Life in Israel:
I was born in Tel-Aviv on October 25, 1944, to Cypora Besser Olej and Leon (Aryei) Olej (I later changed the spelling from Olej to Olay). When I was born, Israel was not yet a country, the land was called Palestine, and it was ruled by Britain. Therefore, my birth certificate is actually in English rather than Hebrew.
When my mom and dad were first married, in 1939, they lived with my grandmother, Mindle (my dad’s mom) and my dad’s two unmarried sisters (Sara and Esther). All five adults lived in a 2-bedroom apartment. I believe that this arrangement was necessary, because so many people were coming to Tel-Aviv, that it was hard to find apartments. Apartments were being built as quickly as possible but with the war refugees, they were snapped up quickly.
A couple of years later, my brother Yosi (Joe) was born. Then my aunt Sara married and her husband Mordechai, who moved in with the family. Two years later, Sara and Mordechai had a son, Ben and that made for 5 adults and 2 babies in this apartment (Esther had moved out). Then I was born. Unfortunately, a couple of months later my grandmother died. She was the only grandparent that I actually got to see but I obviously don’t remember her.
When I was 3 years old, we (my dad, my mom, my brother Joe, and I) moved into our own apartment. It was a small place (by American standards) with a large living room/dining room combination, one bedroom, a kitchen and bathroom. It also had 2 balconies, one off the kitchen and one off the living room. My parents slept in the living room on a pull-out bed and Joe and I had the bedroom. Since the climate in Israel is lovely most of the year – we spent so much time outside, therefore, we never felt cramped. And of course, after sharing the apartment with so many people, this felt luxurious.
In the spring of 1948, my country changed from being a territory under the British rule, to being an independent country, named Israel. I was too young, only 3 ½ years old, to understand what was happening, but I do remember the day that Independence was declared and the dancing in the streets – all night long with me on my dad’s shoulders.
As soon as the Brits moved out, Israel was attacked by seven Arab countries.
I remember my dad going away to join the military. I remember the planes flying overhead. My brother, who was in elementary school, stayed home for a while because his school was hit by bombs. Our apartment was on the bottom floor of the building, so all the neighbors slept in our little apartment. It must have been a very tough time for my parents but to me it was party time with all the neighbors visiting.
Luckily, Israel survived the war – our soldiers were determined because if we lost, we had no-where else to go. My dad came home and all the neighbors went back to their apartments.
What was life like for me in Tel-Aviv? We did not have a car, a phone, or a television set. Israel is sunny and warm most of the year, therefore, I spent lots of time playing outside with friends. In the summer my mom took my brother and I to the beach every day. Although we lived near the Tel-Aviv beach we couldn’t swim there since in those days, it was polluted (it’s beautiful now). Instead, we took a bus for about 20 minutes to a town called Bat Yam. There we swam in the warm water and played in the sand. We always had lunch on the beach. Then the ice cream man would come around carrying a large cooler and selling ice cream bars. Sometimes mom would let us have ice cream. I remember the beach days as magical.
On Saturdays, my dad’s only day off, we would have a family outing in the morning. Sometimes we rowed on the river, or went to a park. But in the afternoon my dad took a nap and woe to us if we woke him up. He was tired because he worked 6 days a week for long hours. My brother and I would either play outside with friends or in bad weather we would play Monopoly or work on his stamp or coin collection.
One of my favorite things to do in the summer was to go to where my dad worked and meet him after work and come home with him. We would often stop for ice cream near his work.
We had lots of cousins living near us in Tel-Aviv. My mom’s sister, Pola, had 3 boys and one girl. The oldest, Shlomo, was 7 years older than me, the second one, Shraga, was my brother Joe’s age and the twins (Yehuda and Aliza) were 2 years younger than me. They were my special friends. We used to see spend a lot of time with them. My mom’s brother, Yichiel had 2 children, but we rarely saw them. I do remember going to their house for dinner a couple of times.
My dad’s 2 sisters each had two sons. My aunt Sara had Ben, who was 2 years older than me, and Joe (Middle Joe) who was 3 years younger than me. My aunt Esther’s oldest boy, Yakov was 3 years younger than me, and Yosi, was 5 years younger. There I was, when we all got together, with 5 boys (4 cousins and a brother) and me. We used to have rowdy times and my dad said that he always had a headache after one of our get togethers.
There was virtually no crime and by age 6, I was allowed to go to friends’ houses and to my piano lessons on my own. My dad played the violin and trumpet and loved music, so he started my brother on the violin and me on the piano by age 6. I know we had very little money, but what we had, was spent on our music. As I got older, I was allowed to go to the beach (not to swim, just to hang out) with my friends in the early evening. We used to make a bonfire and cook potatoes. That was marvelous.
But my best friend remained my brother. We spent lots of time together and he never seemed to mind that I hung out with his friends. He had a bike (I didn’t) and he used to give me rides on his handlebars. How safe is that? In those days, we didn’t know about helmets either. It’s a wonder that we stayed alive. The upside is that there were very few cars on the roads, so we were probably pretty safe.
