Wednesday, May 7, 2014

I want to tell you a story about perspective. It's a little long, but worth it, so get a cup of coffee.

Last year, on my 49th birthday, I am now sorry to say, I was not very "happy." I woke and said to myself, "and so I begin my 50th year on this earth." I felt my banged up knees crick as I got out of bed, groaned at the lines on my face when I looked in the mirror, and railed at the effects of time and gravity on my body as I put on my bra. I was old, and growing old was not going down easy for me. I was pretty sad about it. I spent most of the ensuing summer wrestling with it. Playing tennis, my knees were rickety, my shoulder ached, and I just didn't have the energy that I used to. Angry and bummed, I didn't want to accept getting old and I wasn't sure I could do this whole growing old thing.

Then on Labor Day I banged into a door jamb and broke my arm. It was the eve of first day of school, so we waited until morning, put the kids on the bus, and Justus, my husband, brought me to the Emergency room. The X-rays showed a lesion (tumor, growth, whatever you want to call it) in the bone, right where it broke. The emergency room doctor was afraid to come back in and tell us, but a very brave and kind hearted physician's assistant took a deep breath and explained what the X-ray showed. I knew it wasn't good. He tried to be positive, but I knew. We knew.

It turned out I had multiple myeloma, a rare blood cancer that usually appears in people much older than me. I thought about dying, leaving my husband, the man I adore, and my beautiful boys. I thought about my boys growing up without their mother and I was just sick! I thought about all of the things I still had to do. And finally I thought, "hey! I'm only 49!" Suddenly I wasn't so old anymore. Suddenly growing old wasn't such a bad thing, it became something I wanted more than anything. Everything had turned around on a dime. Or more accurately, on a fall.

I've spent the time since, doing everything I can to stick around for a few more years. This year I woke on my 50th birthday happy to be alive, getting good morning kisses and happy birthday hugs from all of my boys, (young and "old") the loves of my life. Though Justus and I spent the day at Sloan for more tests, X-rays, and another dreaded bone marrow biopsy, it was also filled with phone calls, text messages, inboxes, and Facebook posts from friends and family sending love and birthday wishes from around the country.

When we came home we found to my delight, gifts from my wonderful friends! The fig tree that I had been researching, obsessing over, and vacillating about for the past few weeks and a planter box full of my favorite herbs! If you know me, or have been to my house, you know I love plants, flowers and gardening! One of the bummers of my recuperation this year, is that I can not receive flowers, dig in the dirt, nor plant or tend a garden.

In the planter box was also a pair of gloves that had a name scrawled across them that we couldn't quite figure out. After puzzling over it for a while, and being the hipsters that we think we are, we finally decided that "phui" must mean phooey, kind of like "phat" is "fat", right? I try the glove on and look at the attached tags. Know what they say? "Peace, love & mud"! I turn the gloves around and now I can see it! Laugh my ass off, clear as day, they say "mud" once turned in the right direction! I laugh and laugh at how we could have missed that, and then I start to cry thinking about how lucky I am to have a such great friends and family, and finally, just to be alive.

It's all about perspective, isn't it?

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

In loving memory of my father, David Francis Yanolatos



My father has passed away.  His eighty five year old heart stopped beating on Monday afternoon. We will bury him on Friday. Truth be told, I believe we buried the heart of the man eight and a half years ago on a warm spring day, the day we buried my mother. They were married for fifty five years. He never came back from that. If he were made of normal stuff, he’d probably have passed on quickly, as so many older surviving spouses do. Not my father though, he was tough. I mean really tough.

He was a rock, and at times I thought his powers were almost mythical. I had a bad car accident when I was nineteen. Months later when I recovered, my dad insisted I get back behind the wheel. He rode with me as I drove back to school for the first time. I became terrified on the parkway. I tensed up and almost started to cry. He simply put his hand on my shoulder and said, “Relax baby. Daddy’s here. You know nothing bad can ever happen to you when Daddy’s here.” And I believed. Back then I knew, that while there was a breath in his body, nothing bad could ever happen to me if my dad was there. Just like that, my fear was gone. Such was my faith in my father and his super human abilities. Every child should grow with such deep rooted faith in their fathers, and their ability to love and protect us. I warn you though, it makes the adult discovery that he’s only human a harder pill to swallow.

He’d survived three heart attacks, a quadruple bypass, an aortic aneurism, prostate cancer, metastic cancer, congestive heart failure and emphysema. He succumbed in the end to pneumonia.

He had his first heart attack thirty five years ago. He was younger then than my husband is now. He was coming home from a particularly nasty work day. His heart attack began in the car.  He was a New York City Police detective and he’d gone through the mill at central booking that day.

