The Talmud says, “There are stars whose light only reaches the earth long after they have fallen apart. There are people whose remembrance gives light in this world, long after they have passed away. This light shines in our darkest nights on the road we must follow.”
My Granduncle Gilbert was my bright, shining star in cashmere. If he were with us now, he would light up the room, wanting everyone to smile. He would not want us to focus on the sadness of his death, but instead look at the happiness we still have in our lives. He would want us to look at each other and appreciate what we have together and what we hope to make better.
After all of my grandparents passed away, my Auntie Lillian and Uncle Gilbert stepped up to the task, filling the empty space as my grandparents. I had always loved them, but now, I loved them even more, because as a little kid, they were going to be around forever. However, as I recently learned, time is of the essence.
Although I can no longer see my Uncle Gilbert in person, his memories will stay alive in me forever. I remember cruising down the highway in the white convertible with the top down and thinking “Wow, I have the coolest uncle ever”. And I remember falling down the stairs at his home in Lexington and hearing Uncle Gilbert yell “uh oh, we need a doctor” and sure enough, I needed stitches on the back of my head. I was so mad that night, not because I needed stitches, but because I missed ½ a night of being with him.
I remember when I was a little girl, playing with Lexi on Rosh Hashanah, trying to tie-dye a scarf outside, but accidentally tie-dying the whole back patio instead. I could tell by the look on my Uncle Gilbert's face that he was mad, but not once did we hear him raise his voice. After that incident, Lexi and I spent what seemed like hours trying to scrub the patio, and when we got tired-- our dads took over for us. I don’t think I’ve been outside on that patio since then.
I remember every Rosh Hashanah, my Uncle Gilbert and Auntie Lillian would save an extra batch of the hot dogs in dough for when I arrived. It was also one of these special nights that my Uncle Gilbert told me to “Have a party and invite my pants to meet my shirt”. Since then, that term has become one of the most frequently used phrases in my house.
Not more than two months ago, I went to visit my Uncle Gilbert. It was a week or two before he was going to Israel, and I knew that I would miss him. I knew that this visit was one that I would never forget, but not for the reason I hoped. It was during this visit to Lexington that I learned to play my first real chess game. My Uncle Gilbert was so patient and calm, even when I continually asked what each piece did. I wanted my Uncle Gilbert to win so badly, so when my dad would help me with a move, I’d do the opposite. Unfortunately, I ended up winning somehow, but I told Uncle Gilbert that he was the real winner because he taught me how to play. Little did I know that this visit would be the last of its kind.
Before we left each other, he told me how much he loved me, and I reassured him that I loved him more. We never knew when it might be the last time we got to tell each other that we loved one another.
On Sunday, May 20th,I found out that my Uncle Gilbert was not doing well, so I went to say my goodbyes. When Ronda told him that it was me who came to visit, he took my hand, and kissed it, while looking at me with his “I love you” eyes and a big smile.
Uncle Gilbert, I will miss your sweet kisses, and the arguments we had about who loves who more. I will miss your tremendous hugs and your voice. I will miss your bushy eyebrows rubbing against my face when you kiss my cheek and I will miss your calls at the end of a bad week. But most of all, I will miss visiting you and your cashmere sweaters. You were such an amazing person who will never be forgotten by any of us here on earth. Although this seems like goodbye, it is not. This is your Kelly saying see you later. I love you, Uncle Gilbert.
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Rabbi Ilana Garber’s Sermon with a Tribute to her Uncle Giggy
Shavuot – Ruth Sermon 5767
And a Tribute to Uncle Gilbert Garber z”l
Rabbi Ilana C. Garber
(with help from Lori Lefkovitz)
The story we just heard is about moving on in life and through life. From loss, desperation, and pain, a woman who calls herself bitter in place of pleasantness, we eventually reach hope, love, faith, future, redemption, and the birth of a child.
I am struck by how far this story stretches into the past before and the future beyond these episodes in the life of a widow and her daughter-in-law.
Consider Naomi, a woman whose past we know little about. She becomes a widow within the first few sentences of the book. We have only to imagine the characters of her husband and two sons in order to fully understand the void their deaths leave in her life.
And for Ruth and her newborn baby, Oved, we must imagine the fullness of his life, blessed to have a mother and a surrogate mother in Naomi. All we know about him is that he becomes the grandfather of King David.
It is as if, on this long timeline, someone placed a magnifying glass on a single tiny dot on the line, on a time in which two women who survived great personal losses befriended one another and found a way to move on, redeeming us all through their promising new baby.
Isn’t it just amazing how compressed a life becomes after death. Just weeks or months after a person dies we no longer remember the subtleties of their life. Instead, we report the same little stories, the funny character traits, and the oft-repeated phrases. We reduce a person to loving a certain color, always eating the end of the brisket, or never missing a football game. We tend not to dwell on the person’s past – what came before. And in our loss, we tend not to focus quite yet on the future, the legacy that person has left for us.
And yet, that is what we ultimately must do. We are all tiny dots on the timeline that extends far into the past and far into the future. We may be ultimately compressed into trite details, but we represent so much more and that is what we value in ourselves and our loved ones.
When we come together for Yizkor we affirm this. Like Ruth and Naomi, we comfort each other, proving to ourselves and each other that we all suffer loss, we all know pain at some time, and yet, we all live to endure, to move on, to live, and to see the future carried on in our name and our legacy. That’s why we have children, or become teachers, or write books, or whatever else you have done to leave a legacy. That is why we all cling to life.
Imagine what it would be like to tell Ruth and Naomi what they eventually become, that they lead to King David and then eventually to us? What if you could jump into the book of Ruth to encourage them in their time of great loss and pain that their enduring it all will one day be “worth it.” To convince them that their rich past does not end with them, but that their strength leads to our future. For instance, I’d love to show Ruth how countless Jews by Choice see her as a role model.
And how often do we wish we could tell our deceased loved ones what we have become, that we could show them diplomas, pictures of grandchildren, and other forms of accomplishment that they did not live to see? When we continue to live, to move forward, to dance through life, we are ever more aware of those who are no longer with us. And that pain is felt even as we celebrate life’s happier moments.