Celebrating holidays in Israel:
There are many Jewish holidays, but I will just mention the way we celebrated my favorites.
In the fall, we celebrated Sukkot, which commemorates the 40 years that the Hebrew people lived in tents while they wandered in the Sinai desert, after they left Egypt. Therefore, each family built a hut in their yard or balcony. We were no exception. We would get four pieces of wood for the corners then put old sheets from wood to wood for the walls. We used palm leaves for the “roof”. We would then eat our meals in our Sukka (tent) for one week. It was wonderful. We did not have to worry about rain leaking into our tent because it doesn’t rain in Israel between April and November – not one drop.
On Hanuka, we didn’t get presents but we did get some coins. We lit candles, sing songs, played with the Dreydel and ate latkes (potato pancakes). Hanuka is a holiday to commemorate a victory over the Syrians who had invaded Israel. Hanuka was a very meaningful holiday for us; we had just fought a war of survival and won.
Purim, my favorite, is a bit like Halloween – because we dressed up and went around in our costumes. We received treats – especially wonderful cookies called Hamantachen. During Purim we heard the story of when the Jews, in Persia, were saved from destruction. The story is told in the Bible in the Book of Esther. During the re-telling of the story, we had noise makers to enjoy every time the name Haman was read out.
Passover Seder was always at my aunt Pola’s house. My uncle Pinchus would lead and we would read the whole Haggadah and sing all the songs. I always fell asleep at the table before it was finished.
Israel is a Jewish country, and the holidays are celebrated by everyone. We had 8 days off from school for Hanuka, 7 days off for Passover, 8 days off for Sukkot etc.
Life in the United States:
My dad’s brother Abe, as well as many cousins, had settled in Chicago well before the holocaust. For many reasons, dad wanted us to move from Tel-Aviv to Chicago. He went before us to make sure that he could get a job and a place for us to live. After about 10 months he sent for us to come and join him.
It was really hard for my mom to leave Israel. Her only family, a sister and a brother lived near us. She lost all the rest of her family in the war. Neither my brother Joe nor I wanted to leave either: we had our friends and our cousins. In those days, people did not travel easily. Once we moved, communications with those in Israel, would be via mail. There was no internet, or email, and limited phone use. When we left Israel, I thought that I would be saying goodbye to everyone forever. But I had no choice.
I had never been out of Tel-Aviv or its suburbs up to that point and my mom felt that we should see some of the country before we left it. Therefore, that summer, we went on a trip. I was a very picky eater, and I worried all the time about having to eat food that I didn’t like. However, the trip was very interesting, and I was glad I had seen more than just Tel-Aviv by the time we left.
Then in January we said good-bye to everyone. We went to the port city of Haifa and boarded a ship. The crossing on the boat took two weeks. The first part of the trip was very comfortable because we were on the calm Mediterranean Sea. We stopped in Pompeii, Italy to see the city that was buried by the ash from Mt. Vesuvius. It was fascinating.
However, when we reached the Atlantic Ocean, it was a different story. It was winter and not the best time of the year to be in the Atlantic Ocean. It was very rough, especially for three days in the middle of the trip. The boat rocked from side to side and almost everyone was sea sick. But I wasn’t. There were maybe 10 of us still eating in the dining room. Both my mom and my brother were sick.
We made one more stop – Halifax, Canada, on a cold January day. We had the day at port and went sightseeing. I saw an escalator for the first time. It was too cold, though, for walking around for long and we returned to the ship, a bit frost bitten.
Eventually we reached New York. I remember seeing the Statue of Liberty for the first time. No, I was not excited – I was still sad to have left Israel. We then took a 20-hour train ride from New York to Chicago where my dad was waiting to greet us. I was happy to see my dad but not to be in this strange new country.
In Chicago
I arrived in Chicago on January 21, 1956. It was cold! So cold that I didn’t know what hit me. In Tel-Aviv, where I grew up, it only got down to 40 degrees and that was usually only for a day or two. But here in Chicago it was in the teens. I needed to buy winter clothes right away. My Israeli “winter” clothes were just not going to keep me warm.
On my first day at school, I wore my new warm winter pants. In Israel, I wore pants in winter and shorts in the fall and spring. But in Chicago at that time, girls were expected to wear skirts and not allowed to wear pants in school. The teacher and students tried to explain to me about that rule. I didn’t know enough English to understand. Eventually I got it (pants – no, skirt – yes). The next day I wore pants to school under my skirt. Some of the other kids also did that, but it wasn’t cool. I didn’t care – I was cold.
On my way home from school the first day, I got lost. The buildings all looked the same, red brick, dirty and ugly. I was missing the beautiful sunny white buildings I had left in Tel – Aviv. Luckily my mom was looking out of the window and called to me.
It was very hard the first few months at school as I knew very little English. I worked really hard with my mom to learn the language. I also had to get used to a new name. My uncle Abe had changed his name from Olej to Olive, and we did the same. I hated my new name.
