Letter from Manny (Oma's Brother)

Losing Shirley was different than losing Rose [Oma's & Manny's mother]. Shirley used to joke about Rose every time we left Israel after our infrequent visits: "She'll bury both of us." Nevertheless, we could see the inevitable coming. Shirley, on the other hand, was always optimistic about her illnesses. "Oh, we have it under control. Feelin' great. No more treatment after next week. Etc." So her death was a surprise. She always was impulsive.

Growing up with Shirley was not easy. I was five years her senior so I was always being recruited by our parents to exert control over this unruly child. She was very independent. Peter and Rose worried about her constantly. And I was constantly telling them not to worry, she was an average kid growing up. There was no tension between Shirley and me - it was between me and our parents. They got very agitated when I refused to councel Shirley as a big brother should. I knew better than to waste my time and effort on a sister who had her own ideas. Rose and Peter had been spoiled by me. I was a goody-goody kind of guy when I was at home.

When we took up residence at the grocery store on Lapin Avenue in the late 1930s, Peter and Rose always called by her Yiddish name Shifra. Lapin was in an immigrant English-Irish neighborhood so Shifra became Skipper for some and Chips for others. I adopted Chips and that's the way I always addressed her.

When Israel was declared, much to Rose and Peter's great pleasure and pride (and surprise, I think) it was discovered that Chips was an ardent Zionist. And it was with mixed emotions that they greeted the announcement that she, her husband and her brood were emigrating. Peter and Rose were also very much involved in the new State - especially Peter - and now they had a wonderful excuse to visit.

I dimly remember the place in Jerusalem and the walks we used to take across the ravine to JU where Chips took classes. Then abruptly (characteristically) Ben was gone and Emil appeared. It was clear to everybody that Chips was very comfortable with Emil and the family quickly accepted the new arrangement.

After Peter died, Rose stuck it out in Toronto for a couple of years and then decided that she had had it with Canadian winters. Shirley was moving to Kvar Vradim and she added a room for Rose who moved in. From what we could make out from afar the arrangement worked smoothly in spite of some snarling on Rose's part in Emil's direction.

As you all know, as Rose grew older different living arrangement were made, and Chips handled it all with her usual aplomb and efficiency. She continued to go about her business, Rose's business, your business (she always kept an eye on all of you) as if
it was the easiest and most natural thing in the world. I think it was the three of you, the tight family, and constant communication, that kept it all together. It gave her strength and purpose. When Emil got sick we saw she had the right stuff. If there were any complaints we didn't hear them over here.

It takes and event like this to bring a life into focus. The picture that emerges is full of wonderful, gratifying detail and I have been examining them with memories I never knew I had. She was, to the very end, a "gitte neshima," as they say in Yiddish.