Moving forward, we look to the past. We give our children the names of their ancestors and then we see characteristics develop that remind us of our loved ones. Knowing that history repeats itself we notice family trends, relationship patterns, even common interests spanning generations. Life is enduring, God is enduring, memory is enduring in one way or another. We are but a speck on this long line, this chain of tradition.
I must pause in my written word for just a moment. When I was writing this on Tuesday, I received a call telling me that my great uncle had died. While he was blessed to know his wife for 70 long and wonderful years, it is hard to believe this patriarch has died. It was too new and too raw for me to formally insert details about him into this sermon, as his funeral is going to be held tomorrow, but it seems so fitting to share with you something about my Uncle Gilbert, Uncle Giggy as we called him, in order to illustrate the points I have been making.
My uncle was a historian. But not the kind of historian that reads lots of books. No, my uncle had one primary book – the phone book. Wherever he went – from Virginia to Vilna – my uncle would open the phone book, look for anyone with the last name Garber or Gawenda or Galinsky, our other family names, and he would call them up – every person he found – and invite them to his hotel lobby so they could meet, share family histories, and so that he could take a swab of their cheek cells so that he could test their DNA to see if we were really related. My uncle did this for his whole life – and he linked the family together in so many ways through this project.
Uncle Giggy then took all of the names and put them on a family tree – a big scroll that runs from one side of this sanctuary to the other. He has, at times, shown me where my name is, and he recently told Adam, my fiancé, that his name would be added to the tree after our wedding. The gift Uncle Giggy gave us all by this genealogy project and family tree is to show us that we are all specks on that timeline. We know who came before us and that there is room for many more to come after us. We have the gift of an extended family, and the blessing of someone who cared so much for family and taught us all to care. That is what I have learned from my Uncle Giggy, and in this holiday of Shavuot, when we joyously celebrate so much, I am keenly aware of these blessings as well as of the pain of not seeing him in this world again.
In the midst of our joyous holiday of Shavuot we pause, we interrupt our joy of receiving the Torah, to acknowledge the absences that may compromise our celebrations. Just like the shattering of a glass at a wedding that reminds us of pain amidst great joy, we are reminded of our loss even while we celebrate. And in that, we are reminded of our own frailty, our mortality, and how life is so short, so precious.
Naomi and Ruth left behind the remains of husbands and children in order to start over, and what they carried in their hearts and bodies we will never know. What we know that they never knew is that their moving on in life carried the promise of blessing for all of us. The Book of Ruth triumphs over death by giving us the widest possible perspective on life. The way we honor the dead is to live with the conviction that our lives are infinitely promising no matter how grim things may seem. We live knowing that the promise of our own futures is partly owed to the many, often intangible ways that our departed have shaped who we are.
And so we remember them, pausing in the joy of our holiday to acknowledge from where we have come, what made us who we are, and to ponder what we one day might leave behind to others. Yizkor. We remember. Please turn now to your Yizkor booklets, page 4.
And a Tribute to Uncle Gilbert Garber z”l
Rabbi Ilana C. Garber
(with help from Lori Lefkovitz)
The story we just heard is about moving on in life and through life. From loss, desperation, and pain, a woman who calls herself bitter in place of pleasantness, we eventually reach hope, love, faith, future, redemption, and the birth of a child.
I am struck by how far this story stretches into the past before and the future beyond these episodes in the life of a widow and her daughter-in-law.
Consider Naomi, a woman whose past we know little about. She becomes a widow within the first few sentences of the book. We have only to imagine the characters of her husband and two sons in order to fully understand the void their deaths leave in her life.
And for Ruth and her newborn baby, Oved, we must imagine the fullness of his life, blessed to have a mother and a surrogate mother in Naomi. All we know about him is that he becomes the grandfather of King David.
It is as if, on this long timeline, someone placed a magnifying glass on a single tiny dot on the line, on a time in which two women who survived great personal losses befriended one another and found a way to move on, redeeming us all through their promising new baby.
Isn’t it just amazing how compressed a life becomes after death. Just weeks or months after a person dies we no longer remember the subtleties of their life. Instead, we report the same little stories, the funny character traits, and the oft-repeated phrases. We reduce a person to loving a certain color, always eating the end of the brisket, or never missing a football game. We tend not to dwell on the person’s past – what came before. And in our loss, we tend not to focus quite yet on the future, the legacy that person has left for us.
And yet, that is what we ultimately must do. We are all tiny dots on the timeline that extends far into the past and far into the future. We may be ultimately compressed into trite details, but we represent so much more and that is what we value in ourselves and our loved ones.
When we come together for Yizkor we affirm this. Like Ruth and Naomi, we comfort each other, proving to ourselves and each other that we all suffer loss, we all know pain at some time, and yet, we all live to endure, to move on, to live, and to see the future carried on in our name and our legacy. That’s why we have children, or become teachers, or write books, or whatever else you have done to leave a legacy. That is why we all cling to life.
Imagine what it would be like to tell Ruth and Naomi what they eventually become, that they lead to King David and then eventually to us? What if you could jump into the book of Ruth to encourage them in their time of great loss and pain that their enduring it all will one day be “worth it.” To convince them that their rich past does not end with them, but that their strength leads to our future. For instance, I’d love to show Ruth how countless Jews by Choice see her as a role model.
And how often do we wish we could tell our deceased loved ones what we have become, that we could show them diplomas, pictures of grandchildren, and other forms of accomplishment that they did not live to see? When we continue to live, to move forward, to dance through life, we are ever more aware of those who are no longer with us. And that pain is felt even as we celebrate life’s happier moments.
Moving forward, we look to the past. We give our children the names of their ancestors and then we see characteristics develop that remind us of our loved ones. Knowing that history repeats itself we notice family trends, relationship patterns, even common interests spanning generations. Life is enduring, God is enduring, memory is enduring in one way or another. We are but a speck on this long line, this chain of tradition.
