Mom

 So, Mom would have been 100 on the 15th of November. This was the last time I saw her in Connecticut when she was 97. I could not get back to you during COVID, so we left it at this. She no longer knew who I was, but I think she understood that I was someone close in her life. She was a caring mother who overcame her own challenges. She was perhaps the best 5th (and 6th) grade teacher that I ever observed. She had a scholarship to Cornell University after graduating high school a year early, but she could not afford the basics at that school and opted instead for Brooklyn College. She supported me in my sports and music and made sure that dyslexia would only make me stronger. She and I shared the horror of Dad dropping dead in front of us and my failed attempts to revive him and then weeks of grieving, with both of us having to get to our teaching jobs and perform in our schools only to come home to that sadness. She traveled, kept amazing journals, and understood that despite the fact she was not religious, her Judaism was a hallmark of who she was and would always be as it has been for me.