Saturday, October 18, 2014

Clara

Hey Everyone!!!



This blog is about a grandma of mine I do not know.  Her name was Clara.

Let me give a little background info on how I even know my bio dad's side of the family at all.

You see, it all started the summer before turning four years old.  My great-grandma Toby (Tosha was her real name. She was a Jew from Poland) passed away from cancer.  When she died, my grandma Eileen's  (Tosha's daughter) meddling sisters, wanted to sell my great-grandma's house and the business she ran (Called Toby Lee, a clothing store for women in Brooklyn), and of course the condo she owned in Puerto Rico.

My grandma Eileen insisted on buying it outright but her sisters were adamant on it and was like NO.  We will sell everything and split the profit into three.  Whatever.  The other two sisters already had all the money in the world.  WTF would they have wanted more money other than to see my grandma not succeed in life?  That's the way I look at things.

So my grandma, the pushover that she is, accepted their terms.  She took what little money she had left to find a place to live.  The cheapest she could find was a fixer upper house out in Long Island (I bet that was suggested by my aunt as she was in real estate at that time.).

In any case, I lived happily ever after there in a little town called Hewlett on Long Island.  But that was a past life.  My life turned to shit pretty much the summer before my ninth birthday.

Anyway, my real dad started looking for me when I was 13, though I have to laugh at that because he always knew where I was.  When I was 16, I saw him for the first time since I was two years old.

I saw him once more when I was 19, and actually got to meet his family.  I met his sister and his brothers....I even got to meet his parents.

They were speaking to me in Hungarian as if I was supposed to understand the language.  And according to my aunt, it was my grandma's fault for keeping me in hiding.

NO ONE WAS HIDING ME.  ANYONE COULD HAVE FOUND ME.

But alright, let's roll with that excuse and believe their lies.

So that's how I know about that family.  I have an aunt that I keep in touch with...er, well, somewhat, on FB.  It's more like I have to email her to find out what's new and even then no one knows anything.

Anyway, I guess my grandma was really sick and had been for sometime now.  She battled breast cancer and strokes?  I'm not sure about that last part.

Well on Wednesday October 1st, I got an email from my aunt stating that her mother had passed away on Monday.  I went looking at her profile and wouldn't you know?  Others knew about this before me.

Whatever....Doesn't bother me.

Or does it?

Because if it didn't bother me I wouldn't be writing it....Right?

It doesn't.  I really didn't know her and it's not like either one of us made an effort to go out and see each other.  Though I have to admit the times I was in NY I was without a vehicle but I offered several times to take a train out to see them.  I never heard back from them ever.  It was always some lame excuse as to why they couldn't see me.

Fine.

Because of them, I have learned to be truthful even if it hurts.  I'd rather someone be honest to me than to lie to me and I find out the truth later on anyhow.

What did I inherit from my grandma other than big boobs and psoriasis?

I knew nothing about her and will probably never know because they were all liars...

Although I was told that her name was Clara, spelled with a K.  I don't even know if Stern was their real last name.  I mean a German name in Hungary?

Well, that's all I have to say about that.

I really don't have much else to say about Clara and my bio dad's family.

Other than that I wish them well, and I have no ill feelings towards them.  They are who they are.  I either have to accept that, or walk away forever.

RIP Clara who I never knew...

~~DJ































Memoir, Random, Blog,

Comments