I must pause in my written word for just a moment. When I was writing this on Tuesday, I received a call telling me that my great uncle had died. While he was blessed to know his wife for 70 long and wonderful years, it is hard to believe this patriarch has died. It was too new and too raw for me to formally insert details about him into this sermon, as his funeral is going to be held tomorrow, but it seems so fitting to share with you something about my Uncle Gilbert, Uncle Giggy as we called him, in order to illustrate the points I have been making.
My uncle was a historian. But not the kind of historian that reads lots of books. No, my uncle had one primary book – the phone book. Wherever he went – from Virginia to Vilna – my uncle would open the phone book, look for anyone with the last name Garber or Gawenda or Galinsky, our other family names, and he would call them up – every person he found – and invite them to his hotel lobby so they could meet, share family histories, and so that he could take a swab of their cheek cells so that he could test their DNA to see if we were really related. My uncle did this for his whole life – and he linked the family together in so many ways through this project.
Uncle Giggy then took all of the names and put them on a family tree – a big scroll that runs from one side of this sanctuary to the other. He has, at times, shown me where my name is, and he recently told Adam, my fiancé, that his name would be added to the tree after our wedding. The gift Uncle Giggy gave us all by this genealogy project and family tree is to show us that we are all specks on that timeline. We know who came before us and that there is room for many more to come after us. We have the gift of an extended family, and the blessing of someone who cared so much for family and taught us all to care. That is what I have learned from my Uncle Giggy, and in this holiday of Shavuot, when we joyously celebrate so much, I am keenly aware of these blessings as well as of the pain of not seeing him in this world again.
In the midst of our joyous holiday of Shavuot we pause, we interrupt our joy of receiving the Torah, to acknowledge the absences that may compromise our celebrations. Just like the shattering of a glass at a wedding that reminds us of pain amidst great joy, we are reminded of our loss even while we celebrate. And in that, we are reminded of our own frailty, our mortality, and how life is so short, so precious.
Naomi and Ruth left behind the remains of husbands and children in order to start over, and what they carried in their hearts and bodies we will never know. What we know that they never knew is that their moving on in life carried the promise of blessing for all of us. The Book of Ruth triumphs over death by giving us the widest possible perspective on life. The way we honor the dead is to live with the conviction that our lives are infinitely promising no matter how grim things may seem. We live knowing that the promise of our own futures is partly owed to the many, often intangible ways that our departed have shaped who we are.
And so we remember them, pausing in the joy of our holiday to acknowledge from where we have come, what made us who we are, and to ponder what we one day might leave behind to others. Yizkor. We remember. Please turn now to your Yizkor booklets, page 4.
Gil’s Obituary from The Boston Globe, May 25, 2007, Page D19
Gilbert Garber, 83, executive in family's travel company, auto school
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By Bryan Marquard, Globe Staff | May 25, 2007
A decade ago, Gilbert Garber traveled to Jerusalem to gather with far-flung members of his family, who had spread to 18 countries.
"In thinking of arranging a family reunion, it occurred to me that I might plan a party to which no one would come," he wrote afterward in an essay posted on the Internet. He need not have worried. More than 50 relatives from 10 countries spent three days together in May 1997, sharing memories and securing the bond between families of different eras and disparate cultures.
"Our past is part of what we are today, and our children's future is being built on today's present," he wrote, adding: "As an archeologist uncovers places and things, the physical properties of the past, we were uncovering people . . . giving them life, personalities, faces, and stories."
Mr. Garber, an executive with his family's Garber Travel and Garber Auto School businesses for decades, died of prostate cancer Tuesday in his Lexington home. He was 83 and had previously lived in Belmont before retiring in the early 1990s.
The youngest of five, he grew up in Dorchester and Roxbury and spent much of his childhood in the Fields Corner neighborhood. His father's family was from Lithuania; his mother's from Poland.
When he was 13 he went to a friend's house after school one day and met the boy's sister, Lillian Waldman. They quickly became friends and married six years later, in 1943, just before he shipped out to serve in military intelligence with the Signal Corps.
"We were separated for 2 1/2 years," she said. "We wrote each day to each other. I still have all his letters."
Back home after World War II ended, Mr. Garber began taking college courses and working for the businesses his oldest brother, Bernard, had founded, but work soon consumed his time.
"His brother had started the driving school and the travel agency, figuring that the auto school -- with the automatic [transmission] -- wasn't going to live long," his wife said.
Mr. Garber was a driving instructor and administrator at the driving school and was appointed by Governor Endicott Peabody to the Governor's Highway Safety Committee. He served in various capacities in the travel agency through the years as executive vice president, president, and partner.
In 1963, he helped found the International Congress and Convention Association, which helped travel agencies become more involved in the burgeoning market for meetings in other countries. Along with the business opportunities, Mr. Garber wanted to encourage peaceful international gatherings, said his son, Stephen, of Boynton Beach, Fla.
"By doing this, he was connected to presidents and ministers of tourism throughout the world through our humble home in Belmont," his son said.
The work often took Mr. Garber out of the country. He always traveled with his wife, and they visited 25 countries.
"We met kings; we met princes; we were in castles," she said. "It was a very fascinating situation. We were always together and recognized together. I took part in everything in his life. He was a very special man."
"The love that he and my mother had together set an amazing example," their son said. "He showed us how to be attentive, loving, caring, devoted. He would buy my mother flowers every Friday night for the Sabbath. If he couldn't get them, he would have them delivered."
At 65, Mr. Garber retired and returned to the education he had left unfinished, attending Boston University and inviting students from classes to his house to compare notes. He graduated in 1993.
"It was a beautiful thing, because he was such an influence on the younger people," his wife said. "And they all came here to study for their exams."
In retirement, Mr. Garber was a trustee for Massachusetts Bay Community College and chairman of the trustees for Potter Pond Association, a residential organization in Lexington. He advocated for wiser use of utilities to lessen the impact on the environment in Lexington and in Eastman, N.H., where he had a vacation home.
