Aunt Miriam

As we were having coffee in the sunshine, I asked Margie to tell me about her mother’s family.

“Let me see what I can remember. Was my mother Austrian or Polish? Maybe Russian? No, that was my father. But anyway my mother and all her siblings made it to America before everything went to hell in Europe. There was Ben, her eldest brother, who was a success at making money but never shared any of it with the rest of us. Then there were the two brothers who got into gambling. That was unfortunate. But my Aunt Miriam, she was the youngest: I thought she was beautiful, and I loved her. She was easy-going, kind, had a sense of humor. My mother was so harsh. She was like a machine, Rrrrrrrr! She would attack, like, what do you call it when they tear buildings down?”

Demolition?

“Yeah, she was a big demolition machine, my mother. ‘Who do you think you are?’ she would ask me if I had some small dream for myself. But her little sister, Miriam, she was always trying to build people up. Give them confidence. I saw how she operated. I used to tell myself, ‘Be like Miriam.’ I was glad there was somebody in my mother’s family I could want to be like. Why am I talking about this?”

I asked because I always love hearing about your youth. Did your Aunt Miriam live near you?

“She lived in the Bronx, but in the upscale part of the Bronx. I guess we were in the down-scale part (Laughing).”