Archive | December, 2020

Walking Through the COVID Pandemic

24 Dec

Walking as saved my sanity through the past nine ten months.  

I walked the Gezer Park trails with my real estate agent/friend.

I have been walking several times a week for over 20 years. When it has been nice, I walked outside with one of two friends.  When it was cold, my main walking buddy and I walked inside at our gym.   She and I have been walking for the past 20 years.

When the virus shut everything down, walking became my lifeline.  We were told going outside to walk was important.  And we were told as long as we stayed six feet apart, outside was okay.  With that advice, my walking dates increased.  Instead of walking three or four days a week, I upped it to six or seven days a week sharing these walks with two different friends. 

Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday with my neighbor: Wednesday, Friday and Sunday with my walking buddy and when in town, another friend would join us.   On these outside walks, we visited and talked.  We shared our feelings about what was going on in the world. We discussed our families and what we were going through.  We spoke about how important it was having each other to walk with during this time.

Occasionally I walked with other friends. My real estate agent/ friend and I walked Gezer Park once and around my new neighborhood another time. I loved walking at Gezer Park because my daughter and son in law got married there! A close friend and I eat outside on some Thursdays and then go for a walk when we can. There are other friends who have graced me with a walk as well! Thank you to all my walking buddies! Being with you outside has been wonderful!

My husband and I often take walks on the weekends. These are additions to my walks with my friends.

My main walking buddy and I have done charity 5 Ks together.  How would we do it this year. Well we figured it out and we did. We signed up for the “Run For Ruth We Dissent” virtual walk. We donated to one of the charities listed and then walked together the 3.2 miles needed.  Our other buddy could not sign up because the registration closed, but she walked with us.

The start of our walk in my old neighborhood.

Since I moved during the pandemic, my old neighbor and I have been alternating walking sites. One day in my old neighborhood trails, the next time at the new house. We realized that the tail system by my old house hooked up with the trails by my new house in a three-mile trek. We walked it! My husband dropped me off at her house, and we walked back to my house. Then I drove her home.

On our 3-mile walk through the Tomahawk Trails.

I used to make 10,000 steps about three or four days a week.  Now I have hit that goal almost every day.  I just ended a 56-day string of 10,000 or step days.  I finally took a day off hitting just 6700 steps.  I am back at six consecutive days of walking over 10,000 steps.  Before COVID, I averaged walking 22 – 26 miles per week. When I went over 26, I was ecstatic.  Now I average 29 – 38 miles per week!  A major increase.

Walking has become the silver lining of my pandemic experience. 

Now the weather is getting colder.  We have had several very warm days, even taking advantage of one and going to our local arboretum. Walking in the afternoons has taken over our morning walks. Too cold at 8 am, so we walk at 2 pm.  But some days we just cannot walk outside.  Because of the risks of indoor exercise at our gym, we have decided not to walk there.

Monet Gardens, Overland Park Arboretum

In the pre-pandemic days, I would have just taken these days off.  But now, I get on my treadmill and walk the 2 to 2.5 miles I would have walked with my friends. Some days, I walk slowly, 3.5 miles per hour while I watch my favorite HGTV shows.  Other days, I hustle and try to up my speed and incline to get my cardiac workout. 

Instead of seeing walking as a chore and thinking I could be using my time more wisely.  I now know that walking is what has saved my sanity, my health and my feelings of isolation, as I have walked by way through the pandemic.

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Kindness Will Heal the World

21 Dec

In April, after I had moved into my new home, I needed something to do other than unpack and feel panicked about the pandemic. I decided to take online classes, I chose the website Coursera. I started with the most popular course of all, Dr. Laurie Santos’ the “Pyschology of Wellbeing.” Dr. Santos teaches at Harvard University.

It was fantastic.  Her theories and work in positive psychology just touched my soul.  Because of the class, I started keeping in a nightly journal where I recorded each night one thing I savored, one good deed I did and three things that I was grateful for that day.  Her class focusing on learning to appreciate what we have and the importance of friends, family and memories only emphasized something I already knew and what she taught:  travel and seeing the world, making good memories,  was much more important than buying things.

But the most important point was the emphasis of kindness.  I always believed in doing a good deed every day, but according to the class the research has shown, that people who do good things for other people feel much better than those who do not. And they feel better for a longer time than just getting a good job and a pay raise.  Doing good, being kind, is the most important for happiness.