Much of his time, however, was devoted to genealogy. Through his efforts, the family tree now includes about 1,600 names, family members said, including 484 who perished in the Holocaust.
"Genealogy is family history. In our case it is also world history," he wrote in an essay, posted on the Internet, about a 1994 trip to the homelands of his ancestors. The visit included a journey to places where extended family members were killed.
"It doesn't matter how many movies one sees, how many books one reads; nothing has the same impact as visiting, in person, Birkenau and Auschwitz," he wrote. "In Birkenau the barracks still stand in endless rows. Where they don't, the chimneys of the barracks stoves are still in place giving an eerie reality of what being there must have been. It defies one's imagination. The Auschwitz of the Holocaust is contrasted with the Auschwitz of today by green grass and a peaceful almost idyllic setting of solid brick barracks buildings, belying the terrible tragedy that took place there every day. The bodies are no longer there; the ashes and the ghosts are."
When Mr. Garber was close to his own death, he spoke with his wife, whom he had befriended 70 years earlier.
"I got to see him ask permission to go from my mother, and she gave it with love and with a blessing," their son said.
Besides his wife and son, Mr. Garber leaves two daughters, Linda Sagiv of Hof Hasharon, Israel, and Ronda Jacobson of Newton; his brother, Alfred of Falmouth and Palm Springs, Calif.; three grandsons; two granddaughters; and a great-granddaughter.
A funeral service will be held at 10:30 a.m. today in Temple Emunah in Lexington. Burial will be in Sharon Memorial Park.
© Copyright 2007 Globe Newspaper Company.
Monday, May 28, 2007
Gil’s Trip to His Roots (Apr-May 1994)
A few pictures from Gil’s trip that fulflled his compulsion to return to the shtetlach of his father’s youth—to Palushe, Ignalina, and Shvintzian (now, Svencionys).
Gil’s Report of Major Milestone in Quest to Assemble His Family’s Genealogy
Gil’s primary dedication was to his family and, in furtherance of that, he was the family genealogist—continually striving to capture all the information he could on his extended family. One of his many major accomplishments in that long-time goal was a family reunion he organized in 1997 and held in Israel. Here is the report he prepared to describe that momentous event.
FAMILY REPORT OF THE REUNION IN ISRAEL
Kiryat Anavim, Jerusalem
May 1–4, 1997
In thinking of arranging a Family Reunion it occurred to me that I might plan a party to which no one would come; or maybe it would be a war where all involved would be on the losing side. Yet, not to plan a Reunion would be to forego the completion of the circle which started when my uncle, Max Garber, first organized the original family tree, graphically drawn by my brother Sumner and cousin Bernie Copans, all of blessed memory. I first met Joel Levy in Johannesburg when he was 8 years old. He was committed even at that young age to discovering everything about the Gavendo family. Three decades later we coordinated our family efforts.
Having pursued the family information over the ensuing 40 years, having seen it to fulfillment (though as a dynamic of family life it will never really be completed), having experienced our trip of three years ago to the places of our origin in Lithuania, could I really stop now?
So, with my neck stuck out, with my reputation as a professional meeting planner at stake, with the cooperation and expert advice of our daughter and her husband, Linda and Menachem Sagiv in Israel, we proceeded. With great optimism we reserved 25 rooms for three days, seven rooms for an additional day. I reasoned that if we realized 40 participants we’d be successful. But would the support be there to fulfill our plans to bring Bluma Katz and Josif Gavendo from Lithuania and to cover the myriad of costs related to staging a meeting, to support the updating of the family genealogy information (the Blue Book), to arrange proper memorials to those of the family who fell in the Holocaust, to plant a Jewish National Fund (JNF) Garden? Would anyone’s imaginations, other than our own, be captured? Would others share our sentiments that this would be a last-chance opportunity to explore our roots, to hear our family story at first hand, to realize all of this in the surroundings of Jerusalem?
In a recent article in The Book Peddler, the author writes about her activities in helping people learn of their roots saying, “Sometime it is only a narrow interest in their family names. But on an intellectual level it is much wider and deeper. For the intellectual things which happened…generations ago are part of their intellectual heritage, of their intellectual identity. You cannot live knowing only what happened to you.” Our past is part of what we are today, and our children’s future is being built on today’s present.
And what was to be the goal of a Reunion, what did we hope to accomplish? Was there not some way that we could acknowledge our forebears…especially those who lost their lives in the Holocaust? Are they to go unremembered by those more-fortunate family members? Was not their sacrifice the foundation on which our lives were built…the foundation of the very existence of the State of Israel? Would not the coming together itself of distant family members be a fitting tribute to their memories?
Did anyone share our sense of history, that the story of our family, now dispersed in 18 countries, in every continent of the world, was, in fact, the story of the Jewish people? Did anyone share our sense of excitement in learning how we got our family name, of discovering siblings and other relatives of our great grandparents, of learning of the connections with others who share our family name who came from the same shtetlach?
Obviously, everyone’s interest is not piqued by every question. Choose which applies to you. But in the aggregate, the answers to the questions posed were, “Yes, Yes, a resounding Yes!!!
When we departed for Israel we had more than met our minimums. More than 50 people were coming from 10 different countries. All who were coming from the Diaspora were related. Our minimum budget requirements had been met, thanks to broad support and a most generous contribution from our Colombian Gilinski cousins. Their contribution alone guaranteed Bluma’s and Josif’s participation. We had payment in hand sufficient to plant 150 trees in the Gilinsky/Gavendo Garden. Once in Israel and adding in the participation of those residents there, the final registration was 92. Gilinsky’s and Gavendo’s both known to us and unknown to us, were calling…can they come? While a few of the registrants had to cancel at the last minute, their spaces were filled by others including grandchildren and great grandchildren, once the elders saw what was taking place.
