EREV YOM KIPPUR

I participated in several Yom Kippur services via Zoom. I started off with TBZ, the synagogue next door. Then I switched to the W + S Minyan in Cambridge, affiliated with Harvard Hillel. Now I am listening to a conservative service on JBS TV. Kol Nidrei was not the Sandler minhag. I remember sitting in Bubbe's house waiting for Zaidy to come home from shul. We women did not go. So the Sandler minhag was to attend Kol Nidrei and then come home and eat. 

The next day Shirley and I walked to the Woodrow Avenue shul where we met up with Bubbe who was sitting in the women's section, the first row of the balcony.  There we chanted the Yom Kippur service which is the longest of the year. It takes a lot of time asking for forgiveness for the myriad number of sins listed in the prayerbook. After that we walked over to Bubbe's house and fasted until around 6:00 including me. 

Change is hard. Ken and I exchanged emails today and recently. It's been good being in touch during these strange, isolating, pandemic times. I heard from Ellen too and her recent move. Ellen took the time to send me some photos of Ken during the upheaval of moving and I am grateful for that. I hope things are going better with the new house and the old one ! 

The photo below shows Bubbe, the young and when I knew her. Roby sent me that photo of Bubbe with the lute. I thought I would never see it again. But we began corresponding while I was living in Berkeley and I wrote about it. He was so excited to tell me he had it and he had negatives and prints made that he sent to me. That meant a lot to me. I have Roby's baseball and Zaidy's glasses and also a watch.

I could not resist putting 'Yom Kippur and Bob Dylan' in the search box. This came up from an excerpt in Dylan & Me – 50 Years of Adventures, Louie Kemp chronicles how two Jewish boys from rural Minnesota met at Jewish summer camp in 1953.

"In one amusing story, Kemp recalls the time he and Dylan attended Yom Kippur services in Santa Monica, California:

We had been there before, and the rabbi recognized Bobby right away. But few if any of his fellow worshippers – all somberly dressed – realized he was standing at the back of the room. Having, as usual, missed the memo regarding the dress code, Bobby was wearing cowboy boots, torn jeans, a hoodie, a black leather jacket, and what looked like a long-lost pair of Jackie Kennedy's sunglasses.

Specifically, he was attending the closing service of the day, Neilah... The Ark housing the holy scrolls of the Torah remains open for the entire service, and it is considered a great honor to be chosen by the rabbi to open it. This carries with it many blessings for the new year. The honor customarily goes to the temple's most generous donor – but not this time.

With his ancient eyes, Rabbi Levitansky scoured the congregation. At last, his gaze came to rest upon a solitary figure standing in the back of the room. He motioned the casually dressed fellow up to the pulpit, and up he came. Bob Dylan opened the Ark on Yom Kippur. "

MR. TAMBOURINE MAN - 1990 LIVE

I found another live performance with Dylan, Roger McGuinn and David Crosby singing Mr. Tambourine Man, written by Bob Dylan. He comes on stage a few minutes into the song. A surprise...

I sent it to Ken and got the following comment:

"just got 'round to watching the video (never seen it b4) & had a couple of impressions.

1. great

2. David Crosby evidently lives forever/ McGuinn tried his best to harmonize with Bob (whose voice never would have made it out of Greenwich Village if not for his poetry) as in

"one hand waving free - silhouetted by the sea..."

3. whether it is by the sea or in yr backyard or in yr living room - the wave is joy & freedom incarnate.

i imagine a woman in a full skirt - her holding one side for movement's sake, twirling by seashore w/ the other arm waving free - obviously forgetting today's troubles until tomorrow.

thanks - i really enjoyed it."

 

Mr. Tambourine Man.

 

 

 

 

MASTERS OF WAR - LYRICS

MASTERS OF WAR

Sung by Eddie Vedder at the 30 Year Anniversary Show in Madison Square Garden.

