AGE IS JUST A NUMBER - PART IV

As I think of all Lois taught me in her eighties and into her ninetieth year, I ponder, what can I teach someone who is now age 50? With many common interests, if they realize that age is just a number and listen to what I say, I’m sure there is much to offer. If you’re still reading this "soliloquy," you’ll see how much I have to say solely from what I learned from Lois.

Funny, as a case in point, passing on the knowledge of obscurities and fascinating real-life tales came to reality when we celebrated last month at a family function on my father’s side. We were with cousins ranging in age from 43-50. I saw mouths drop at some of the stories I relayed from life experiences and learned that I educated my younger cousins about jargon from when I was in high school.

I can never top Lois with all she shared, and I wouldn’t want to steal any of her thunder. As she requested, I waited until she was gone to write about her life. It took me a year to mourn her loss enough to be able to draft her story.

Lois was over the top with her encouragement about my writing and told me in no uncertain terms to get my book published. At her insistence, she even prepaid for copies for her two eldest granddaughters.

In the end and at the end, Lois and I were family and could listen and learn and openly share the good and the bad. It didn’t matter that we were over twenty years apart in age. We proved that age is just a number.

Lois was interested and remarkably interesting to the end of her days. At times we laughed as schoolgirls with enough passion for popping a gut.

Sadly, she completely lost her will to live after her friend of 70 years, Florine “Flo” Talisman, whom she met on the train for homecoming from Ohio State and played bridge with until recent years, passed away months prior, on January 7, 2022. Flo’s babies were the babies in the crib with Lois’s youngins when their mothers played canasta.

A brilliant spark faded as Lois died peacefully in the hospice unit of the home for the aged. My feisty cousin succumbed to a blood clot in her leg where she had bypass surgery 12 years prior that they then said could last eight years. She lost her ability to speak on Thursday afternoon because her pain was so intense.

Remarkably, while she was non-religious, she died on the Sabbath, Saturday, February 12, 2022. Pain or no pain, if she could speak, she would have cracked a sarcastic comment and snickered about the day of her demise falling on the Jewish holy day.

As I struggled for the appropriate word to add to the previous sentence, before the word comment, it came to me that Lois would have been the one to ask. Her knack for words was commendable. The expressions that she freely used were well taken, such as “Life is Stranger than Fiction.” And her hearty laugh and zany sense of humor were cathartic.

With all the traveling she did, one place Lois said regrettably that she never visited was Portugal. I hope my dear cousin Lois who taught me so much, has a bird’s eye view of Portugal from heaven.

Rest in peace dear one. You are dearly missed.

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Dear Cousin Lois,

If you’re looking down, the news I have to share will make you beam. About our children alone, I want to tell you that Judd landed the legal position he wanted in your hometown, and he and Dena bought a house in your old neighborhood. Solly and Dizzy are thriving. I know how much you enjoyed having their pictures hanging in your room. Rina and Eric bought a townhouse in Tarzana and had a beautiful baby girl to fill it with joy. If you were here, we would talk about the baby’s name. You would either love her name or hate it. Either way, you surely would let me know. And Moss moved to Brooklyn and is dating a woman about who you would ask to learn more.

On a sad note, I just found out that Cousin Joyce’s daughter died, an untimely death, but her mother severed her ties with the family, and nobody knows what happened.

Thank you again for your honesty and openness. You taught me a great deal, especially that "age is just a number."

With eternal love,

Your BFF,

Sharon