Success was evident from the first evening’s event on May 1. After a period of time for an informal coming together, there were introductory remarks, followed by a representative of each family coming forward to the microphone to introduce their family, tell of their connection, and whatever else they chose to say. Registered were relatives from the USA, Canada, England, Scotland, Holland, Estonia, Lithuania, Colombia, South Africa, and Israel. Mark Galinsky from Toronto had just been to Israel but was in Greece. Could he come? Dr. David Galinsky from Beer Sheva, Israel, planned to spend a few hours. He was leaving the country but spent more than 24 hours, leaving directly for the airport. David Galinsky, originally of Leeds England, now of Jerusalem, came to see. He summoned his newlywed sister and brother-in-law, and David returned…and returned…and we found the connection between his family and that of Isaac’s of Capetown, descendants of Abraham Gilinsky. And that’s how it went.
On Friday morning we made our pilgrimage to Yad Veshem. After a brief tour, we had our own family ceremony in the Hall of Remembrance. Our daughter Ronda Jacobson had prepared a reading of poems of the Holocaust written by children from various lands. Interspersed between the reading of the poems, the younger generation among us read the 162 names of those known at the time to have been lost from our family in the Holocaust. (Subsequently, an additional 42 family members were identified.) The readers were Joel Levy of South Africa and London, Robin Sadavoy of Canada, Rose Louer-Galinsky of Holland, Kim Leonard of New York, and two of my Israeli grandchildren, Toby and Nadav Sagiv. And then those who did the reading, led by Toby still in her army uniform (she had just joined us from her base) marched in procession to the eternal flame and laid a commemorative wreath. We all then recited the Kaddish. All were overwhelmed by emotion.
As we were about to board our bus, our guide/translators asked for the chance to speak to the group. They thanked us for allowing them to be part of a most-meaningful family tribute. As we were there on the week-end of the observance of Yom Hashoa, they expressed that we had captured the true meaning of Yad Veshem and especially so, by our involving the younger generation. The younger ones thanked us as well for including them in our ceremony. It was a very rewarding experience.
We returned to our kibbutz hotel where our sessions began. The Family Blue Book, now a compilation of all Gilinsky and Gavendo families known to us, was explained in detail using transparencies and an overhead projector. It’s a complicated book, but worth the time necessary to comprehend its format and contents.
Bluma then told the riveting story of life in the shtetl of Shvintzian, one of the key places of our family origin. (Palushe and Ignalina are two of the others.) Bluma lived in Shvintzian before the war and returned there after it. In 1937 she and her husband were apprehended and questioned about anti-Communist activity. Her infant child was taken from her. She was told that all she had to do was to confess to the charges and she would be set free. She recognized that would not be the case and, besides, she could not confess to what was not true. After months of interrogation under the most difficult conditions she was sentenced to 10 years in the gulag, to a mining camp far beyond Siberia, perhaps 35 miles from the Japanese border. She was never again to see her husband. She, and the other prisoners had no contact with the outside world. She knew nothing about the war, nothing about her baby daughter. After completing her sentence she had to stay in the area of the camp long enough to earn sufficient funds to pay for a ticket to return to her home town. She located her child who had been reared by the Communists. To this day, her daughter now a physician in Vilnius, can not be dispelled of the notion that her mother abandoned her. She refuses any contact with Bluma.
Bluma’s mission became that of finding out what had happened in our shtetl. How, in this predominately Jewish town, could there have been an uprising by neighbor against neighbor, friend against friend. She went from farmhouse to farmhouse, from door to door, asking what people had seen, where, how? She did find out that the uprising incurred spontaneously on one day, primarily by the Lithuanians, with some Germans alongside. She was told of the location in the forest where the killings took place. It was she who organized the party of survivors to arrange a fitting burial mound to mark the location of the mass grave…the one where so many of our family are buried. There is so much more to her story, more appropriately to be told at another time. On her return home she is to be interviewed for Spielberg’s Shoah Project. Her story will be recorded as part of the permanent record of the Holocaust. Bluma still lives in Shvintzian, determined to stay on, to serve as the historian of the area, to tell the story to all who visit. Perhaps, too, as an act of defiance, that neither the Nazis nor the Russians prevailed. One can only wonder what would have been our fate if our elders had not emigrated from that shtetl.
Then it was Josif’s turn, and he didn’t disappoint us. He was able to connect people in the audience. He was able to remind them of family events and places of their childhood. Since our visit of three years ago he had done further historical research on the origins of our family names: Gilinsky and Gavendo. His investigations have lent authenticity to his previous stories. He could have gone on…and on…and he did. Fulfilling our hopes of a personal recounting of our family story, bringing it alive.
His stories encouraged others to tell theirs. While some broke off from the larger group for the filming of each family unit, for inputting family information into the computer, to view the video of our trip three years ago to our shtetls, to show their own family snapshots, to discover.
Also in attendance at the Reunion was our very-dear friend David Kanter from our home town. Over the previous many months David and we had worked together to convert all of our computer data to an updated software program called Reunion®. It took many days and nights of concentrated effort, especially once we received Joel Levy’s data of the Gavendo family. David arrived in Israel with the latest printouts of all of the information. The printouts, in scroll form 24 and 36 feet in length, were posted on the walls of the meeting room. Everyone there whose information we had at the start of the meeting could find their name in its rightful place on their family printout. When David arrived we had approximately 3,100 names. By the end of the Reunion we had added 1,000 additional names. He sat with attendees adding, correcting, updating…one night until 3AM and he started again at 7AM. And he continued to meet with several people after the meeting. People came to our hotel, as they couldn’t fit into the schedule at the Reunion. David’s contribution, on a totally voluntary basis, added a great dimension to our event.
As an archaeologist uncovers places and things, the physical properties of the past, we were uncovering people…giving them life, personalities, faces, and stories. They weren’t just names of long-gone family members listed in a book. They became real people who lived and felt and functioned, who raised families and worked and built businesses.
The talents of our family know no bounds. Jodie Myers of Florida, daughter of Dr. Ivan Myers, originally of South Africa and more recently of Israel, was our official photographer. Jodie, of the Gavendo tree, had just graduated from Florida State University with a degree in film directing. We could have paid thousands of shekels and not gotten a better-qualified, better-natured photographer. She was wonderful. She is wonderful. She did 11 hours of video recording, plus snapshots of every family unit. It will take months to accomplish, but the intention is to edit the films down to one hour of fascinating viewing, with the film then being made available to all who are interested. Jodie plans to relocate to California and find her niche as a film director. Kol Hakavod, Jodie.