I started listening to her podcast, the Happiness Lab.  I also joined the Facebook page devoted to Dr. Santos’ lessons, The Happiness Lab Classroom.  In this time of stress and uncertainty and physical distancing, it helps to focus on the good.

I followed up that class with one called “Resilience Skills in a Time of Uncertainty.”  This course also focused on the theories of positive psychology. The instructor this time was Dr. Karen Reivich, who is the Director of Resilience Training at University of Pennsylvania.   Her lessons built on what I learned in Dr. Santos’ course.  Some of it was rehashing the same information.  But it reinforced and emphasized how to help yourself feel better.  For me,  what I learned, is that you do that by doing good.

After taking this class, I changed my journal entries.  I now write five things I am grateful for each evening.   What has this done for me?  Instead of going to bed worried about the world, the pandemic, the election, the craziness going on, I think about what I am thankful for and the good that I see.  It really makes all the difference.

What else has it done for me?  I was always a charitable person, but my husband and I have upped our donations especially to food pantries and organizations that do direct aid.  I have written letters to and called people who I think need a boost.   I have tried to let my friends know how much I appreciate them. I am focusing on doing at least two good deeds of kindness each day.  Kindness with conviction.  I would rather focus on that then being upset or annoyed.

I am also trying to watch more uplifting programs.  Forget all the gloom and doom movies and documentaries.   This led me to watch the most magnificent documentary about doing good I have ever seen.   I suggest everyone watch The Antidote.  I cried tears of joy throughout the movie as it tells the stories of nine people and organizations that help others in the most sensible and good ways. 

Every one of these programs should be followed throughout the country.  There were three that truly touched my heart. At Bridge Meadows in Portland, Oregon, foster care children and their ‘adoptive’ families live in a community with seniors.  Watching them interact brought joy and tears to my heart and eyes.

In Sullivan County, New York, the Center for Discovery, was amazing.  Since I spent every summer for over 25 years in Sullivan County, I was stunned to find out about this wonderful educational program and home for children and adults with complex disabilities.  And wonder of wonder, a friend of mine’s uncle spent most of his life here.  I am so impressed.

A nurse and doctor in Boston treat the homeless.  The doctor goes out into the streets to find people and care for them.  The nurse encourages into her clinic, where they soak the feet of the homeless who learn to trust them to get the care they need.  Wow.  Just watch.

The other six programs were wonderful as well.  Watch this movie.  Currently it is on Amazon Prime. If you want to bring some joy into your life and learn about more ways to help others.  Watch it.

Kindness is what will heal our world. Listening to others.  Being a friend. Appreciating what we can and helping others, in my mind, can make such a difference to the divide that is now hurting our country.  

Every human being deserves to live a life to the fullest of their abilities.  This documentary shows us how.

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A Pay Phone, Then a Party Line: Using the Phone in The Catskills

17 Dec

Recently I wrote a blog about doing the laundry in the Catskills. (See blog below.) Several of my friends who spent their summers with me in Kauneonga Lake, and my brother, felt I left out one important aspect of the laundry shed: the pay telephone.

In our small colony, owned by my maternal grandparents, the pay phone was also located in the laundry shed. The only way of communication for almost all the residents of the colony to the outside world.  If they needed to call their husbands, doctors, restaurants, anything, this was the only place to make a call or to get a call. Our colony was small, so when someone did get a call, the person standing closest to the phone would answer it and send a child to go get the call recipient!  Of course all the children loved to answer the phone. At larger colonies there was an loudspeaker system to call people to the phones. (See blog below.)

I think, but since I was a child, I am not sure, that the Moms had set times and days when they spoke to their husbands during the week. 

The phone my friend has from the bungalow colony.

The telephone has long disappeared.  However, when reading my blog, one of my friends told me that she had the phone, and sent a picture.  I do not know how she got the wall phone she had.  But though I thought the number was correct, the phone was wrong.  There was no place for the money.  And our pay phone definitely was a commercial one with coin slots.

Now I did say that the pay phone was the only way to communicate. But that is not totally true. My grandparents had their own separate line because they owned the colony and would need to call local people like the plumber or electrician. So if my Dad wanted to call my Mom, they had this private line to speak. Also if there was a true emergency, my grandparents would call for help.  You did not need to use the pay phone.  Hmmmmm. I wonder if the phone my friend has is the one from my grandparent’s bungalow?  Could be.