There was a “kid” that was getting a really hard time from some of the other officers and the sergeant in charge. I never learned the circumstances of his arrest. All I knew was that my father said he “wasn’t right.” He berated the others and told them to lay off of the kid, because he clearly wasn’t capable of understanding what was going on. His true reward surely lies in heaven, but on that day, it was having the Sergeant make the simple booking process a nightmare of “up the stairs and down the stairs,” red tape, and frustration.  

Another time he got a letter from a man he sent to prison. The man thanked him. He said my father was the only man in his whole ordeal that treated him like a person worthy of compassion or respect.

I tell those stories because that’s how he was, and I find myself needing to be reminded of it. I thought he became very bitter when my Mom got sick, and it only got worse after she passed. When he was living, for some reason, I couldn’t cut him any slack for that. But in the two short days since he’s been gone, I suddenly have found the insight and compassion for my own father that he would have shown a kid he didn’t know from Adam. I knew I would have regrets, and I do. He had just become too difficult.

Difficult. Difficult is caring for my mother, his wife, as her mind slipped away from dementia. Difficult is repeatedly calming the love of his life when she was screaming at him to get away from her, because she thought he was some strange man. Difficult is going along with his new identity as “the boss” when he simply became that, and nothing more in her mind. One day, when she could still talk, my mom said, “He’s very nice, but God help him when Dave comes back and finds him here trying to be cutesy with me.” All of our hearts broke when it came to the point where she couldn’t even recognize herself in the mirror. But for my father, my fierce, fearless, tough as nails, strong as an ox father, it was his undoing.

That man’s myriad adventures included taking part in The French Connection (the real story, not the movie), and guarding Frank Serpico (who he did not like, but was not going to let anyone harm). He had fist fights and gun fights and he was the man who put the bullet hole in the marquis above the Gramercy Park Hotel.

He was a Radioman in the Navy, and a “gymnast, pool hustler, brawler, and bum” for the year after he got out. That was one of the best years of his life, he’d say. He was part of the 52/20 Club. When you got out after the war, you got $20 a week for 52 weeks. My father took his twenty down to the pool hall and parlayed it into five times that. He was living “the life.” Then he met my Mom, and turned his life in a new direction.

My grandfather, my mom’s dad, took him from the pool hall and taught him a trade. If he was going to marry my mother, he was going to have to mend his ways. My grandfather put the tile and slate roofs on many of the historic buildings that went up in New York City in the first half of the last century. He was an artisan really, from Germany.  I never met him but my father loved him dearly and respected him like no one else.

A bum no more, my parents got married and started a family. We were Bronx Irish Catholic and they proved it with the size of our family. They had six children together, who would have sixteen grandchildren and two great grandchildren (so far). 

Though he began a career in the service of New York City, he always worked two jobs. He continued to ply the trade my grandfather taught him on his days off from the City job. He and my uncle Carl did it together, and my brothers were recruited in as well as they grew older.  

He started working for New York City at the Sanitation department and then moved to the police department’s Emergency Service Division, on to beat cop, then detective, finally ending his career amongst New York City’s Finest as a second grade detective. I would tease him that he never made it out of the second grade. If the heart attack didn’t get in his way, I’m sure he would have made it to first grade, and then I really could have had some fun!

He was a good provider and none of us six children lacked for anything we needed, or most of what we wanted.  He was always working, so I would say we did miss out on something important, spending time with him. He wasn’t out throwing the ball around with us, or sitting helping with homework, he didn’t really have the time for that.  When he did take a day off for family stuff, he would pile us all into the station wagon for day trips, with –you’re not going to believe this - two or three of us in the way back with no seat belts!  As you can imagine, we didn’t take very many big family vacations with our very large family, but we had a great time right at home.

Our house was “the place to be” on our block, and our friends were always there. Our big old house in the Bronx had a big old yard to go with it. We had swings, a basketball court, and a pool with a slide. We had dogs, cats, ducks, fish, snakes, lizards, hamsters and at times even chickens! My mother called it a menagerie, and it was, for a house in The Bronx.  There wasn’t a stray anything that my mother wouldn’t take in, be it a pet, a wild animal or a person. My father would shake his head like he didn’t want to do it, but he always went along.  

He didn’t like credit cards. He always carried a huge wad of cash, and God help the unsuspecting mugger who tried to take it from him (even at eighty plus)!  

He always voted in every election, all of them. Rain, shine, snow or sickness, he showed up and voted. For most of his life he voted Republican, and was proud of it.

He and my mom would take me with them to the voting booths when I was young. They didn’t have to, they had built in babysitters in my older brothers, but they did. My mom would close the curtain and pull the levers. When I was able to read, she said “we don’t tell anyone who we vote for in here, especially Daddy, okay?” You see, Mom was secretly a Democrat.

