The Book of Esther
My mother had two sisters; I’ve already told stories about my Aunt Maxine. Now it’s time to write about my aunt Esther.
There were some kind of strange family dynamics with this. My mother was 11 years old when Esther–the youngest–was born. My mother told me stories–and I witnessed this for myself–about thinking of Esther as her “baby sister.” They loved each other deeply and gave each other the greatest support possible. My mother adored Esther from when she was born, brought her gifts when she got a job after high school. Then, during our family crisis, with the baby being born and then dying and Herb having to be physically removed from the hospital, my mother took over Esther’s rehabilitation. My father played a quiet role in this–he was involved, did a man’s job extremely well, could be counted on, always.
When I was 3 Esther was 17. It felt as if she was my older sister. For a reason that only God knows, my intense love and admiration of Esther hurt in some way. It was my heart expanding, I think; I just could not get enough time and attention from her. Later, when I dragged myself back to Pittsburgh from Hartford, demoralized, I came to depend way too much on Esther and this brought trouble.
However–here is a nice story about all of us. When Esther graduated from high school she got a secretarial job at “Carnegie Tech” as it was called then. She was able to take courses there at night for free. Also, because she loved the piano, she would practice on one of the school pianos after her work hours. She longed to get a piano of her own. She still lived in the Morrowfield with her mother, and my grandmother let Esther have the single bedroom.
My aunt had been secretly saving money to buy a used piano. This one little part of the story is vague–either she told my grandmother she was doing this or she didn’t tell her until the piano arrived. But the piano did arrive and, according to my mother, my grandmother fell apart, and there was screaming and more screaming. First of all, there was the fact of the piano being there and second, once the delivery men came with the piano, they couldn’t shift it so that this piano would fit through Esther’s bedroom door. My mother was called immediately and rushed over there but what could she do? She tried to calm the pair but then–and, boy, did my mother tell this with gusto—“I DECIDED TO CALL SHERRY.”
My father’s name is Sherwin; everybody called him Sherry.
“But Mom, why did you call Daddy? He was miles away at work; what could he do?”
“Your father always knew what to do. My guess is that by using the Yellow Pages he found some place that moves furniture and especially knows how to take pianos apart and put them back together.” Simple.
So that’s what happened; a man with several helpers came to the Morrowfield, took the piano apart, moved the parts into Esther’s bedroom–done.
This is one of the many stories my mother told me as she was fading from this world. Fortunately I have a good memory for things like this and I know I’ll never forget them. What a legacy I received!
lgmwriting 