, and I can no longer articulate what I was expecting.

I am certainly not a dour person, and I do not think that I tend to focus too heavily on the darker side of things. But looking at cancer as a battle and celebrating the victors somehow suggests that those who were not in attendance at this event simply did not have the strength or the courage to fight the valiant fight. This is simply not true. It is very easy for the “survivors” and their caregivers to treat themselves to a round of applause, but how can we do this without forgetting all the patients and their devoted caregivers who are not in the room with us because they are too debilitated or no longer alive?

By definition those gathered on Tuesday were the ones who can wear rose-colored glasses. While I am grateful to be part of that group, I am ever mindful of how little any of my particular attributes had to do with it, and how quickly and easily it can all disappear.  

On a much lighter note, we are going out tonight to see David Crosby perform at a place called Town Hall. We have never seen him apart from Stephen Stills and Graham Nash. He underwent a liver transplant over ten years ago and it is wonderful that he came through that and is still able to perform. But we still have to think about all those folks who need transplants and cannot be moved to the top of the list in time to save them, or cannot afford to consider that option at all.

I will write about the concert!

  

Love,

Rebecca