Monday, May 27, 2024
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Ad hoc photos on the shelf of my library need framing.
I remember the day our mother brought Louis home from the hospital. She had paused on the final landing to our sixth-floor apartment on Hun 19th and Second Avenue. I reached on tiptoes to see my new baby brother wrapped in a fluffy white bundle. As an infant, our mother rocked him to sleep in my Coach doll carriage.
Louis had the lower bed of our bunkbeds squeezed into the rooms we shared at various addresses. He had stitches in his head about five times. Our cousin Patty Girl threw a can at his head. Another time, he played catapult with his friends in the rubble of the demolished high school adjacent to our building. Still another again when he fell running down the marble steps going to meet our mother at the beauty parlor. He would fill in the other times. He would laugh and smile that smile that lit his eyes with delight. I wish he were here.
The first Christmas Eve after our parents separated, our mother spoiled him with two or three almost life-sized FAO Schwarz stuffed animals. He would set up hundreds of little green plastic soldiers, cowboys and Indians on the living room floor if one went missing, he knew which it was. He was furious when we raided his beagle bank. He and Ruth loved their three-legged Beagle, who had lost a leg in a trap. He loved their cats, Bear and Zinger.
My two brothers, Jim and Louis, were both my tormentors and protectors.
Jim babysat us, and I babysat Louis when I was old enough. We had a rough and tumble childhood with sometimes fierce battles. We were three passionate personalities growing up in railroad apartments in East Harlem. Our mother moved us first to the Grand Concourse and then to Walton Avenue near Yankee Stadium in the Bronx. After I married, she moved with Louis to Bergen, NJ, where fate brought him and Ruth together.
Jimmy Boy was our light. He loved his baby brother deeply. I love both my brothers endlessly.
We laughed when, around ten years old, Louis spoke about emptying the mind. He proved to be heads above his older siblings. He gained six black belts in Korean Tang Soo Do. He visited Korea several times for competitions in visits to his Master. I think he ate or witnessed the eating of live monkey brains.
I hope he comes back to haunt me for being unable to fulfill his dying wish. I can’t believe I will never see Louis again.
Louis walked his own unique path in life, becoming a martial art Master—searching for diamond mines in Brazil and living with his beloved soulmate Ruth far from the maddening crowd in Mountaindale. He was as courageous in illness as he was in life. He never complained, never felt victimized by fate. He was stoic.
Perhaps it does not seem strange Louis and I were closest after his diagnosis. I told him I never realized how much I loved him. How can it be a privilege to assist someone in their end-of-life process? It was. He refused to eat the hospital food, so I got whatever he wanted when he wanted to eat—brought him a strawberry smoothie and fresh carrot juice. I straightened his sheets—changed channels—put fresh water and ice in a paper cup with the green sponge swab he used to moisten his mouth. But I did not keep my promise. He wanted to die at home.
Life is lived in forward momentum. Death invites reflection. Master Lou is eternally my hero and guide. I grieve the material absence of my two brothers and our parents Death cruelly hacked from my being.
Jimmy, our mother and father, guide him in transition. Their energy had been close, visiting my dreams weeks before Louis’ diagnosis.
Louis wept in appreciation for the outflow of love he received from all his friends and family. He is indelibly cradled in our hearts.
Liberty, NY 845-292-7160
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