A Day In The Life

I visited my Aunt today. She is 91,though you would never know it- she is a powerhouse full of energy and life. She moves fast, talks fast and always has a positive attitude.

She always tells me “you have to keep going- no matter what life throws at you.” The other thing she always tells me is to grab each day, get the most out of it while you can, and enjoy those days. Her manner of speaking is forceful and exuberant- on the verge of an order almost. I keep her words in mind, as she speaks from a place of knowledge- she has lived through the loss of a 50 year old son, 11 years ago last week. A loss that could easily destroy a person, we so feared what would happen when we knew his prognosis wasn’t good. But Aunt Leni rose above it, was thankful for the 5 years she had with him during his illness. His words to her when he knew there would be no more treatments were, “Ma, we had a good run.” They both looked at what they had had for those 50 years, rather than what was being taken away.

She is blessed with grandchildren, and great children at this point, who number in double digits. She can never do enough for them, see enough of them, revel in their accomplishments enough. Look up unconditional love in the dictionary, and you will find “Tanta Leni” as the definition. That point was brought home to me today during our visit. I asked how 2 of her grandchildren were doing, the 2 daughters (twins) of her son that died. They are in their early 30’s. She looked at me and told me to sit down, what a week she had had, and what news. The one granddaughter who had gotten married 2 years ago, had gotten divorced. You may be thinking, so, no big deal, divorce is so common, so what. For my Aunt this is a very big deal because it meant her granddaughter had gone through a painful experience, which breaks her heart. She followed up telling me how at least now her granddaughter can move on, move forward and hopefully find happiness in the future.

The next piece of news was not so easy for her to share, I think maybe because she did not know what my reaction would be. She said her granddaughter had come to visit, and though my Aunt did not share exactly how she was told, her granddaughter told her she was gay. My Aunt then repeated what she had said upon learning this from her granddaughter, yelling at her, “DID YOU THINK I WOULD LOVE YOU ANY LESS?”

My 91 year old, European born, Orthodox Jewish Aunt is the real deal in my eyes. There are people far younger than her, that would be less accepting, or unwilling to accept someone coming out. To her, it made no difference, she was glad her granddaughter had told her, and said the main thing was for her to be happy in her life.

I was moved to tears after she told me, knowing that it could not have been easy for her to hear either piece of news from her granddaughters, but love is love and that is all there is.