In recent years, he found himself leaning more with the Democrats as well, but mainly he was disgusted with all of them. He said they were all crooks. The only difference was the extent of the thievery. He said “the Democrats just steal a little less.” I don’t know how he figured the math on that, but hey, he’s entitled to his opinions, and he had many!

Though he wasn’t a regular church goer, he was a righteous man, who always tried to do the right thing.  His idea of the right thing might be at odds with some, but he was from a different generation, a different world really. Socially, economically, technologically, and he had seen a lot of things in life that most of us never will.

When he’d have his friends from the police department over and they’d reminisce about their cases, telling war stories about crime in NYC, it was better than going to the movies! I remember him laughing at the end of one of them, saying “yeah, those were the good old days, before Miranda!”  I think he was only half kidding. Sometimes when one of his friends began a story, my father would stop him and say, “Anna (that’s what he called me back then), you have to leave for this.” Those of course, were the stories that I really wanted to hear!

He was a great lover of children and animals. One year my mom got a lamb from a farm for Easter dinner.  She actually picked it out. My father wouldn’t get out of the car. He sat in the car and yelled “Murderer” from the window. My mom was a great cook, but it was hard to enjoy the leg of lamb that year.

My mother always cooked for a crowd, and there always was one. Our place was “Grand Central Station,” as Mom would say, and it was. She and my father wouldn’t have it any other way. Thinking back now, it’s hard to believe he went from the man who welcomed everyone, who loved a good laugh and having everyone around, to the man who tried to drive everyone away in the end.

My father was a hard, impatient man. He demanded you do the right thing, and Lord help you if you didn’t.  He had a lot of goodness and kindness in him, but he was a hard man. Growing up I never thought he appreciated my mother properly. His word was law, and we all were to do as he told us, including my mother. I’m not sure I felt he was worthy enough of my mother.

When she got sick, he was transformed. He never left her side. He became infinitely patient, explaining the same things over and over. Feeding her, dressing her, taking her for the long drives that seemed to soothe her. She was slipping away and he didn’t know what to do to stop it. It broke him when he finally had to admit that he couldn’t take care of her at home any longer.

Even though she didn’t know who he was, he was there at the home to feed her every day. He wouldn’t go anywhere because he had to be there to feed her himself. When I tried to do it, he said I didn’t do it right. It was in his role as caretaker that I finally saw what had been true my whole life. He loved her to a breadth and depth that was impossible to measure.

When I was a young adult he once told me not to go on the endless search for perpetual happiness. He said people ruined their lives and the lives of others trying to hold on to it. Happiness, he said, was just a state of mind that would come and go throughout my lifetime. He told me to instead strive for contentment. “If you work hard, and do the right thing, you’ll be content with periods of happiness thrown in.” Like I said, I was young at the time, and I thought that was a very sad way to grab a hold of life, but as I’ve grown, I don’t think he could have given me any wiser words to get me through life’s hiccups.

I guess that’s what made him bitter. I see it now, all of the love he felt for her, and all of the regrets he had. After all, he had worked hard. He had done the right thing. He had muscled through life’s disappointments, been there for his friends and his family, and still the fates, or God, or simply a mass of plaques and tangles ate away at the mind of the love of his life and he lost her.

He never got over that. 

I hope he’s with her now, because I know that’s all he’s wanted since we lost her.

My father was many things. Hard, complex, stubborn, unforgiving, difficult, and flawed. But he was also funny, compassionate, righteous, loyal, honest, passionate and loving.

In the end, he was just a man, but he loved, and he was loved.

Friday, December 21, 2012

Drive-by politicians

Haven't posted in a while, doing the inventory of what was lost for the insurance company has consumed much of my free time over the past month when I am not working on repairing our home. I am just about wrapping that up, and now, lucky you, get to read my thoughts, hopes, fears,  experiences, nightmares and delights. It's a regular roller coaster over here lately!

So, I went to our Village Hall yesterday (Island Park’s new temporary one-- The one in a trailer because our village hall was wiped away along with all of our village records). I stopped in to drop off some Christmas Cheer for our hard working village employees, and discuss the message I received the day before from the City Manager of Long Beach. He said that he was happy to announce that Long Beach was the first recipient of a FEMA grant from Sandy. He said they received 24 million dollars through the work of Senator Charles Schumer. I was wondering if our village had received a FEMA grant as well. Of course everyone laughed. We are all very happy for Long Beach. They were devastated and deserve it, but no, we hadn’t received a grant from FEMA. I don’t understand that. 



