I am just days away from reciting Yizkor, the prayer of Remembrance, on Yom Kippur for the first time for both of my parents. Losing my Dad a few weeks ago marked the end of an era. As long as he was alive, I was still someone’s little girl, regardless of the fact that I just turned 54. His passing has also reopened the grief for my Mom, unexpectedly bringing back a renewed pain to a loss that happened six years ago. I now find myself a full-grown adult, yet carrying this strange feeling of somehow being orphaned.

My Mom left this world ready for her days to end, asking me, “How much longer, Rebeca?” after a battle with cancer. My Dad on the contrary, left abruptly, still craving more from life, with projects unfinished and giving me instructions from what would become his deathbed at the hospital: publish his latest book on antisemitism. It came out of the press the day of his funeral.

He wanted a lively event to hand the book out. Instead, in what became a celebration of his life before we buried him, we gave copies away, asking people to change from  “I’m sorry for your loss,” to a L’chaim, To Life. Defying Jewish mourning law on celebratory toasts during shiva, I sat on the floor, physically reminded of just how low life can bring you, when one of his friends handed me a shot of Macallan, his favorite single malt, coincidentally aged 18 years, the numerical value in gematria of chai: life.

Still in that phase of grief commonly referred to as denial, but which to me felt more like experiencing a split personality, erratically shifting from tears to laughter to anger, I went to our house in La Antigua Guatemala as soon as shiva ended. It is our home of more than 50 years of weekends and vacations,........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)