October 16, 1992

Come you masters of war
You that build the big guns
You that build the death planes
You that build all the bombs
You that hide behind walls
You that hide behind desks
I just want you to know I can see through your masks

You that never done nothin'
But build to destroy
You play with my world
Like it's your little toy

You put a gun in my hand
And you hide from my eyes
And you turn and run farther
When the fast bullets fly 

Like Judas of old
You lie and deceive
A world war can be won
You want me to believe
 But I see through your eyes
And I see through your brain
Like I see through the water
That runs down my drain

You fasten all the triggers
For the others to fire
Then you sit back and watch
When the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion
While the young people's blood Flows out of their bodies
And is buried in the mud
You've thrown the worst fear
That can ever be hurled
Fear to bring children
Into the world

For threatening my baby Unborn and unnamed
You ain't worth the blood That runs in your veins
How much do I know To talk out of turn
You might say that I'm young
You might say I'm unlearned
But there's one thing I know
Though I'm younger than you
That even Jesus would never Forgive what you do

Let me ask you one question
Is your money that good?
Will it buy you forgiveness
Do you think that it could?
I think you will find
When your death takes its toll
All the money you made
Will never buy back your soul  

And I hope that you die
And your death will come soon
I'll follow your casket
By the pale afternoon
And I'll watch while you're lowered
Down to your deathbed
And I'll stand over your grave
'Til I'm sure that you're dead

These words ring true today. cm

HAPPY BIRTHDAY + HAPPY NEW YEAR

I am still rock and rolling my way through my birthday and onward to Rosh Hashanah which starts tomorrow night at sundown. My friend Laurie will come over. I am making chicken soup now. Laurie will bring the matzoh balls. I have the round challah and gefilte fish for Laurie. I never liked gefilte fish, even in Bubbe's house. 

 "How terribly strange to be 70." Ken once called me and sang those lines to me, maybe on his 70th birthday.  

I just heard Eddie Vedder's version of Masters of War for the first time. Powerful. Anger. Dylan wrote that in 1963. Then Eddie Vedder sang it at the 30 Year Anniversary show with the appropriate anger the song needed.

The 30th Anniversary Concert Celebration, 1993 is new to me this week. Ok, I'm behind. What a line up ! Music royalty, Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, Kris Kristofferson, The Band, Stevie Wonder, Tracy Chapman, Chrissie Hynde, The Pretenders, Tom Petty with some Heartbreakers, Neil Young, Eric Clapton and more. Read more about it here. Read the liner notes. I'm still processing it. All to celebrate Bob Dylan's 30 years in the music business ! And he looks non-plussed throughout while all the other musicians look at him with reverence. It must have been very intense for him. 

I signed up for the Bob Dylan Newsletter on my 70th birthday. :-) They asked for your age range. I just made the cut...lol.

Per usual my thoughts go backwards on these holidays. Memories from being at Bubbe's house. My chicken soup is on the stove and is just like hers except I add fresh ginger along with the carrots and onions and garlic. More on that later.

Bubbe, 1962 (?) photo in the Sandler apartment on Stratton St. in Dorchester. The table is set, white tablecloth, in the living room. I think this was Passover. She died not too long after this picture was taken. 

FIRST DAY OF ROSH HASHANAH 9.19.20

TISHREI 5781

I just finished Rosh Hashanah services, via Zoom with the synagogue next door, TBZ, Temple Beth Zion. As a child I remember going to the Woodward Avenue shul with Shirley and sitting next to Bubbe, first row of the balcony where all the women sat. I loved it, I thought we had the best seat in the house :-) After services, we walked over to Bubbe's house for another delicious Rosh Hashanah lunch eating the food from the night before. The table groaned it was so full. Tzimmes, gefilte fish, chicken soup, brisket, chicken - I do not recall a green vegetable :-) For dessert, we had a choice of sponge cake or honey cake and rugulach. I still love rugulach. The cast of characters around the table: Bubbe, Zaidy, Shirley, me, Aunt Ruth and Ken. After eating, Ken and I played endless games of fish and war and ken always won. Somehow he always had the aces ! :-) And then we got sent home with lots of leftovers. Bubbe cooked enough for an army. Shirley once told me "there had to be enough food for leftovers because if all the food was eaten, Bubbe thought she didn't cook enough !"

1962-63

"Masters of War" is a song by Bob Dylan, written over the winter of 1962-63 and released on the album The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan in the spring of 1963. The song's melody was adapted from the traditional "Nottamun Town". Dylan's lyrics are a protest against the Cold War nuclear arms build-up of the early 1960s

VISIONS OF JOHANNA

I am rock and rolling my way into my seventh decade - the big 7 0.

With the help of Bob Dylan and poetry.....and with a little help from my friends. :-) (Joe Cocker) Ordinarily I would have gone out for lunch at Zaftigs for a spinach and goat cheese omelette, but not today with the virus. Small socially distanced gatherings......