Our village lost everything. Everything. Hearing my friend Rose tick off the list was like a smack in the face. We lost our library, our post office, our village hall. We lost all of our houses of worship. The Methodist Church, The Catholic Church, The Greek Orthodox Church, and The Jewish Synagogue. We lost our elementary school. We lost every business. All of it. I realized all of these things individually, but had never run the list down in my head or out loud. How can you hear that recitation and not shed a tear? 

How can you be aware of that and not show up for us when you are supposed to represent us? How do these shameless politicians drive right through our town to get to the photo op in Long Beach, and they don’t even get out of their cars for a simple “hey, how ya doin?” in Island Park? I learned yesterday that not a one of these politicians have stepped over the threshold of our new village hall (the trailer in the LIRR parking lot.) No, not even Dean Skelos who stood on my front steps, shook my hand, and asked for my vote the weekend before the storm. Not Ed Mangano, not our new rep (after redistricting) Carolyn McCarthy. Not Governor Cuomo, Charles Schumer, nor Kirsten Gillibrand. Not Anthony Santino, not Howard Kopel, and not Kate Murray. Well Kate did show up this past weekend for a half hour stop with Santa at the fire house, finally – 7 weeks after the storm! They have all been to Long Beach for their photos, and most have had to drive through Island Park to get there.

There are two “Hamlets” in our town’s zip code. Barnum Island and Harbor Isle. After it became apparent that those hamlets had been abandoned by anyone that could help them, our Mayor took on those hamlets as well. He, and we, all realized they were getting no representation from their town and county officials. Someone had to help them, so Mayor Ruzicka did. 

After watching all of the relief trucks bypass us for Long Beach, we are now watching all of the tractor trailers full of refuse cart the whole mess out of Long Beach, Lido Beach, Atlantic Beach, and Point Lookout. All of the aid came in through our town, and all of the garbage is leaving through our town, but not much stops in our town.

Shameless.

Monday, November 12, 2012


Care packages from The Salvation Army, the unsung heroes who've been here since the beginning!


The bleach was leaking, but hey, still works!

What are those strange wooden contraptions in there?







I'm going to have to explain and demonstrate how that clothes line and wooden clothes pins work to my children (and some of my friends!) Ya gotta love it! :)

Saturday, November 10, 2012

I am told there will be a warming station set up in town today. This will be a place with satellite television, chargers and heat. No word yet on a shelter with beds, but it is warmer now. The snow has melted and the temperature is supposed to be in the fifties today. Tomorrow the sixties!

I have to say our mayor and village employees are doing a great job cleaning up. The garbage trucks were out immediately in the aftermath. The guys were going around first collecting any garbage that they could determine had food in it. They were relentless, picking through garbage piles to find bags, boxes, anything that contained food which would draw rodents. That was no easy feat as people were pouring their homes into the streets!

     Most blocks in the village have had the pay loader treatment I explained yesterday, and it's not quite as depressing driving through them. I know the sidewalks will fill up again since a lot of people just left things as is until the insurance adjusters come. They are going to have mold problems. The  black mold was already creeping up the studs when we opened the walls.
     Our first floor is gutted now of everything below 27 inches. Many people had water up to the tops of their windows and will have to gut everything out. Others will just need to be bulldozed.








We drove over into Long Beach again yesterday and boy oh boy, they have a time ahead of them. It made me really appreciate what a great job our little village is doing ourselves.

More good news, the Red Cross has come to town! Hooray! They were driving the streets with hot meals for all of the people. People came streaming out of their houses for hot dogs, baked ziti and other meals cooked up by Southern Baptist Convention. The truck in our neighborhood had a Spanish speaking volunteer, and I found a very nice woman from Red Cross at the FEMA tent to help my neighbor.

The Red Cross has been kind of persona non grata in our town because they've been noticeably absent. The Salvation Army on the other hand, has been here big time, and they have become town favorites.

I spoke with one of the volunteers from the Red Cross and she said they were ready to go the day after the storm but weren't allowed to. That was very cryptic. What did she mean, they weren't allowed to? She said they have rules and regulations to follow and they need approval from Washington to move in. As a result they didn't get on the ground in Long Island until Saturday.
   
 The man who was driving the food truck said he'd spent days up on the North Shore feeding people with big cars and even bigger boats. He didn't understand why they weren't in our town sooner. Hey, we've got some pretty big cars and boats down here too,our boats are just capsized and our cars are underwater- like our mortgages! But hey,we all need to eat, right?

Understanding the workings of FEMA and the Red Cross is a job in itself. Everyone wants everything from FEMA but I've been told repeatedly, FEMA just pays. I still don't know why they can't pay for a generator for a shelter, but they don't, and the Red Cross doesn't have any. They do the food, the cots, hygiene kits, etc.
More later...


Aerial Photo's of Hurricane Sandy's destruction
"It's all just stuff"