Emotional Overload

So here we are, in NYC, a few hours before the ceremony we've been planning in honor of Asher.  We've had an intense time.  We came to America with our married daughter, her husband, and their three young children, and with our youngest daughter (a young woman nearly 25 years old).  We spent the first 5 days in Washington, DC, and stayed with my first cousin, a vigorous woman of eighty-two, filling her home with the commotion of small children.  In NY we've been split up between friends and relatives.

Even without the underlying reason for the visit - we would never have come to the US now were it not for the memorial ceremony - the logistics of this trip have been exhausting.  Just keeping track of three young children in the commotion of museums and shops was a daunting task, not to mention all the planning that went into it.

It was important to us to share our grief with our American relatives and friends, to give ourselves and them an opportunity of communicating face to face, not just via emails, letters, and telephone calls.

On Friday night we hosted a dinner for eighteen in an Italian restaurant on Amsterdam Avenue for friends who have come from out of town to attend the memorial today.  The guests are all special people to us - relatives and old friends.  It was comforting to see them.  No one really had to say anything direct or explicit about condolences.  That had all been said already.

Before the dinner, we attended Friday night services at Bnei Jeshrun, a trendy synagogue on the Upper West Side, where the services are accompanied by accomplished musicians, and the emphasis is on spirituality and social concern.  Judith and I both found ourselves on the verge of tears during the services.  The time that has passed has not diminished our sense of loss.  It has only taught us that we must continue living with it.