 VISIONS OF JOHANNA

Ain't it just like the night to play tricks when you're tryin' to be so quiet?
We sit here stranded, though we're all doin' our best to deny it
And Louise holds a handful of rain, temptin' you to defy it
Lights flicker from the opposite loft
In this room the heat pipes just cough
The country music station plays soft
But there's nothing, really nothing to turn off
Just Louise and her lover so entwined
And these visions of Johanna that conquer my mind

In the empty lot where the ladies play blindman's bluff with the key chain
And the all-night girls they whisper of escapades out on the "D" train
We can hear the night watchman click his flashlight
Ask himself if it's him or them that's insane Louise, she's all right, she's just near
She's delicate and seems like the mirror
But she just makes it all too concise and too clear
That Johanna's not here

The ghost of 'lectricity howls in the bones of her face
Where these visions of Johanna have now taken my place
Now, little boy lost, he takes himself so seriously
He brags of his misery, he likes to live dangerously
And when bringing her name up
He speaks of a farewell kiss to me
He's sure got a lotta gall to be so useless and all
Muttering small talk at the wall while I'm in the hall
How can I explain? It's so hard to get on
And these visions of Johanna, they kept me up past the dawn

Inside the museums, infinity goes up on trial
Voices echo this is what salvation must be like after a while
But Mona Lisa musta had the highway blues
You can tell by the way she smiles
See the primitive wallflower freeze
When the jelly-faced women all sneeze
Hear the one with the mustache say, "Jeez, I can't find my knees" 

Oh, jewels and binoculars hang from the head of the mule
But these visions of Johanna, they make it all seem so cruel

The peddler now speaks to the countess who's pretending to care for him
Sayin', "Name me someone that's not a parasite and I'll go out and say a prayer for him"
But like Louise always says "Ya can't look at much, can ya man?"
As she, herself, prepares for him
And Madonna, she still has not showed
We see this empty cage now corrode
Where her cape of the stage once had flowed
The fiddler, he now steps to the road
He writes ev'rything's been returned which was owed
On the back of the fish truck that loads
While my conscience explodes
The harmonicas play the skeleton keys and the rain
And these visions of Johanna are now all that remain

Songwriters: Bob Dylan

Live Performance.

MEMORIES OF ZAIDYS

Ken and I have been talking about our Zaidys. We talked about the Zaidy from Bubbe and Zaidy in Dorchester. Years ago I remember talking to Roby about his father, my Zaidy. Somewhere I have some notes Roby sent me about growing up in 45 Harlem Street with Ruthie and Shirley. I will look for them. I posted the Sandler family geneology that Roby put together on my blog in 2009. I remember talking to him about them. I was taking notes and wrote a few things on the chart. Ken remembers Zaidy as a bitter man who passed the bitterness on to his daughters. Interesting, I did not see that when Shirley and I went there on friday nights. With one exception.

Zaidy sat at the head of the table. Every friday night we heard about how he went to school in Russia through snowdrifts six feet high. Sometimes, after he said the Kiddush he started talking very loud. The volume went up. I actually don't remember what he said. But I do remember what Bubbe said, "Morris, SHA !" And Morris did SHA ! He went silent. That was the only time I recall Bubbe raising her voice ! Ken reminded me that Zaidy's bitterness stemmed from the fact that when he was a child, he wanted to go further in school but was told no and he had to go to work instead. I do remember Zaidy talking about that. Shirley told me there was a belt on one of the kitchen chairs that was used to punish his children, i.e. Roby, Ruthie and Shirley.

ken said:

the man i spent many weekends with - Morris Josephs nee Josevovitz (sp) who every Friday after sundown put on his Tefillin at the kitchen table, alone as i watched from the other room & dovened & was kind, gentle, loving & all that stuff that follows.

he had a small deli in Chelsea that had old timers playing some old timey card games (a small fee for table rental) & sold 3 cigarettes for nickel when a pack cost 25 cents.

no wonder my father was a gambler.

my father was born to gamble & dance &

my mother loved to dance with gamblers.

This is the first time I heard about the name change from Josevovitz to Josephs. (which was a common thing when jewish immigrants landed in Ellis Island) And the first time I ever heard of Ken's paternal grandfather. Slowly, slowly, the pieces fall into place.

MALDEN YEARS: 1965-1975

OVERVIEW

It's time to write about The Malden Years. Shirley re-married. She married Julius Silverman, Bookmaker from Malden. So we moved to Malden. I like to call it "schlepped along for the ride." From 104 American Legion Highway we moved to 55 Wigglesworth street into a two family house. We had the bottom floor. I liked it. Instead of a two bedroom apartment we moved into a House ! With porches, front and back. We lived there while Shirley and Julius built a new house on 45 Lillian Road.