At first all the kids were excited to have a foreign student. They had never had one before in that school. Also, because most of them were Jewish, they were excited to meet an Israeli. They spent time trying to teach me things. But soon they tired of it and left me alone. There was only one girl who stayed friends with me. She was also an outsider since she was the only non-Jewish girl in the class. It was lonely.
One of the most embarrassing days during my first month was Valentine’s Day. We didn’t have Valentine’s Day in Israel, so I didn’t know about it. When I got to class, all the kids gave me Valentines. I didn’t give out any in return. I felt embarrassed.
But all was not bad. It was great to be with my dad again. And there were new things to enjoy. The most exciting was television, which we didn’t have in to Israel. The whole family sat around in the evening to watch “I love Lucy” and the “Hit Parade”.
We also had new family to meet in Chicago. My dad’s brother, Abe, lived in the same building with us. Also in the same building, for a short while, lived my cousin Anita (Abe’s daughter) and her husband Phil. Living with Anita was her younger brother Stuart, who was 9 years old. Stuart’s mother, Abe’s wife, died when Stuart was very little, so his sister took care of him. Stuart and I became friends.
Eventually spring and then summer came to Chicago. The city looked so much nicer in the warm weather. We lived close to the beach and spent quite a bit of time there.
My little brother Keith is born
Soon after we arrived in Chicago, my mom became pregnant. She wasn’t too happy about it because she was already 40 years old and my dad was 48. In addition, she was just getting used to living in a new country and speaking English. She did not know the customs, so when her doctor referred to her as Mrs. Cypora instead of Mrs. Olive, she didn’t correct him. Luckily, they figured it out before my brother Keith was registered as Keith Cypora on his birth certificate.
Keith was born on October 28, 1956. I couldn’t wait to take him out in the carriage for a walk. I thought of him as a little doll. But by the end of October, when he was born, it was already cold in Chicago, and my mom didn’t want to take out such a little baby out in the cold. I finally talked her into letting me take him for a walk when he was about 3 weeks old. But it was November and we didn’t last long outside.
Strange for me was that the Holidays that were such a part of everyday life in Israel, like Sukkot, here were only visible if you went to a synagogue – which we did not. Christmas seemed to be such a strange holiday with everyone dragging trees to their apartments and Santa Clauses all over the stores. I loved the lights but everything else seemed so foreign. We had not known about Christmas in Israel.
Moving to Skokie
After 3 1/2 years of living in a 2-bedroom apartment building in Chicago, my father bought a house in a new neighborhood in Skokie. I wasn’t sure at all that I wanted to move. The Chicago apartment was walking distance from the beach and, at 14, I was allowed to walk to the beach with my friends. I remembered how long it took to make friends, and I didn’t want to start all over. This time, though it was easier because I was entering a regional High School, and there would be lots of new kids.
That fall my brother Joe started at the University of Chicago, which was about an hour away from our house. I would see him on some weekends and on school vacations. This changed the family dynamics again.
High School
I started at Niles High West in September 1959. Skokie was growing quickly, and the old high school was not large enough, therefore, a new school was just built. All the freshmen and sophomores went to the new school (Niles West), while the upper classmen went to the old school (Niles East). There were 2,000 kids in my building and 1,000 of us freshmen. It was pretty frightening.
Luckily it was pretty easy to make friends. I joined the Pep Club and helped backstage for the drama club. The classes were getting easier for me because my English was improving. Math was always easy and I was put in an advanced Math class. But for all the other classes, I needed to be able to read English. I had to work hard at it but my grades were very good.
I was becoming very American. I listened to popular music: Elvis and Pat Boone and to show music such as Oklahoma and Carousel. I also loved and regularly watched a program called American Bandstand and knew all the regulars.
When I turned 16, I had a fancy luncheon party at a hotel. All my friends had these parties, and I wanted to feel like one of them. I hadn’t really given a thought to the fact that my parents might not have the money for the party. But maybe they were fine with it. They never complained. I really felt special that day.
On Saturday, I usually worked at my father’s beauty shop, answering the phone and collecting money. One day, the shampoo person couldn’t come, my dad had me wash the hair. I was really nervous about either using water that was too hot or too cold. I also worried about getting their blouses wet. But I must have done OK because I got lots of tips that day. My dad didn’t pay me, I was just expected to help. I enjoyed being there because I got to know the customers really well and had my favorites. I only didn’t like to go to work on days that something else was going on at school or with my friends. But if what I would miss was really important, my dad would let me skip work.
My best friends were Jill and Betty. We have managed to stay in touch and now Jill lives about 2-hours north of Naples, Florida, while Betty lives 2 hours east of Naples, during the winter months. When we can’t meet in person, we zoom to catch up.
During my last year in high school, I worked after school at a book publishing company, filing and typing. I enjoyed the work – it was good experience and the money was nice, as well, since I was saving like mad for college. On Saturdays I still worked for my dad.
My brother, Joe, was my date for my senior prom, because I broke up with a boyfriend two weeks before the event. It was very kind of him to take me, and we had a great time. At the same time that I graduated from High School, my brother Joe graduated from the University of Chicago (U of C). He was admitted to the Physics graduate program, and we would both be at the University in the fall.
