an old writer and his words

  • GRANDMOTHER’S RULES

    My grandmother covered allher upholstered furniture in plasticthat stuck to your bare skin in summerand was always cold in winter.She said she did not wantto get the fabric stained, thatpeople could be easily cleanedjust like plastic slipcovers.I asked her why she did notcover the rug, an off-white plush,in plastic and she chuckled,“because, grandson, crumbsneed a…

    Lou Faber

  • APP-LICATION DENIED

    I can still recall my grandmother saying,whenever she thought I should be outsiderather than sitting in my room with a book,that “idle hands are the devil’s workshop.”I didn’t have the heart to tell her that Jewsdid not believe in the devil and that,in any event my hands were engagedin holding the book and turning pages.I…

    Lou Faber

  • THE EASE OF FORGETTING

    I have little memory of the manwho was my first adoptive fatherand none of his funeral, two-year-olds,my mother said, should notknow of death at that age.Nor did I attend my grandmother’s,she the mother of my second adoptive fatherbecause 12-year-old shouldn’thave the memory of funerals,according to my mother.I did attend her mother’s funeral,had to because I…

    Lou Faber

  • SIX FEET UNDER

    I remember the afternoonwas cold and damp, with a persistentdrizzle that escapedthe clustered umbrellas,the sky a blanket slowly sheddingthe water that soaked itas it sat out on the clothesline. I suspect you would haveliked it this way, everyone in attendance,everyone shuffling their feet,wanting to look skyward,knowing they would see onlya dome of black umbrella domes.…

    Lou Faber

  • WORKSHOP

    Grace settles into the chair,less an act of sitting thanof floating down onto the seat.She has borrowed my grandmother’ssmile, kind, gentle, inviting.She pulls a book from her bag,its pages or most of themdog eared, and I glimpsesome annotations in the margins.We sit around her like childrenawaiting presents on a holiday,as acolytes seeking knowledgefrom a font…

    Lou Faber

  • THE TIE’S LAMENT

    I still have the tieI wore to m grandmother’sfuneral, one I conducted,but the suit from that dayis long gone, and just as well,for it would be several sizestoo large for the present me. I’ve only worn the tie oncesince that rainy day in Marylandand then to a weddingto balance out the sadnesswith a bit of…

    Lou Faber

  • COOKBOOK

    As a youngster I thought I hadconvinced my grandmotherto one day entrust me withthe old family recipes, sincemy mother wanted little to dowith the kitchen and less withanything that came from “there.” It was a bit of a shock to learnyears later that grandma wasborn in London, that her mothershared my mother’s dislikefor the kitchen…

    Lou Faber

  • ANYWHERE BUT

    I was twelve at the time, would havechosen to be anywhere but there.I hated visiting her at home, but thistook my disgust to a whole new level.We were never close, never would be,she so old, so old world, so unlikeanyone I had known, so like the womensitting outside the old hotels on South Beachwaiting for…

    Lou Faber

  • THE VILLAGE

    I’d like you to tell meabout the village in whichyou grew up, and how oddit must have been for youto have met my grandfatherso far from any villagein the heart of Lithuania.I suspect you leftwith your parents, exhaustedby pogroms, exhaustedby the Jewishnessthat to them defined you.I’d love to knowabout my mother whoI never got to…

    Lou Faber

  • PHOTO

    Oddly I have a photo of my grandmother’s grave, but not one of my mothers, either of them actually, and we’ve yet to have a funeral for the one who raised me. I forgive the one who gave me life, for she gave me to one she felt could care for me well and she…

    Lou Faber