Shirley and Julius went to Hawaii on their honeymoon. Looking back, that was the happiest I ever saw Shirley. When they came back she put all the Hawaii pictures into a photo album. She did not say one negative thing about the trip. Vintage Shirley - happy.

That photo album must have gotten thrown away after the divorce. Barry told me she called him one night when he was living in Revere. I think she was drinking and she said, "If you want the pictures and family movies, come and get them." He did not. So she threw the history of our lives into the trash.

Shirley got pregnant with Barry while we lived on Wigglesworth Street. When I asked her many years later why she had a baby so quickly she said "I didn't think I could get pregnant at my age." Ok. She was in her 30's. Another question: another 'strange' answer. 

I'M YOUNGER THAN THAT NOW

Leaving one decade

into another..

My Back Pages

Bob Dylan, Roger McGuinn

Crimson flames tied through my ears, rollin' high and mighty traps
Pounced with fire on flaming roads using ideas as my maps
"We'll meet on edges, soon, " said I, proud 'neath heated brow
Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now

Half-wracked prejudice leaped forth, "rip down all hate, " I screamed
Lies that life is black and white spoke from my skull, I dreamed
Romantic facts of musketeers foundationed deep, somehow
Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now

Girls' faces formed the forward path from phony jealousy
To memorizing politics of ancient history
Flung down by corpse evangelists, unthought of, though somehow
Ah, but I was so much older then. I'm younger than that now

A self-ordained professor's tongue too serious to fool
Spouted out that liberty is just equality in school
"Equality, " I spoke the word as if a wedding vow
Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now

In a soldier's stance, I aimed my hand at the mongrel dogs who teach
Fearing not that I'd become my enemy in the instant that I preach
My existence led by confusion boats, mutiny from stern to bow
Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now

Yes, my guard stood hard when abstract threats too noble to neglect
Deceived me into thinking I had something to protect
Good and bad, I define these terms quite clear, no doubt, somehow
Ah, but I was so much older then I'm younger than that now

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: Bob Dylan

Live with Bob Dylan, Roger McGuin, George Harrison, Tom Petty, Neil Young. 

Rock and Roll gold !

OLD FRIENDS/BOOKENDS 7 0

old friends

old friends

sat on their park bench like bookends 

a newspaper blowin' through the grass 

falls on the round toes 

of the high shoes

of the old friends

 

old friends 

winter companions, the old men 

lost in their overcoats, waiting for the sunset 

the sounds of the city sifting through trees 

settle like dust 

on the shoulders of the old friends

 

can you imagine us years from today 

sharing a park bench quietly?

"how terribly strange to be seventy" *

 

old friends 

memory brushes the same years 

silently sharing the same fear

 

time it was, and what a time it was, it was 

a time of innocence 

a time of confidences

long ago it must be 

i have a photograph 

preserve your memories 

they're all that's left you

simon and garfunkel, 1968, from the album, bookends.

kudos to ken, musicologist, for my remembering this song.... 

* riffing off of Shirley's chorus line, "isn't that strange ?"

listen to it here.

live from central park, 1981

CLASH OF THE TITANS

Last night I watched Clash of the Titans on TCM. (Turner Classic Movies). I love that movie starring Laurence Olivier, Maggie Smith, Clare Bloom, Burgess Meredith and a young Harry Hamlin as Perseus who has to capture the head of Medusa in order to rescue Andromeda who is chained to a rock cliff. And he does rescue her in the grand style of Greek myths by swooping in riding the winged horse Pegasus causing the monster, the Kraken, to turn to stone - all special effects by Ray Harryhausen using stop-motion camera effects before CGI.

I watched it last night thinking of Shirley. The good Shirley. In Dorchester we would snuggle up and watch countless 'B' science fiction movies. She loved them and I did too. Them, Day of the Trifids, The Day the Earth Stood Still, Creature From the Black Lagoon, etc.

klaatu berada nikto

NEWTON MEMORIAL ARTS: CINDY SPITTEL

Below is the letter I sent to Cindy Spittel, Newton Memorial Arts and cc.'d Barry on it.


