If you ever find yourself with a son named Lev, and that's really hard to do, be sure to never take him to a Jewish cemetery.
After many years of talking to my children about their grandmother (my mother) who passed away long before they were born, I finally got to take them to see her grave in the hopes of etching a more solid connection. I was in Massachusetts with the kids and found myself only a few miles from the cemetery where she is buried.
We were having lunch in a restaurant and as soon as I mentioned where we were going, Lev began collecting rocks in the parking lot because he is well aware of the Jewish tradition of leaving small stones on the top of headstones, representative of a prayer. So with pockets full of rocks we ventured over for an experience that I was curious to observe.
Once within the cemetery fences, Lev started running between the grave markers like Eli Wallach in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, stopping at every name that shared his. He found Levin, Levine, Levinson, Levenson, Levinsky, Levitz, Levitzky, Levinthal, Levy, and Levi. And let's just say there wasn't only one of each.
We finally stepped up to my mother's grave and all the kids carefully placed their stones on top and got to actually see her name in print on the granite face, which I think made it all the more tangible in their minds as opposed to me just repeating her name for them to learn it.
It was far from a sad visit, if not almost pleasurable, and Daniel summed it up best:
"I wish she were still alive, because then we would have two Nanas and they could both spoil us."
No comments:
Post a Comment