One overwhelming sentiment that pervaded was the feeling of how nice everyone was. There wasn’t a complainer, a clinker in the entire group. How pleased and impressed everyone was to be part of such a nice family. Not to single any one out, but to mention just a few: Helen Smolack, a very refined, elegant lady…only concerned that she appeared presumptuous in giving her biography. Her daughters, Carolee and Sharian, a psychoanalyst without pretense. Carolee’s daughter Robin, a lovely young lady. Maxine Jacobson of New York, now of Montana, rewarded herself with the trip as a graduation present, just having received her doctorate in Sociology from the University of Utah. She was accompanied by her daughter, Kim, a student at New York University. Our daughter, Linda, a teacher of English as a Second Language, just now about to receive her Master’s Degree. Her husband, Menachem, returned to school at Bar Ilan and got his BA just this year. Mark Galinsky of Canada, on sabbatical from his high-pressure position on Canada’s “Wall Street”. Dr. David Galinsky, a world renowned expert in gerontology. Chaya Meller, in the process of getting her doctorate in Yiddish studies at Bar Ilan. Joel Levy, now a dentist in practice in London. The Gilinski’s of Colombia, one of the pre-eminent families of that country. Guiora Gilinski of Jerusalem, recently retired as a police commander in that city; his wife Niede, a lawyer. And on and on…just an unusual group of nice (and accomplished) people.
But, I’ve digressed from the Reunion itself. Our final dinner was a gabfest, with all sorts of picture taking, spontaneous speeches, with our daughter, Ronda, acting as Mistress of Ceremonies.
Even as we prepared for the Reunion we were able to establish the connection between the family of Barbara Werlin of Los Angeles and that of the Omaha-originated Bruce Gilinsky family.
As a result of input from those present at the Reunion, we have positively connected the family of Alan Galinsky of Leeds with that of the family of Ike Gilinsky of South Africa. Both are descended from Abraham Gilinsky. There has always been strong indication that Abraham is connected to David, my great grandfather…but likely a cousin, not a brother.
We had received the tree of the family of Dr. Eugene Galen of Los Angeles, but did not recognize the connection with the family of Rabbi Hersh Gilinsky of Jerusalem. That has been accomplished. In fact, we were able to join together one unconnected family strand with my own tree, and six other strands were joined with other family strands.
So you see, by entering all Gilinsky and Gavendo names—with all their spelling variants—into the computer we found connections and are able join families together. It’s very gratifying when that happens. Closer to our own family was the experience involving Chaya Meller of Israel. She emigrated from Argentina some 25 years ago. She remembers that she brought a package from her father to Nathan Shapiro of Petach Tikvah, now a retired professor at Bar Ilan University. Nathan, brother of Siske who lives in Pabradje Lithuania, with Chaya’s reminders, vaguely recalls that he, as a cousin, attended her wedding. They had lost track of each other. Chaya bemoaned the fact that she had not had a single member of her side of the family to invite to any of her many family simches. At the Reunion she discovered Guiora Gilinski with whom she shares a common grandfather…the same immediate family as our Colombian cousins. Guiora and Chaya are my 3rd cousins. Chaya was ecstatic. Just one more example of the family connections which were made.
The last function of the Reunion was on Sunday morning when we gathered at the JNF Tree Planting Center at Ein Kerem, the location of Hadassah Hospital. Each of us present planted a tree, symbolizing the 300 trees which were purchased and are now a permanent commemorative as the Gilinsky/Gavendo Garden. A beautiful poem, written by Helen Smolack, was read along with all of the names of those in whose honor and memory trees were being planted.
As it evolved, ours was less a Reunion than it was a Union. We came as relatives who had not met before. We left as new-found friends, most of whom were relatives.
We had started our Reunion by honoring the memory of those who came before us. We acknowledged their importance to our existence today. We demonstrated our hope in the future of our families, in the future of Eretz Yisroel, by planting symbolic Trees of Life. Not only had we not forgotten, but we looked forward!!
After the Reunion, we visited the Museum of the Diaspora. Some of our family information is in their records. When we have incorporated all the information collected at the Reunion we shall send the Museum an update. At that time an updated edition of the family Blue Book will be ready, as well.
We gratefully acknowledge the contributions, both financial and otherwise, of the many members of the family (and David Kanter) who contributed so much to make this event the success that it was.
With great appreciation and warm regards to all,
Lillian and Gil
FAMILY REPORT OF THE REUNION IN ISRAEL
Kiryat Anavim, Jerusalem
May 1–4, 1997
In thinking of arranging a Family Reunion it occurred to me that I might plan a party to which no one would come; or maybe it would be a war where all involved would be on the losing side. Yet, not to plan a Reunion would be to forego the completion of the circle which started when my uncle, Max Garber, first organized the original family tree, graphically drawn by my brother Sumner and cousin Bernie Copans, all of blessed memory. I first met Joel Levy in Johannesburg when he was 8 years old. He was committed even at that young age to discovering everything about the Gavendo family. Three decades later we coordinated our family efforts.
Having pursued the family information over the ensuing 40 years, having seen it to fulfillment (though as a dynamic of family life it will never really be completed), having experienced our trip of three years ago to the places of our origin in Lithuania, could I really stop now?
So, with my neck stuck out, with my reputation as a professional meeting planner at stake, with the cooperation and expert advice of our daughter and her husband, Linda and Menachem Sagiv in Israel, we proceeded. With great optimism we reserved 25 rooms for three days, seven rooms for an additional day. I reasoned that if we realized 40 participants we’d be successful. But would the support be there to fulfill our plans to bring Bluma Katz and Josif Gavendo from Lithuania and to cover the myriad of costs related to staging a meeting, to support the updating of the family genealogy information (the Blue Book), to arrange proper memorials to those of the family who fell in the Holocaust, to plant a Jewish National Fund (JNF) Garden? Would anyone’s imaginations, other than our own, be captured? Would others share our sentiments that this would be a last-chance opportunity to explore our roots, to hear our family story at first hand, to realize all of this in the surroundings of Jerusalem?