CAROL S. M.            architecture + design
1550 Beacon Street       #8L        617.734.5075    chanelkline@gmail.com

NEWTON MEMORIAL ART COMPANY, INC.
732 WALNUT ST.
NEWTON CENTRE, MA 02459

Attn. Cindy SPITTEL            Re: The Estate of Shirley Silverman

1.7.20

Cindy Spittel,

Please be advised I am  withholding payment of $ 1492.15 as the balance due for a Headstone for Shirley Silverman, pending Legal Litigation pursuant to the two Invoices you sent me.

I am filing a Complaint with the Attorney General's Office of Massachusetts.

I am filing a Complaint with the Funeral Consumers Alliance.

I am filing a Complaint with the FTC Funeral Rule.

I worked for two years with you to design the Headstone for my mother Shirley Silverman. We worked on it with the understanding it would be placed between SANDERMAN AND GEHR. It is not in that location.

See attached Complaint to the Attorney Generals Office.

You did not do your job. You will not treat my mother in this egregious manner. You will not treat me in this egregious manner.

Pending response from Attorney General's Office and Attorney.


Carol S. Miller
Architecture + Photography
617.734.5075

cc. Attorney General's Office, Massachusetts; Barry Silverman, Musician, (son of Shirley Silverman)

BARRY MARC SILVERMAN DYSFUNCTION

I learned today that Barry Silverman, my brother wrote a check to Newton Memorial Arts for the Balance Due on Shirley's headstone even though it is not in the right space. I told him to withhold it for the reasons outlined below.

I filed a Complaint with the Attorney General's Office in Boston against Newton Memorial Arts and the Jewish Cemetery Association of Massachusetts in January 2020. Shirley's Headstone is not in the space it was designed to go between the headstones of Sanderman and Gehr. No one from JCAM or Newton Memorial Arts went to the Baker St. Cemetery in West Roxbury, Kopaigarod section to find the exact location of Shirley's gravesite. They did not do their jobs. 

Judith Kaplan from JCAM met me at the cemetery. She did not direct me to my mother's gravesite. I was measuring the space between Sanderman and Gehr. She did not locate my mother's gravesite at that time. That was her job ! I went with a friend and I have a witness.

I wrote a letter to the Monument company telling Cindy Spittel that I was withholding payment of the Balance Due, $1492.00 while I filed a Complaint with the Office of the Attorney General in Massachusetts. I sent a copy to my brother Barry Silverman. I told him NOT TO PAY the Balance Due.

Today I got a confirmation from the Attorney General's office that they received the Complaint I submitted online. I am working with my State Representative, Tommy Vitolo and the Attorney General's office. I sent the confirmation to Barry.

I have not heard from Barry since last October, 2019 when I originally saw that the headstone was not in the intended space. I asked him if he could speak to his Attorney re. what legal actions would be possible. He emailed back: "I emailed my Attorney. When I hear something I will let you know." I heard nothing from Barry until today ! He thinks he can outsmart and blow off everyone including me.

 I realized he had no interest in pursuing Legal Action. He does not care about our mother or me.  Cindy Spittel must have sent him an invoice and he paid it without consulting me or letting me know. Beyond words of dysfunction.

He paid the Balance Due to the monument company even though I told him to withhold it. Cindy Spittel outfoxed him, out maneuvered him. He paid her instead of hiring an attorney with that money and suing her for any money he paid on the Headstone and for $10,000.00 in damages of mental suffering, emotional distress, she did not do her job, and for interfering with the grieving process.

I know Barry longer than anyone else on the planet. He thinks he can treat women badly because he learned it from his father, bookie tough guy, Julius Silverman, and that includes his sister Carol. He thinks he can just blow me off like he did with other women in his life. Julius Silverman treated my mother badly after the divorce. Barry treated his ex-wife badly during his divorce. And he continues to treat me and our mother, like S**T.

I asked him why he did it.
No answer.
I asked him when he sent it.
No answer.

I am going to start writing about the Malden Years. It is not a pretty picture. Shirley walked into that marriage, a single working mother, upright, walking and vertical and beautiful. That is not how it ended.

Pictures to follow.

He undermined me.
He sabotaged me.
He paid for the Incompetence of Cindy Spittel.
He refused to get an Attorney to investigate our legal options.
Instead he paid Cindy Spittle an obscene amount of money for her Incompetence.

Terrible. Just terrible. Barely an inch to the right or the left. I don't even believe it is a space. It is a pathway. I designed the headstone to go between Sanderman + Gehr in the row behind her. Does anyone know an attorney I can consult to discuss my legal options ?