In 1963 our phone life and summer life changed. My grandparents purchased a winter/all year house about 1/3 mile up Lake Shore Road from the bungalows.  Behind the house was a bungalow that became our summer home.  This was both fun and sad.  We had a bigger bungalow, we had our grandparents, and my parents had some peace and quiet, but we were no longer at the colony at night for fun activities or on rainy days with the other children.  However, there was an apartment at the house, where one of my friends stayed.  (See blog below.). But we were no longer part of the rhythm of the colony on a daily basis. 

Communications changed as well.  People started getting phone lines. They were not completely private. People would get Party Lines.  That is what we had at the bungalow up the hill. My grandparents and my parents shared a party line.  We were so excited to have our own phone.  But it had its now side as well.

The phone lines had slightly different rings, so you knew when you were being called. And we had a special way to call down to my grandparents so they knew we wanted to speak to them.  If you picked up the line when the other people were using it, you would hear them speaking.  In fact, if you were quiet then you could listen to the entire conversation.

That was a bit crazy, cause my grandmother sometimes would listen in!!! My MOM would get furious.  And they would have a big argument!

Here is my brother’s memory:

“Yes. She (Grandma)never said anything just listened. She was really good at it,
and I think many times we did not even know she was listening. Mom
would know when Grandma knew things that she had not been told! It was
one of the things that I remember Mom arguing with Grandma about!”

Since my grandparents lived in the Catskills throughout the year after 1969 when my Grandfather retired, their phone line would be on all year long, while our phone line would be turned off after Labor Day.

But eventually, everyone got their own private phone lines.  It was amazing.  I could call my aunt at the bungalows and find out what was going on with my cousins.  Were they going to the movies? What were the plans for the rainy day or the evening? That was what we were missing when we first moved to the bungalow by the house.  

When we were teenagers, those phones were even more important for when we made plans with our friends and cousins.

The days of the payphone and party lines ended in our colony, but the memory of the times when two people needed to make a call.  Or watching when a teenager was on the phone trying to find a private spot….there was an extremely long cord. Or wondering if my Grandma was listening on the line….I have to admit, every once in a while I listened in on my Grandma’s call. Mainly because I needed to make a call and she was already on the line.

The Summer the Laundry Never Dried

Sometimes Rainy Days Were the Best Days In the Catskills

Loudspeakers Often Interrupted Life And the Quiet of the Catskills

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The Summer the Laundry Never Dried

12 Dec

The rain started slowly this time.  Giving my Mom enough time to call for us.  But she really did not have to, all the children in our little colony were running to the same place: the clothes lines.  It had rained for weeks.  Finally, there had been a break in the weather. For days, everyone lined up at the two washing machines to get their clothes and linens done. People were running out of clothes to wear.  Everything was a muddy mess.  No one could afford for the newly cleaned clothes to get wet.

We all hustled and ran for the clothes.  Each group of children around their Moms pulling the clothes off.  The littlest ones were grabbing the clothespins and putting them into the cloth bags.  We were successful.  None of our clothes got really wet.  While Mom went back to our bungalow to hang our clothes up on the porch, I remember helping my Grandma take off some of her clothes off the lines.

At least we did not have to go to a laundromat to clean our clothes! This was important as most of the moms up for the summer did not have car with them in the 1960s.  Having to go to the laundromat was a major ordeal especially with all the little children. I guess sometimes someone did go. There was always one husband/father up there for the week who could run this errand as needed.

For us there was a little shed that held two washing machines.  Our moms would put their laundry basket in a line so everyone knew who went next.  They left their laundry soap and change in the basket as well. The person before them would empty out their laundry from the machine and put the next wash in.  I think it cost 50 cents to do a laundry.  Then they would tell the next person that their wash was up, so they knew when to go get it and start the next load.  How they knew, I don’t know.  Perhaps everyone had different colored baskets or different laundry soap, but they knew.  It is a mystery to me.

Laundry days were usually Wednesday and Thursday. Everyone wanted the laundry done before the weekend when the Dads would be up. But during this time of endless rain, occasionally the Dads would have to take the laundry to the laundry mat. I got to go with my Dad once. It was quite the adventure. Long lines, as everyone needed clean and dry clothes. I remember where the laundromat was, just outside of Kauneonga Lake on the road to White Lake and to ice cream, Candy Cone. Of course, I remember, because once our washes were in the machines, Dad and I went for ice cream while we waiting to go put them into the dryer. Then we stayed close to the laundromat, to get our clothes as soon as they were done.

So many laundry memories came rushing back to me due to a painting. A distant cousin of mine, {her grandmother and my maternal grandmother were first cousins. (See blog below.)} did a series of paintings that she then gave to people who made a donation to her chosen charity, an animal shelter. One painting touched my heart. I made my donation.