In a recent article in The Book Peddler, the author writes about her activities in helping people learn of their roots saying, “Sometime it is only a narrow interest in their family names. But on an intellectual level it is much wider and deeper. For the intellectual things which happened…generations ago are part of their intellectual heritage, of their intellectual identity. You cannot live knowing only what happened to you.” Our past is part of what we are today, and our children’s future is being built on today’s present.
And what was to be the goal of a Reunion, what did we hope to accomplish? Was there not some way that we could acknowledge our forebears…especially those who lost their lives in the Holocaust? Are they to go unremembered by those more-fortunate family members? Was not their sacrifice the foundation on which our lives were built…the foundation of the very existence of the State of Israel? Would not the coming together itself of distant family members be a fitting tribute to their memories?
Did anyone share our sense of history, that the story of our family, now dispersed in 18 countries, in every continent of the world, was, in fact, the story of the Jewish people? Did anyone share our sense of excitement in learning how we got our family name, of discovering siblings and other relatives of our great grandparents, of learning of the connections with others who share our family name who came from the same shtetlach?
Obviously, everyone’s interest is not piqued by every question. Choose which applies to you. But in the aggregate, the answers to the questions posed were, “Yes, Yes, a resounding Yes!!!
When we departed for Israel we had more than met our minimums. More than 50 people were coming from 10 different countries. All who were coming from the Diaspora were related. Our minimum budget requirements had been met, thanks to broad support and a most generous contribution from our Colombian Gilinski cousins. Their contribution alone guaranteed Bluma’s and Josif’s participation. We had payment in hand sufficient to plant 150 trees in the Gilinsky/Gavendo Garden. Once in Israel and adding in the participation of those residents there, the final registration was 92. Gilinsky’s and Gavendo’s both known to us and unknown to us, were calling…can they come? While a few of the registrants had to cancel at the last minute, their spaces were filled by others including grandchildren and great grandchildren, once the elders saw what was taking place.
Success was evident from the first evening’s event on May 1. After a period of time for an informal coming together, there were introductory remarks, followed by a representative of each family coming forward to the microphone to introduce their family, tell of their connection, and whatever else they chose to say. Registered were relatives from the USA, Canada, England, Scotland, Holland, Estonia, Lithuania, Colombia, South Africa, and Israel. Mark Galinsky from Toronto had just been to Israel but was in Greece. Could he come? Dr. David Galinsky from Beer Sheva, Israel, planned to spend a few hours. He was leaving the country but spent more than 24 hours, leaving directly for the airport. David Galinsky, originally of Leeds England, now of Jerusalem, came to see. He summoned his newlywed sister and brother-in-law, and David returned…and returned…and we found the connection between his family and that of Isaac’s of Capetown, descendants of Abraham Gilinsky. And that’s how it went.
On Friday morning we made our pilgrimage to Yad Veshem. After a brief tour, we had our own family ceremony in the Hall of Remembrance. Our daughter Ronda Jacobson had prepared a reading of poems of the Holocaust written by children from various lands. Interspersed between the reading of the poems, the younger generation among us read the 162 names of those known at the time to have been lost from our family in the Holocaust. (Subsequently, an additional 42 family members were identified.) The readers were Joel Levy of South Africa and London, Robin Sadavoy of Canada, Rose Louer-Galinsky of Holland, Kim Leonard of New York, and two of my Israeli grandchildren, Toby and Nadav Sagiv. And then those who did the reading, led by Toby still in her army uniform (she had just joined us from her base) marched in procession to the eternal flame and laid a commemorative wreath. We all then recited the Kaddish. All were overwhelmed by emotion.
As we were about to board our bus, our guide/translators asked for the chance to speak to the group. They thanked us for allowing them to be part of a most-meaningful family tribute. As we were there on the week-end of the observance of Yom Hashoa, they expressed that we had captured the true meaning of Yad Veshem and especially so, by our involving the younger generation. The younger ones thanked us as well for including them in our ceremony. It was a very rewarding experience.
We returned to our kibbutz hotel where our sessions began. The Family Blue Book, now a compilation of all Gilinsky and Gavendo families known to us, was explained in detail using transparencies and an overhead projector. It’s a complicated book, but worth the time necessary to comprehend its format and contents.
Bluma then told the riveting story of life in the shtetl of Shvintzian, one of the key places of our family origin. (Palushe and Ignalina are two of the others.) Bluma lived in Shvintzian before the war and returned there after it. In 1937 she and her husband were apprehended and questioned about anti-Communist activity. Her infant child was taken from her. She was told that all she had to do was to confess to the charges and she would be set free. She recognized that would not be the case and, besides, she could not confess to what was not true. After months of interrogation under the most difficult conditions she was sentenced to 10 years in the gulag, to a mining camp far beyond Siberia, perhaps 35 miles from the Japanese border. She was never again to see her husband. She, and the other prisoners had no contact with the outside world. She knew nothing about the war, nothing about her baby daughter. After completing her sentence she had to stay in the area of the camp long enough to earn sufficient funds to pay for a ticket to return to her home town. She located her child who had been reared by the Communists. To this day, her daughter now a physician in Vilnius, can not be dispelled of the notion that her mother abandoned her. She refuses any contact with Bluma.