College
I applied to three colleges, but the choice was easy; I won an Illinois State scholarship that basically paid tuition, and could be used at U of C.
When checking into the dorm, I met my roommate Leslie, and we are still friends. She lives in Israel now. I was the Israeli; she was the American – I stayed in the U.S. and she moved to Israel. Leslie and I had a little room – large enough for 2 beds, 2 small desks and 2 small dressers. The phone was a shared in the hallway and bathrooms were also shared and down the hall. We were in a dorm that was divided into three buildings. Two of the buildings housed women and one housed the men. Connected to the three buildings was a fourth building which had the cafeteria and study rooms. Since Chicago gets really cold in winter, they built basement tunnels to get us from one building to another.
The academics were very hard. Wow. I was not prepared for so much work. I had placed out of first year math, so I was studying advanced calculus. Also, we had to take a prescribed set of general courses. I took music, art, literature, history, sociology and much more. I had tons of pages to read every night. But the work was very interesting, and I really like learning new things. The best part was that I was introduced to many things I had never known about before. I learned to look at pictures differently and I read many authors that have enriched my life, such as Jane Austen. The professors were fantastic and class sizes were very small. U of C believed in round table discussion method of teaching.
I became engaged to my brother’s roommate, David, during my freshman year but we broke the engagement by summer. College wasn’t all work. I used to hang out with my brother, Joe and his friends. I went out with lots of guys, and I used to sit and talk with my roommate and other friends for hours. It was very different to live, surrounded by people my age, rather than in a family.
In my second year I discovered that I really didn’t want to study mathematics. The straw that broke the camel’s back (as they say) was theoretical math. When I was told to prove that 1 plus zero was one, I gave up. I loved math but at the U of C, it was all theoretical. I am a practical type. I decided to change my major, but to what?
I had a wonderful time taking different courses to find out what I wanted to major in. I took Chinese Art and Modern Art. That was great fun. We went to museums and studied the paintings. Although I enjoyed it, I knew that I wouldn’t really be good enough to do it as a career. I also took a course in Russian Literature. I just loved the Russian authors, but I didn’t really want to learn Russian (which I would have needed).
It was almost the end of my second year, and I was running out of time to pick a major, so I looked around some more and settled on studying “Ancient Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations” at the Oriental Institute, because I already knew Hebrew. I studied the people that lived in Egypt, Israel, Turkey, Iran and Iraq some 5 thousand years ago. I specialized in ancient and Medieval Hebrew.
During my third year I had the opportunity to learn to play the harp. I had always wanted to play the harp, but my parents couldn’t afford one. However, in the same dorm was a fellow student who brought her harp to school and played the harp beautifully. She gave me lessons and a key to her room so that I could practice while she was in class. This was just wonderful. But it would be another 30 years before I owned my own harp.
Also studying at the Oriental Institute was Thomas (Tom) Logan. He was doing graduate work in Egyptology and since the Oriental Institute was very small, we were in some of the same classes. We got to know each other that spring and decided to get married the following September – just before my last year of college began. I now know that we didn’t really give ourselves enough time to get to know each other. But then I thought I was ready for marriage.
We had a very small wedding in my parents’ house – 25 people total. The ceremony took place in the living room and the dinner in the basement. It was intimate with only family and close friends. Tom and I lived in married student housing, which was a nice change from being in a dorm, but it was further from classes. Chicago gets really cold in the winter, and I felt that mile walk every day. I used to have to stop in doorways just to catch my breath. That winter there was a major snowstorm. The cars were buried in the snow and some of them didn’t come out for months.
That summer, Tom and I drove from Chicago to Carmel, CA where Tom’s family lived. We didn’t have a car, therefore, rather than fly (we couldn’t afford it) we signed up to transport a van for someone. We assumed we would get a good car, but what we got was a broken-down van, which made for an interesting trip. We invited my brother Keith, who was 10 at the time to join us. We had a great trip with him even though he ate such a limited diet. We camped on the way there.
Teaching pre-school – 1967/68
After I graduated, I wanted to continue my studies and was accepted into the Oriental Institute graduate program. But we couldn’t afford for both of us to go to graduate school. One of us had to work and since Tom was already two years into his PhD studies, we decided that I would get a part time job and go to school part time. I am not sure why, but after a couple of semesters I lost interest in getting a PhD at the Oriental Institute.
I decided to teach pre-school, but I looked so young that the director was worried that the parents wouldn’t trust me with their kids. She had me wear my hair up because she said it made me look older. I loved teaching – and I guess I passed the ability and the love down to Maggie, who was an awesome teacher. I also taught Hebrew at a nearby synagogue to make extra money. I taught for two years. Then when Tom received a good fellowship, we figured that we could afford to start a family.
1969 was a very exciting year. My brother, Joe’s wife Joan and I were both pregnant with our first children. Daphne was born in April. She was a very good baby and slept a great deal. When she wasn’t sleeping, she was playing and laughing. When Sean was born in September, I learned that all babies were not as complacent as Daphne. Sean slept little and cried before falling asleep and when he first woke up. But otherwise, he was delightful. Luckily, I lived half an hour by car from my parents and received lots of practical help and encouragement.
