Category: Memoir Publisher: Estelle B. Breines
ISBN-10: 1450264050
Pages: 120
Copyright: Feb 2, 2011
ISBN-13: 9781450264051
A memoir of the author's childhood and young adulthood in Brooklyn in the 1940's and 50's.
Excerpt
Dad and Grandma had a good relationship for the most part despite the fact that they were in-laws forced to live together. They good-naturedly teased one another all the time. On occasion they would begin to argue about some matter or other and soon one would challenge the other. "You wanna bet?!" It wasn't long before Dad would say, "But you haven't paid me the quarter you owe me from the last bet I won." to which she invariably responded in a snide tone, "What's the matter, I'm not good for it?" To my recollection, no bet was ever paid, but the debates and good humor ensued nonetheless.
Unfortunately, that is the only humor I can remember Grandma enjoying. She was a bitterly depressed woman, widowed after what appeared to have been an unhappy marriage to a cardiac invalid in a time of poverty, forced by circumstance to live with a duaghter who she did not like, totally dependent upon her for support and care. She spoke of death to me on a daily basis. "Only the good die young, and I'm not good enough." Grandma died in her mid 60s of uterine cancer and more directly pneumonia, which the doctors described to us as "a friend of the aged." She was much too young from my perspective, but not hers. Her funeral expenses were paid from the benefit that had accrued from the dime she paid to the insurance representative who arrived each week at our home to collect it, marking the book paid each time.
A passionate and poignant memoir written by a woman whose life has been guided by the words: "I am here to learn how to love well." The book is a deep examination of relationships, family, motivation, and honoring of the Self.
(Richard M. Feldman) Ever since I was a young boy, the only thing I wanted to be was a cowboy. I wanted to own and work on a real ranch, with cattle and horses. Especially horses.
While I never became a cowboy, considering everything I have done
