Monday, September 10, 2012
Dearest friends and family, I’m here to talk about my Bubbie a woman who devoted every single moment of her life to the happiness of her family. We deeply appreciate that you’re with us today to say goodbye and honor her in the best way we possibly can. It's still very hard to believe that she is gone. I am the youngest of ten grandchildren and my cousins and brother and sister have given me the deepest honor I will ever have bestowed on me – the opportunity to voice our immense love for our grandmother. I want to be honest, first, and tell you all that Bubbie spent time ensuring that every relationship she had with us was special, so although I have asked for everyone’s thoughts, I can’t even begin to come close to expressing what Bubbie meant to each of us individually. Bubbie was an angel on earth with a blonde bob, pink lipstick, and impeccable style. She was a woman who refused to be defined by her age. She loved her home – not because of what existed inside, but because it was the house that she watched her children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren grow up in. She was a woman of grace, of unwavering loyalty, of true honesty, and of immense strength – these characteristics came out in the way she carried herself, in the way she never missed a birthday, a graduation, a significant moment in our lives, in the way she always gave honest and real feed back, and in the way she always shielded us so much from her pain. And then, there’s the memory of our Bubbie with our Zaydie – this everlasting image of two people madly inlove perfectly completing each other. For them this love wasn’t just shared or reserved for themselves, it was given away to their family, to us. That was the way we grew up – with love as our glue, our connector. Our Bubbie made it that way. Today, 10 grandchildren are in this room together as a unit - holding each other for comfort and we’re like this because our idea of family was built on a foundation of love. We shared our lives with her and in turn she loved us entirely. She was there with us every step of the way… She had such power in silence. It was always her being there that mattered. When we fell ill she spent every moment visiting us, worrying about us, losing sleep over us. No matter the condition she was in – she made us her first priority. When we left on different life journeys she was last person we said good bye to before saying good bye to our parents. When we experienced different moments of accomplishment she was there and we felt her pride. Every single moment with our Bubbie was a moment filled with love from the depths of her heart and soul – and we felt that. So thank you Bubbie, for teaching us about love. For teaching us that in this world where we may live far from each other, where we may find distraction in our own issues, that love, in the end, is the only thing that matters. Her greatest gift to us was showing us how to push aside the little fights, the mistakes, and the moments of anger in order to enjoy the moments of shared celebration and of eternal friendship and love. Pirkei Avot or Ethics of Our Fathers tells us that any love that is dependent on something when the thing ceases the love also ceases. But a love that is not dependent on anything never ceases. So we know – we know - that her love will last forever. And, like all families, we have our own issues, because every one of us was created with our own voice, our own opinions, our own philosophy on life, but we shared something greater than anything else: our love for our Bubbie, Evelyn Flaxer. We love you forever.