Joe, Joan and Daphne moved to New Jersey in June. Joe had finished his PhD in Physics and got a job at Bell Labs (which was the research arm of A T & T). He did research on computerizing voice commands. Siri and its predecessors are due to the research that he did.
In October, my younger brother Keith had his Bar Mitsvah. My mom hadn’t been able to talk me into a large wedding so instead she gave Keith a big bar mitzvah party. Joe and family came and Sean (6 weeks) and Daphne (6 months) met for the first time.
Although my family was only a short car ride away, Tom’s family was in Carmel, CA. Since we couldn’t afford to fly to visit, we drove 2,200 miles from Chicago to Carmel two years in a row. The first time we drove was when Sean was 9 months old. We only had 10 days to do the trip, therefore, we drove almost non-stop for 2 ½ days to get there, spent 5 days in Carmel and then drove back in 2 ½ days. With a baby the drive was short of torture.
The second trip was more leisurely, and we stopped in the Utah national parks and camped. We did some great hiking at Bryce, Arches and Zion parks. We drove to California by way of Yosemite Park. My sister-in-law Liz met us with the idea of camping in Tuolumne Meadows above the main park because it would be less crowded. It was still June and the roads through the park had just opened from the winter snows. We met Liz about noon and had a picnic lunch before picking a camping spot. Sean was busy throwing stones into the river and I was supervising him – Tom and Liz were about 20 feet away. The river was very cold and Tom joked with Liz that the only thing that would make him want to swim in the river was if a bear was chasing him. She said, “Don’t look now but there is a bear behind us.” He thought she was kidding until he turned around and saw a bear coming out of the woods, grab our cooler with the remainder of our lunch and run back into the woods. Tom ran after the bear, luckily didn’t meet the bear, just the cooler – without its contents. (We used that cooler for years with the teeth marks.) We decided that we would drive down to the main campground to protect ourselves from the bears.
Goodbye Chicago – Hello New Jersey
In the fall of 1971, Tom began teaching at Hunter College in NYC and we moved to Mountainside, New Jersey. Although we were now 800 miles from my parents, we lived only half hour from my brother Joe’s house. Sean and Daphne got to see lots of each other. It was hard to get used to living in the suburbs after living in Chicago and on a university campus. It was lonely. Therefore, when Sean was three, I signed him up for pre-school again and went to work there as a teacher. It was fun to be teaching again. We also joined the Unitarian Church; they were very welcoming to our religiously blended family.
In August 1973, I gave Sean an early birthday party because Maggie was due. During the party, I danced with the kids, and I think that this brought my daughter Margaret Elizabeth Logan to the world three weeks early on August 22nd. She was a tiny little thing weighing only 5 pounds 10 oz versus Sean’s 7 ½ pounds.
Maggie was named after four grandmothers: my grandmothers, Mindle and Aliza as well as for Tom’s grandmothers; Martha and Margaret. Luckily, Maggie was a really easy baby. She hardly cried at all. I guess she knew that I just didn’t have enough energy to cope with both kids if she had been difficult.
In the summer of 1974, we bought a house in Chatham Township, NJ. The house was on a dead-end street right near the Great Swamp. It was a dear little house. The neighbors were wonderful – I still keep in touch with the Moore family, who had 3 daughters. The oldest, Sue, was about 8 at the time, the middle daughter, Ruth, was 6 and the youngest, Leanne, was 4. Leanne became Sean and Maggie’s dear friend.
A couple of weeks after we moved to Chatham, Maggie decided to try a circus trick. She jumped out of her crib. I don’t know how she did it. She had never tried to climb out before and the rails were up. Sean and I were in the kitchen and all of a sudden we heard a big bang. We ran up the stairs and there was Maggie on the floor with blood all around. She had cut her forhead and it was bleeding like crazy. It required an emergency room visit, but she was just fine.
One of the perks of living inChatham Township was the town pool. It was really a large man-made lake (about three times larger than a regular pool). It had sand in the shallow end but still had great diving boards in the deep end. Since I was a teacher, I didn’t work in the summer. Sean, Maggie and I spent every nice day at the pool. Sometimes we would go to the pool in the morning, go home for Maggie’s nap around lunchtime and then return in the afternoon with a picnic dinner. Although our house had a backyard with a slide and swings, it was often too full of mosquitoes, being just steps away from the Great Swamp Reservation, to spend much time there in summer.
One memorable day, while Sean was six years old, he ran down a hill behind a friend’s house and somehow bit his tongue while running. It was bad enough that I had to hurry and pick him up and take him to the emergency room. A neighbor took care of Maggie until Tom got home, while I stayed with Sean overnight. He needed stitches in the morning.
