January 22, 2017
Dear Mom,
It has been eight
months and 15 days since I last wrote an essay to post to my blog. The last thing I did write that was not
work-related was your eulogy. But that was not really me writing it….it was a
grief-stricken, defeated, motherless woman.
And then my writing
stopped. Maybe it was the proverbial “writer’s
block”, call it what you will, but the writer in me seemed to die along with
you. I would think about how my writing
process would be to write my blog and then you would be the first one I would
read it to. Even the last blog, I posted
eight months and 15 days ago, I read to you, before they took you to the
emergency room and then off to hospice.
It was Mother’s Day, the last one we would ever spend together in this
physical world. After that, every time that
I would think about putting words to “paper” (I’m always “writing” in my head)
I would remember you would not be there to read it to.
But today is
different. I am unblocking my writer
self– the person I truly am because I just experienced the most meaningful,
life-changing event and I wanted to share it with you, so I decided to write
you a letter. In many ways you were
right there with me at this event, probably because I was with your family- the Waltzers- your nieces, Andrea,
Garie, Janie and your great-nieces Sarah, Eva and Layla. Kim was there with me too.
We marched together
in the Women’s March on Washington, to protest the new President, Donald J.
Trump a day after his inauguration. It
was a mini-Waltzer reunion- where my cousins and I marched together with our
daughters to protest this new administration and the many things it stands
against, many things that you have taught me to stand for.
Remember, mom, that
day 9 months ago when I took you to vote in the primary, and you voted for
Hillary Clinton? You were so happy. You kept thanking me for taking you to
vote. We took a selfie together right
outside and posted it on Facebook. It
was the last picture we took together before you had the stroke that changed my
life forever, the very next day.
It wasn’t only your
stroke that changed my life, other things have happened, besides your death. Lindsay and Scott have moved with the kids to
North Carolina. Kim has moved out of the house and is living in Queens and now Mark
and I just bought a new house in North Carolina and will be moving in the
summer. But the most surprising thing
that happened was one you would never
have expected, that you dreaded even…. Donald J. Trump actually won the
election and is now POTUS. Remember how
Martin would tease you in the hospital and say that you voted for Donald Trump
in the primary and you would shake your head and make a face? That’s how I knew you were still “with us”. The only thing was you couldn’t really talk
and get the words out you wanted to say because of the damage from the
stroke.
I haven’t written
in months. Maybe, just like the stroke
stopped you from talking, your death stopped me from writing. And this is hard for me because you’re not
here. But yesterday changed all
that.
You have always
taught me to stand up for what I believed in.
You have shared with me such wonderful stories, the legacy of your Waltzer
family, a family that began with two immigrants, Morris, then Fanny, coming to
America to make a better life for themselves.
Thankfully, they did, because otherwise, they most likely would’ve been the
victims of Hitler’s regime. I think of
my own children moving away from me– just to Queens or North Carolina and that
being a change, but your parents moved to another land, without anything! Grandma never even saw her mother again and
she was in her early twenties. This
country gave your parents- my grandparents- the liberties and the life that
sometimes I take for granted. But after
yesterday, I never will.
I frequently look
through the old pictures you left behind.
I realize now they are not just photographs but they tell an important
story of the life I am privileged to have.
All those pictures of dad as a soldier when he fought in WWII should serve
as a reminder of the time when the world threatened to take away the free will
and human rights of others. I must never
presume that these rights come without working for it and protecting it.
I remember how you
told me the story of Grandpa when Jackie Robinson moved around the corner from
him and a neighbor knocked on his door with a petition for grandpa to sign to
get Jackie Robinson to move out of the neighborhood because he was Black. And Grandpa refused to sign that petition and
said, “He can live wherever he wants to live. It’s a free country,” and then
shut the door in the neighbor’s face. Grandpa
never forgot or took for granted that he was an immigrant and what it means to
have your rights taken away from you.
There’s also a picture
of Dad, taken at the iconic Civil Rights March on Washington, in August of 1963.
He is standing on the mall, with the Washington Monument behind him. And
yesterday, I was there at the very same place, again, where Dad stood. Again, I stood and marched for human rights,
over half a century later- civil rights, religious rights, women’s rights, LGBT
rights. Another woman at the march held
up a sign that said, “I CAN’T BELIEVE I STILL HAVE TO PROTEST THIS SHIT 1-21-17”.
I can’t believe it either, but we cannot
be silent.
So, we marched,
four of the Waltzer women with their daughters and even their granddaughters,
daughters-in-laws and grandsons marched in the other Women’s Marches in New
York and Chicago. You and your iconic wedding
picture with all the Waltzers were even in that march, thanks to the signs Sarah
made: “TWAT”- The Waltzers Against Trump. And the Waltzers who couldn’t be in the march
were there in spirit. We made history, mom, (or herstory)! Women’s marches
were all over the world.
You would be SO
proud, Mom. We stood up for what we
believe in, for what our family believes in. And it’s because of you and
because of those stories you shared countless times. Those stories are my legacy mom and thank you
for sharing them! Because now I know
what those stories mean and why I marched.
I love you, Mom. I cannot put my arms around you and tell you
that or hold your hand and feel you squeezing back like only a mother can do. But I can use that love to give me strength
to carry on everything you taught me that is important.
That picture of us
after we voted in the primary together- the last thing we did together serves
as a reminder of my civic duty and as a citizen of this world. I thought it was something we would look at
together while we watched the inauguration of Hillary Clinton or we would even
take another picture when you would get to vote for Hillary in the actual
election. Unfortunately, that never came
to be, but such is life, it is full of things we don’t plan. Thanks to my friend, Maritza, the picture now
sits in a frame with a quote engraved from Abraham Lincoln, All that I am or hope to be, I owe to my
Angel Mother. She gave it me when
she came to pay a shiva call. Yesterday,
you, my Angel Mother were with me. I
know that, for sure.
Always in my heart,
Jeannie
