For the first time in my life, I didn’t attend services for the Jewish High Holidays. My knee took preference over my brain’s wishing to be there, but an amazing alternative arose.
The high holidays begin with Rosh Hashanah and leads over 10 days to the holiest day of the year, Yom Kippur. The holiday is a day of fasting and asking for forgiveness for our sins with fervent prayers and a service remembering the ones we lost.
Fortunately, I discovered a TV network, JBS (Jewish Broadcasting Service), remarkably bringing their cameras into The Hampton Synagogue and Central Synagogue in Manhattan for coverage of the High Holy Days services.
I sat with an ice pack on my knee enthralled with the beautiful music and the Hampton Synagogue’s extraordinary cantor Netanel Hershtik’s voice. He took my breath away, transporting me into the spiritual world of the Day of Atonement.
Central Synagogue’s rabbi led the Yizkor service in which we pay tribute and pray for those we lost. The word means “remember,” and prayers are meant to implore God to remember the souls of loved ones who have passed away.
It gave me time to reflect on my mom, my dad, my beloved daughter Lara and my beloved husbands. I will remember them forever. As long as I live, they will live, and then my children will have them live on in their hearts. That’s how life is eternal!
Sitting in my recliner recovering, I remembered my mom as my Girl Scout leader in her uniform. She was my role model for taking leadership positions, from the Girl Scouts to serving as PTA president at my schools, to taking charge of the family.
My extraordinary dad was in business, working six days a week — like God, he rested on Sunday. My mom catered to his every need and when she got very ill toward the end of her life, I saw my dad reverse roles; he took total care of my mom, catering to her every need.
My dad was a role model for me in business. He kept careful records of every day’s sales and, without saying a word, I learned by watching and listening.
I was blessed with parents who treated me like Queen Esther, the Jewish Queen we celebrate during Purim who, in ancient Persia, is credited with saving the Jews. She is a true Jewish heroine!
Whatever I achieved, my parents celebrated. I feel their presence everyday and the Yizkor service gave me time to reflect.
My daughter Lara was brain damaged at birth when she turned blue in the nursery and was developmentally always a 3-month-old, yet she taught me more than anyone else on earth and led me to be the person I am today.
I learned I had what it takes to fight for her and ultimately helped thousands of people with special needs. Her sweet face is in my mind’s eyes, always.
Then, I said a prayer and lit a Yizkor candle for my late husbands, who each lifted me with their wisdom and love. They helped me be who I am and I miss them dearly, too.
Yom Kippur ended by breaking the fast with a feast of bagels, lox and salads of every kind prepared by my daughter Samantha. But the best part of the meal was seeing my children Josh and Tracey and their beautiful children Hudson and Sloane delivering it to my door!
What a special day of contemplation and togetherness. It doesn’t get better than this — even if I was homebound.
Love to you, my dear readers.
Goodbye, Ethel Kennedy
While many of the young girls of my day shrieked and screamed for The Beatles, I was screeching at Robert Kennedy standing on a flatbed truck on Church Avenue in Brooklyn.
By his side until the day he died was his beloved wife, Ethel, the mother of his 11 children, her last born after her husband’s murder.
What courage she showed just a few years after JFK’s assassination rocked our country. She handled her life with dignity, was involved in human rights and raised the opportunities for minorities.
In our backyard, New York Senator Robert Kennedy sponsored legislation that helped create the Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation, one of the first projects in our nation having local government and business combine forces. I still remember his powerful words: “Neither by itself is enough, but in their combination lies our hope for the future.”
Ethel continued to support the corporation and lived to see its enormous impact in that community.
She also oversaw the creation of the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Center after his death. President Obama, whom she supported with many fundraisers, gave her the well deserved Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Ethel was the original “Power Woman,” a combination of mother and human rights advocate.
Her life made a difference. May she rest in peace.