In the winter of 1976, I had a harrowing trip from New Jersey to Chicago. My ex-husband, Tom had been in Egypt working and then was flying directly to Chicago to work on his PhD with his professor. He planned on staying with my parents in Skokie and asked me to meet him in Chicago in order to bring his books to Chicago. The books were very heavy and took a great deal of room in the suitcase. This is before the days of suitcases with wheels. To save money (which was not plentiful), we decided that the kids and I would take the overnight train from Newark, NJ to Chicago. It sounded like a good idea – get on at 5pm and get to Chicago at 9am. I packed some books and toys for Sean and Maggie while on the train and asked a friend to drive me to the train station in Newark, NJ (about 15 miles away).
Unfortunately, it snowed quite a bit that morning and she would only take me to the local commuter train station – (1 mile away) which would get me to Newark, but 1 mile away from the Amtrak station I would need to leave from. Normally this would not have been a problem, I would have taken one of the many taxis at the station. But because of the snow, there were no cabs and I couldn’t walk because Maggie was too young and the suitcases too heavy. So here I was at the local station, desperate to get to the other station. If I had been smart, I would just have gone home, and it would have been the end of the story. But instead, I asked some policemen who were parked at the station for help. They put me and the kids in the police car, put on the sirens and drove on the sidewalk (the street traffic was totally stopped) and got me to the train station on time.
Of-course my Chicago bound train was late. But I didn’t mind, at least I made it so far. Little did I imagine what a long trip awaited me. The train went very slowly because the train switches were frozen and we didn’t get to Chicago until about 5pm the next. I was so glad to get there and see my dad at the station. This was before cell phones therefore I had no way of knowing if anyone was picking me up. My parents booked my return to New Jersey via air.
In June of 1976, I went to Israel for two weeks, my first trip back in 20 years. Since I was a U.S. citizen, I took my U.S. passport with me. When I arrived at the airport in Israel, the passport control agent asked to see my Israeli passport. (My U.S. passport says, “Born in Israel”) I said that I was a U.S. citizen therefore I didn’t have an Israeli passport. They said that they would let me in but not out of the country without it. I spent 2 days of my 14 days in Israel, at the passport office trying to get it.
The rest of my visit was wonderful. I stayed with my aunt Pola and got to see my cousins. It was a very emotional experience for me to go back and see where I used to live. But mostly, it was exciting just to hear Hebrew spoken again.
By then, I had started studying for my master’s in accounting at Rutgers University. This was a 15 month program. It was very scary going back to school after a 10-year break. I had to learn how to study all over again, while taking care of two children. I had classes 4 days a week (Monday to Thursday) with full days (9 to 4) on Monday and Wednesday and 9 to 1pm on Tuesday and Thursday. On my day “off” I did lots of homework. Maggie was at daycare while I went to class.
The program had an eight-week break between December and February and I was able to get an internship at Nabisco in the accounting department. My first day at work was during an ice storm. I was one of very few who made it to work that day, but how could I stay at home on my first day. It was really scarry to drive, though. The internship was awesome and I was hired to start as a management trainee in the fall. Thus began a 25-year career at Nabisco.
I was the first management trainee hired with children; therefore, I knew I had to set a precedence so that other women would have this opportunity. This was not always easy since children have a habit of getting ill or getting into trouble. I was lucky to have good friends and neighbors who sometimes picked up my children or watched them when ill. Sean gave me some moments of stress.
For two years, in the 4th and 5th grades, Sean attended private school in Dover. He had severe dyslexia and this school was amazing. But the school was quite a few towns away and Sean had to take a train from Chatham to Dover. One week it rained very hard and the streets were flooded. Around 9 am I received a phone call saying that Sean and the other boy traveling with him were not at school. After doing some checking, we learned from the station master that since the van was not there to take them to the school from the station when they got off the train in Dover, they got on a train going back to Chatham. This is in the days before cell phones – so now I have to try to find them – where could they be? They had not called me or the other boy’s mom. It turned out that they walked the 2 miles from the Chatham train station to our house. They said that they had been told that all the roads were flooded and figured that the van would never get to the station. Actually, they probably thought it would be a fun adventure to be on their own and to have a day off from school.
Another time Sean added to my stress level, when he poked his eye with a pencil while at the school in Dover. Luckily, he was fine. But I did feel helpless from so far away.
Arrangements for Maggie during my first year were simpler. She went to an all-day kindergarten/childcare place. Maggie’s drama occurred in the summer when she was at the pool with her dad. While sliding into the pool, she cut her face near her eye. I met them at the hospital and held her hand while she was stitched up. Luckily it was less dramatic than Sean’s tongue incident, because we didn’t have to stay overnight. But it could have been disastrous if she had cut herself just a couple of inches nearer the eye.
In June 1979, my brother Joe got married to Ginny. The ceremony was held outside in Joe’s back yard. Ginny’s daughter, Tara, was a great addition to the family. She was Maggie’s age.
That fall, Tom and I separated and divorced a year later. I stayed in the Chatham Twp house with the kids. A couple of years later, Jerry and Stefan moved in with us.
In June of 1981, my brother Keith received his PhD in Physics from the University of Chicago. He was only 25 years old and one of the youngest Physics PhDs in the history of the University. He taught at the University of Minnesota his entire career. In addition, he was very sought out by other universities to come and give talks or collaborate. When he spent any length of time in France, we went for a visit.
