Now I See the Moon A Mother, A Son, A Miracle (NF8) by Elaine Hall

Author:Elaine Hall
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2010-06-16T21:00:00+00:00

I COME FROM a long line of women who did not give up, among them my aunt Pearl. She was born with a hole in her heart. Her hands always shook, yet throughout her life she knitted many beautiful items despite the tremors. They never got in the way of her doing things.

All the Goldenberg children were given middle names, except for Pearl. This was because, at her birth, the doctors told my grandparents that she was about to die. The birth certificate had to be filled out so quickly that they had no time to settle on a middle name.

Though Pearl survived, she wasn’t expected to live beyond her twelfth year. In school, she could only attend classes held on the first floor, since she needed to avoid even the slight exertion posed by a single flight of stairs.

In the Orthodox Jewish tradition in which she was raised, the sole reason to marry was to have children. Because of her condition, Aunt Pearl couldn’t have children, so instead she took care of my grandfather as he aged and was always regarded—though not by me—as a “spinster.” Aunt Pearl fascinated me. She smelled of rose toilet water, which stung my nose. Brown hairs grew out of the moles on her face. I liked to stare at them, wondering how they got there, and how long they would grow.

Every Sunday, when we visited my grandfather, my dad would arrive at their five-story brick house, toolbox in hand, prepared to fix whatever was broken: old plumbing, stopped-up garbage disposals, a light switch—my dad would repair them all. What he couldn’t repair was his sister’s loneliness.

Every Sunday, as we entered the house, Aunt Pearl would grab my father and hug him. Then she would cry, pounding on his back as if trying to beat out her own emotional pain, “Sollie, Sollie, Sollie. I can’t do this anymore! I am so alone.”

Every Sunday, my dad would hold her, calm her down, and then we would eat dinner. On the drive home across the Fourteenth Street Bridge, my dad would tell us stories about his three older sisters, Pearl, Shirley, and Bella.

“They spoiled him,” my mom would tease.

“Yes, they did.” He’d smile with sweet guilt. “My mother was busy sewing, so my sisters raised me and spoiled me. Pearlie is the smartest of all of us: a writing genius. She wrote for the local Jewish papers. And she worked for the government in the State Department. You have to be really bright to work there—especially if you are a woman, and a Jewish woman at that.”

Whenever we needed any information, we went to Aunt Pearl. She was the original Google.

My brother and I confided in Pearl about things that we would never talk about to our parents—especially if it concerned something we wanted. Aunt Pearl was logical. If she took our side, my parents couldn’t refuse. My brother, at age fourteen, wanted his own phone. My parents said no, so he went to Aunt Pearl.

After

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