In my mind this painting was like a calm and practical Chagall painting, but instead of animals or couples flying above a town, it was a zaftig woman walking across the laundry lines with a laundry basket on her head. The colors, the story of the painting, the atmosphere just yelled Catskills in my mind. Laundry Day! Joy! I had to have it.

When it arrived, the memories started crowding into my mind of the year when the laundry never dried.  How when the sun finally came out and stayed out, all the Moms and grandmas were so filled with joy that they could get their clothes clean. How they rushed to do laundry.  I think they agreed that everyone could do one laundry and then go through again.  Everyone had to get at least some laundry done before it rained again.

 I think they felt like the woman in the painting, just tripping above the clotheslines in happiness.  Finally, finally we all had clean and dry clothes!

Of course, I had to hang the painting in my laundry room. Every time I look at it, I remember how lucky I am to have a washer and dryer of my own. That I do not need to hang my clothes outside to dry depending on the weather. That the joy of laundry should be with me all the time!

Finding Katie!

Oh How I Dream About Ice Cream in the Catskills… In the Summer

T

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A Ketubah Mystery

7 Dec

My maternal grandparent’s ketubah has presented a mystery!

I know for a fact that my great grandfather’s name was Gimple.  That name is what was used in the Yad V’shem testimony that describes his death in the Shoah.  That is the name my grandfather always used when discussing his father.  That is the Hebrew name that was given to my cousin when he was born in 1949 in memory of him.

So why does it say my grandfather’s Hebrew name is Nisan ben Mordechai haCohen, Nisan the son of Mordechai the Cohan?

I was stunned.  I immediately put the Ketubah up on Tracing the Tribe Facebook page for help.  And yes, the name is Mordechai.  Was my grandfather hiding something from us all these years?  I don’t think so. His parents were his parents. But this seemed odd!

Then I thought could this possible be one of the many paired names, but one I had not heard of before?  For example, my paternal grandfather’s Hebrew name was Hirsch Zvi. This is a common paired name as one is Yiddish and other Hebrew for deer. But I had never heard that Gimple was a pairing for Mordechai. 

Thanks to the Tracing the Tribe group, I have since learned that it is. But a bit different.  It does not mean the same thing, but rather they were paired together. It seems Gimple started first as a surname and then eventually became a first name.  I started searching.  And I found response to someone else asking the same question.  It seems in Poland, where my grandfather was from (when it was Poland, sometimes it was Austria), there was a double name for Mordechai Gumpel, Mordechai Gumplein, Mordechai Gumplin and Mordechai Gumprecht, accorded to a Professor G. L. Esterson in Israel.  He supposes that since Gimple is so close to Gumple, that Gimple is also a double name with Mordechai!!!

Then another member of Tracing the Tribe sent me the link below to the Jewish People’s Museum in Israel.  It had an entire page dedicated to the name Gimple and its relationship to Mordechai! The names were paired together, as stated by above by Esterson! Confirmation!

To be honest, this makes so much sense, in my family because my great grandfather was the only man I have found named Gimple.  However, there are many men named Mordechai over the generations before the Shoah.  I wonder if his mother was trying to help end confusion by calling him Gimple, but giving him the Hebrew name Mordechai?  I will never know!

However, I now have to come to my son’s generation.  My son is named for my grandfather, Nisan.   He is also named for my husband’s uncle, Mordechai.   Thus, by happenstance, my son is also named for two generations at the same time, both his great and great, great grandfathers!  Is that not a weird coincidence!!

Sometimes looking back at old documents can improve our knowledge of our family.  I knew I had the ketubah. I had looked at it before. But because it was in such a bad shape, I just kept it put away and did not really examine it.  Today I decided to take a photo to keep its information safe as it continues to deteriorate.  Then I enlarged it on my phone, and there was the information that I had not noticed! 

Another Mystery solved thanks to Tracing the Tribe.

(In an addendum, I asked for help from Tracing the Tribe in deciphering the names of the witnesses, even though I knew they were not relatives. So just so my family knows. Their names were Benjamin son of either Yehoshua or Yehuda, the Levi. And Shlomo the son of Mendel.)

https://dbs.anumuseum.org.il/skn/en/c6/e241754/Family_Name/GOMPERTZ?fbclid=IwAR2UmU_uU4aKv-jbqxoVD6K16LRsd-dnbTHfZlkn4CegeS5xCbv8LPt5iDE

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