Mama passed away on a warm September morning. It was a few days before the Jewish High Holy Days.
She passed away quietly. We were all at her bedside.
That day was Labor Day and the cemetery was closed. They opened it for us and arranged the burial, as Mama would say, by God’s will.
It had been raining since morning. The weather cried along with us. Then the sky was revealed, and the sun shone over that green suburban place in Long Island, warming the soil that had been waiting for Mama for such a long time.
Chapter 20. “After I’m Gone…”
That’s what Mama used to say shortly before her death, telling us precisely and in detail about what would happen after she was gone, about forthcoming events, important and insignificant.
Before her body was cold, all that began to happen.
The week of remembrance begins right after the funeral. This week is called Shiva, which means “seven” in Hebrew. Children, brothers and sisters of the deceased spend it together according to the custom. They spend a week at home remembering and talking about the deceased.
That was what we dedicated our time to. Emma, as well as Avner and Marusya, Mother’s brother and sister, spent that week at our house. We were sitting on the rug-covered floor near the couch in the living room. That was also a part of the ritual – being comfortable was not allowed.
How strange it was to talk about our mama in the past tense, strange and difficult, unbelievably difficult. Yes, today she had been buried and she was no longer with us. I knew it, I remembered, but the feeling that she was still here didn’t want to deal with that. She was not there, but why did I hear her footsteps on the staircase coming down from her bedroom? The steps of the staircase creaked slightly, one after another… eight… nine… And exactly where it had always happened, a short pause. Mama had reached the middle of the staircase and stopped for a moment to take in the part of the living room she could see. One of her feet was in midair for she was about to continue descending the steps. When she saw all of us sitting on the floor, she shook her head in perplexity and lit us all up, the room and the whole world, with her unforgettable sunny smile.
I shook my head and the vision disappeared, but the pain that had settled in my chest remained. A minute passed, and Mama was there, sitting on her favorite corner of the couch, right near the spot on the couch on which I was leaning. I moved my elbow away and shook my head again.
"There is no doubt about it," Uncle Avner said, as if he felt the same thing I did. "There is no doubt about it. Mama’s spirit is hovering over us. It sees and hears everything. It protects us."
My sister nodded, her face mournful. Perhaps it was more difficult for her than it was for me. I had concealed the true state of things from her for so many years. I had been protecting her from grief, but now the grief befell her unprepared soul with such terrible force. I knew that Emma reproached me, that she was even angry, but I had done it out of love for her, out of love. After Mama passed away, we grew somewhat closer. We felt our blood relation even stronger. And now we wouldn’t want anything to harm our friendship… Hadn’t Mama meant it when she often repeated an Asian saying, “Blood relatives are drawn to blood relatives, just as strangers are drawn to each other.”
What a pity I hadn’t written down Mama’s sayings. They had always been wise and pointed. Many things I heard from her had been handed down from parents to children for centuries. She had such a clear mind. Now it was our turn to hand them down to our children. Would we be able to? I hadn't written down anything I had heard. I had always thought that I would have time to do it, always thought that parents would always be there for us…
Emma, dressed in black, sighed again. She sat, resting her cheek on her hand. She was tall and slender – any outfit was becoming on her.
"Mama gave it to me," she said, patting her blouse, after she caught my eye. "A year ago, she said, 'You’ll wear it for my funeral.' And I did. In general, do you notice that everything is happening the way she said it would?” Oh Mama, Mama, how did you know it all beforehand? You knew everything down to the last small detail.
I nodded. I could also tell her something. “When I’m gone,” she used to say, “they will all come to my funeral… you’ll see… to make up with you.”
“They all…” I saw them at the synagogue this morning just as Mama had said – aged, with gray hair. Never mind them. I didn’t want to think about them, to remember anything, to talk about anything… neither now nor during the funeral, as I was standing by the synagogue. It was solemn and quiet there. The white columns, the high ceiling, the resounding granite floors… A morning breeze, tender and warm, was flowing into the synagogue through the massive wide-open door. It was blowing on my head, playing with my hair… Was it just the wind? It was Mama’s day… Her spirit was soaring above us, and nothing bothered it now. All it had was love, love, love for us…
"The spirit of the deceased," I heard Uncle Avner’s voice. Our thoughts and feelings were interwoven in the most amazing way that day. "The spirit, though bodiless and invisible, is endowed with limitless power and of course it can read our thoughts… Who knows? It can even appear if we summon it. We sometimes feel it."
"Yes, yes," my sister nodded.
"Look here," the uncle said. "I remember how I buried my mother, your Grandma Abigai… The winter weather was very bitter as we were taking her body from Tashkent to Samarkand to bury her next to Grandpa. That’s how she wanted it. I don’t know how we managed to get over the mountain pass. It was awfully slippery. As we were approaching the city, I thought, how will we be able to bury her? The ground is too frozen to dig a grave.”
Uncle pressed his knees against his chest and cleared his throat.
"You may explain it as you like, but I say that the spirit of a deceased person is endowed with power. As we approached Samarkand, considerable warming began. Ice started melting on the road, turning into slush. We buried your Grandma Abigai that day. Her spirit must have heard about our worries and helped us," the agitated uncle said.
It’s possible to laugh at superstitions, to reject them as much as you want, to understand that they don’t stand up to the harsh criticism of reason, that they are nothing but soothing fairy tales we inherit from our childhood, but people need these fairy tales. They ennoble us. They help us live. And when we love our dear ones, they help us to feel their presence, not just in our memory but also in nature, in the universe, so let’s allow ourselves to be superstitious if that is healthy for our souls.
As for Emma, she supported Uncle ardently, having no doubts about the unlimited power of spirits. In Uncle Avner she found a person to talk to who shared her views. Emma had become engrossed in mystic literature. She endlessly read books about karma and fortunetelling, and she could talk about those subjects for hours. She and Mama used to discuss them very seriously. My attempts to interfere –to express doubts, for instance, or make a joke – were usually interrupted by an exclamation from Emma, “Get out of here, Valera, cut the crap! Don’t interfere in girls’ affairs!” and they would both break up laughing.
Yes, Mama also believed in spirits and life after death. But didn’t I long for that now too? Didn’t I feel her presence here among us with all my being?
As for Uncle Avner, he reasoned about Mama’s journey after death as about something well known and indisputable.
"Now, up there," he pointed at the sky, "Ester is on trial. It’s being decided where she will go – to heaven or to hell. And you, children, are a part of it. Your behavior in the first 30 days, how you observe the laws and rituals is taken into account most strictly."
Uncle didn’t say by whom exactly it was “taken into account,” but even so, it was clear – by Him, the Supreme Judge and Ruler of human fates.