That August, my brother, Joe and his wife Ginny had their son, Jordan. Not long afterwards, his sister Aliza was born.
In the spring of 1982, we moved from the Chatham Twp. house to Madison. I loved my first house, but it had only one bathroom, which was tough with 5 people. The Madison house was a 4-bedroom, three-bath bi-level house. It felt so huge in comparison to the Chatham house.
Later that spring, Keith brought home his wife, Silvana, whom he met during his time at the Cern Institute in Geneva. Keith and Silvana fell in love but would have dated for a while before committing to a marital relationship. However, Keith was coming back to the United States in a few months. Silvana tried to get a visa to get into the country to come with him but couldn’t. Therefore, they decided to get married so that they could be together. None of us were at the wedding because it happened so fast in Europe.
Since Keith got married in France, my mom gave him a wedding party, in the fall in Chicago. My brother Joe (who also lived in New Jersey) and I brought all our kids to this party. Mom and dad each spoke in front of all the guests. My dad was a very emotional guy, so he broke down crying during his speech. Keith was their baby.
Turning 40 felt like a major milestone in 1984. I threw a joint party with my friend Robin, who was turning 30. She was pregnant at the time and made us buttons: mine said, “I’d rather be 40 than pregnant” and hers said, “I’d rather be pregnant than 40”. Now that I have passed the 81st year mark, 40 doesn’t seem so old.
Spring 1986 gave us a new family member. My brother, Keith and Silvana’s first child, Jonathan, was born on March 31st. His sister, Lea, was born in 1989 and she was named for my dad.
In the summer of 1987, my mom was diagnosed with skin cancer. She was optimistic but lasted only four years after the diagnosis. The following year, 1988, dad was diagnosed with stomach cancer. He predeceased mom and died in May 1989. It was very hard to lose them, and I still miss them every day.
In 1989 Nabisco was taken over by KKR and the headquarters, which had been in Atlanta, moved to New York City with an opportunity for a promotion for me. Jerry and I moved to NYC in the spring of 1990 for a wonderful 30-year stint on the Upper West Side. This allowed me to go to the opera and the ballet often without the long drive home to New Jersey. By then, the kids had left home and Jerry had left Nabisco and was consulting with various companies.
Sean graduated from NYU’s hospitality program in 1992 and began his first career in food management at the Hilton in Alabama, where he met his first wife, Connie. Sean eventually transitioned to a career in procurement at IBM then at BP. Sean and Connie married in 1994 and had two children: Kyle in 1995 and Kaitlyn in 1997. Sean married Joy in 2013 and increased my grandchildren count with Noelle and Natalie. I will include some reminisces of my life with my grandchildren further in this narrative.
Both Stefan and Maggie took time off in the middle of their college years. Stefan travelled around the world for an entire year, while Maggie went to Israel, to stay and work at our cousins’ kibbutz for three months. I knew where Maggie was while she was away, but there were long stretches where I was not sure what was happening with Stefan. It was worrying.
Stefan graduated from Lewis and Clark in the spring of 1996. Post-college he worked at Nike, married Rachel in 2004. Together they worked and lived in Vietnam and Malaysia for two years and is technology when they returned to the U.S. Later, Stefan changed course and began his very successful clothing company, Bluffworks. Then in 2008, their son Jules was born. We were thrilled to have them live just a couple of blocks from us in NYC, giving us lots of time together.
Later in the summer of 1996, Maggie gave birth to Aaron. She continued with her psychology major at George Mason University and graduated in 1997. Maggie married Tyrone Paige in 1998. His son, Sean Paige joined our family. Maggie and Tyrone had Noah in 2000 and Trey in 2002. She continued with her education, receiving a master’s in special education and teaching Special Needs children for the next twenty years. She is currently helping her husband, Kevin Doyle, with his staffing company.
I retired in 2000 at the age of 55. Jerry was working part time but could take off when needed so that we could enjoy adventure travel. I had done international travel prior to that time, but now I look for interesting cultures to visit. I will not report on my trips here because they are available on Nili’s Adventure – Advice for traveling around the world.
We continued to live in NYC but in 2014 we bought a winter get-a-way condo in Naples, FL. We enjoyed the warmth so much that we sold our NYC co-op in 2019 and made Naples our full-time home. The Naples condo was only 3 blocks from the beach and within walking distance of restaurants and theaters. We loved being there but in 2023 we transitioned to the Moorings Park continuing care facility. Although we are no longer near the beach, we are near the philharmonic hall and shopping and only 10 minutes by car from the beach. This is a very lovely campus, and we have made lots of wonderful friends.
A bit more about me.
My main interests (other than family) are music, books and travel.
Music was very important in my family. My dad loved all kinds of instruments (he also played the trumpet), but he loved the violin best. He was never good enough for a real orchestra, but he played with great feeling and practiced a great deal. Often, we would play duets together (piano/violin). When dad retired, he used to practice 2 hours a day, 1 hour in the morning and 1 in the afternoon. I began piano lessons at age six. I gave up lessons at age 12, I believe as rebellion against taking me out of Israel. I returned to it as an adult and had lots of years’ worth of lessons in NYC. I had a short stint playing the harp in college. It was not until 1995 that I found a teacher, rented a harp and then bought my own harp. I currently take lessons from Dickie Fleisher who is the principal harpist at the Naples Philharmonic
My brother Joe played violin as a child and then the tuba. He received a master’s in music in addition to his PhD in Physics. My brother Keith had played piano and French horn. I continued the tradition by giving Sean piano and guitar lessons and Maggie piano lessons. She played the violin and flute at school. Stefan played the drums at band. I continued the tradition by starting all the grandkids on piano. Kyle and Aaron have continued to enjoy the piano. Noah has a lovely voice and has sung in various groups.
Books were also very important to my family. The likely gift for any holiday or birthday were books. My favorite childhood book was Lucy Maud Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables. My mom gave me the book, in Hebrew, when I turned 9 and told me that she read it in Polish when she was a child. My favorite adult author is Jane Austen. I was introduced to her books in college, and they have been my loyal friends. In 1985 I discovered that there was a Jane Austen Society. I began attending local and national meetings. I have been involved in the Society in various capacities now for 40 years and many of my dear friends are Janeites. My list of favorite authors is much too long for this write up. Maggie and I read Emma together and talk about other favorites.
I read to my children when they were small up to age 12. It was our precious down time. I also read with grandkids when they were small. Now that they are all adults, I have fun reading “adult” books with some of them. Kyle (and sometimes with his wife, Keiren) have been reading with me for 18 months. The books are serious and sometimes difficult. It has allowed us to bond and zoom on a weekly basis. Kaitlyn and I have also read a couple of books together. I hope to keep adding the other grands to the joint book readings.
Memorable events:
Above are the bare bone details of my life. I will now recount some memorable events with the kids and grandkids.
Visits with my parents: were always special. Mom and dad came out East to see us each year for Passover. It was wonderful for me to come home from work to a prepared meal and a clean house. Most summers we drove to Skokie to see them. But even more important was the time that Sean and Maggie had with their grandparents when they had them one-on-one in the summers. My parents were not able to do the active types of activities that I was lucky to do with my grands, but they were loving and warm.
Camping in Fire Island in 1983: Fire Island can only be reached by ferry, and we had to bring our tents, sleeping bags and cooking utensils with us on the ferry. When we landed, we had use of wagons to get to our assigned camping spot. On our first full day, it rained all day and all night. There is not much to do in the rain, and cooking was a challenge. We ate in the tent. The three kids played games until it got dark, then we all went to sleep. The next morning dawned with bright blue skies. The campground looked like a refugee camp with all of our wet clothes hanging out to dry. The rest of the week was picture perfect for being at the beach.
Traveling to Israel in 1985: Nabisco was going through a re-organization after its merger with Standard Brands, and it felt like a good time to take a three -week family trip to Israel. We could not afford 3 weeks of hotels; therefore, we brought our camping gear: tents, sleeping bags and cooking utensils. We rented a car and drove all over the country. We visited with my aunt Sara and uncle Mordechai in Arad, my cousin Yossi and family at Kibbutz Yad Hannah, as well as with family in Tel-Aviv. We did some fantastic historical sightseeing which included Jerusalem, Masada, Akko, Caesarea and the Galilee. I had been to some of the sites, but not to all. One fun experience was walking through Hezekiah’s tunnel. This tunnel was dug about 2,300 years ago from Jerusalem out of the walls to get water in case of a siege. Tourists are allowed to walk the length of the tunnel in which there is about a foot of water. It was an awesome experience to share my homeland with the family.
We also had “resort” time in Eilat, and in campgrounds along the Mediterranean. In Eilat, we took a day boat cruise on the Red Sea and crossed into Egyptian waters, which the kids were thrilled about. At the Dead Sea, we floated and enjoyed the unique experience.
But what is a trip without mishaps: In Eilat, Sean jumped off a bridge and landed on a sea urchin. The foot became infected but luckily, health care in Israel is excellent and extremely cheap. The ER doctor successfully took care of the needle.
Trips with the Grandkids: I took each grandchild on a trip when they finished 8th grade. Sean Paige chose Colorado Springs, Kyle chose Quebec City, Aaron and Noah – Boston, Kaitlyn- New Orleans and Trey – Hollywood. Each trip was fantastic. It gave me time to focus on each grandchild and give them new experiences in the bargain. I tried to have a mix of fun and learning embedded in the trip.
The grandkids also came to spend time with me in NYC. Maggie came with her boys each summer. Kyle and Kaitlyn, who lived in Poukeepsie, NY, would join us for some of the time. One memorable summer, when Kyle and Kaitlyn moved to Houston, they came while Maggie’s brood was there. I had six children sleeping on blow up beds and couches with just Maggie and I to supervise. It was a fantastic week, except for Kaitlyn’s allergy trip to ER.
There are many more wonderful adventures, but I will let my children and grandchildren write them up.
Becoming Us 