Bluma’s mission became that of finding out what had happened in our shtetl. How, in this predominately Jewish town, could there have been an uprising by neighbor against neighbor, friend against friend. She went from farmhouse to farmhouse, from door to door, asking what people had seen, where, how? She did find out that the uprising incurred spontaneously on one day, primarily by the Lithuanians, with some Germans alongside. She was told of the location in the forest where the killings took place. It was she who organized the party of survivors to arrange a fitting burial mound to mark the location of the mass grave…the one where so many of our family are buried. There is so much more to her story, more appropriately to be told at another time. On her return home she is to be interviewed for Spielberg’s Shoah Project. Her story will be recorded as part of the permanent record of the Holocaust. Bluma still lives in Shvintzian, determined to stay on, to serve as the historian of the area, to tell the story to all who visit. Perhaps, too, as an act of defiance, that neither the Nazis nor the Russians prevailed. One can only wonder what would have been our fate if our elders had not emigrated from that shtetl.
Then it was Josif’s turn, and he didn’t disappoint us. He was able to connect people in the audience. He was able to remind them of family events and places of their childhood. Since our visit of three years ago he had done further historical research on the origins of our family names: Gilinsky and Gavendo. His investigations have lent authenticity to his previous stories. He could have gone on…and on…and he did. Fulfilling our hopes of a personal recounting of our family story, bringing it alive.
His stories encouraged others to tell theirs. While some broke off from the larger group for the filming of each family unit, for inputting family information into the computer, to view the video of our trip three years ago to our shtetls, to show their own family snapshots, to discover.
Also in attendance at the Reunion was our very-dear friend David Kanter from our home town. Over the previous many months David and we had worked together to convert all of our computer data to an updated software program called Reunion®. It took many days and nights of concentrated effort, especially once we received Joel Levy’s data of the Gavendo family. David arrived in Israel with the latest printouts of all of the information. The printouts, in scroll form 24 and 36 feet in length, were posted on the walls of the meeting room. Everyone there whose information we had at the start of the meeting could find their name in its rightful place on their family printout. When David arrived we had approximately 3,100 names. By the end of the Reunion we had added 1,000 additional names. He sat with attendees adding, correcting, updating…one night until 3AM and he started again at 7AM. And he continued to meet with several people after the meeting. People came to our hotel, as they couldn’t fit into the schedule at the Reunion. David’s contribution, on a totally voluntary basis, added a great dimension to our event.
As an archaeologist uncovers places and things, the physical properties of the past, we were uncovering people…giving them life, personalities, faces, and stories. They weren’t just names of long-gone family members listed in a book. They became real people who lived and felt and functioned, who raised families and worked and built businesses.
The talents of our family know no bounds. Jodie Myers of Florida, daughter of Dr. Ivan Myers, originally of South Africa and more recently of Israel, was our official photographer. Jodie, of the Gavendo tree, had just graduated from Florida State University with a degree in film directing. We could have paid thousands of shekels and not gotten a better-qualified, better-natured photographer. She was wonderful. She is wonderful. She did 11 hours of video recording, plus snapshots of every family unit. It will take months to accomplish, but the intention is to edit the films down to one hour of fascinating viewing, with the film then being made available to all who are interested. Jodie plans to relocate to California and find her niche as a film director. Kol Hakavod, Jodie.
One overwhelming sentiment that pervaded was the feeling of how nice everyone was. There wasn’t a complainer, a clinker in the entire group. How pleased and impressed everyone was to be part of such a nice family. Not to single any one out, but to mention just a few: Helen Smolack, a very refined, elegant lady…only concerned that she appeared presumptuous in giving her biography. Her daughters, Carolee and Sharian, a psychoanalyst without pretense. Carolee’s daughter Robin, a lovely young lady. Maxine Jacobson of New York, now of Montana, rewarded herself with the trip as a graduation present, just having received her doctorate in Sociology from the University of Utah. She was accompanied by her daughter, Kim, a student at New York University. Our daughter, Linda, a teacher of English as a Second Language, just now about to receive her Master’s Degree. Her husband, Menachem, returned to school at Bar Ilan and got his BA just this year. Mark Galinsky of Canada, on sabbatical from his high-pressure position on Canada’s “Wall Street”. Dr. David Galinsky, a world renowned expert in gerontology. Chaya Meller, in the process of getting her doctorate in Yiddish studies at Bar Ilan. Joel Levy, now a dentist in practice in London. The Gilinski’s of Colombia, one of the pre-eminent families of that country. Guiora Gilinski of Jerusalem, recently retired as a police commander in that city; his wife Niede, a lawyer. And on and on…just an unusual group of nice (and accomplished) people.
But, I’ve digressed from the Reunion itself. Our final dinner was a gabfest, with all sorts of picture taking, spontaneous speeches, with our daughter, Ronda, acting as Mistress of Ceremonies.
Even as we prepared for the Reunion we were able to establish the connection between the family of Barbara Werlin of Los Angeles and that of the Omaha-originated Bruce Gilinsky family.
As a result of input from those present at the Reunion, we have positively connected the family of Alan Galinsky of Leeds with that of the family of Ike Gilinsky of South Africa. Both are descended from Abraham Gilinsky. There has always been strong indication that Abraham is connected to David, my great grandfather…but likely a cousin, not a brother.
We had received the tree of the family of Dr. Eugene Galen of Los Angeles, but did not recognize the connection with the family of Rabbi Hersh Gilinsky of Jerusalem. That has been accomplished. In fact, we were able to join together one unconnected family strand with my own tree, and six other strands were joined with other family strands.
So you see, by entering all Gilinsky and Gavendo names—with all their spelling variants—into the computer we found connections and are able join families together. It’s very gratifying when that happens. Closer to our own family was the experience involving Chaya Meller of Israel. She emigrated from Argentina some 25 years ago. She remembers that she brought a package from her father to Nathan Shapiro of Petach Tikvah, now a retired professor at Bar Ilan University. Nathan, brother of Siske who lives in Pabradje Lithuania, with Chaya’s reminders, vaguely recalls that he, as a cousin, attended her wedding. They had lost track of each other. Chaya bemoaned the fact that she had not had a single member of her side of the family to invite to any of her many family simches. At the Reunion she discovered Guiora Gilinski with whom she shares a common grandfather…the same immediate family as our Colombian cousins. Guiora and Chaya are my 3rd cousins. Chaya was ecstatic. Just one more example of the family connections which were made.
The last function of the Reunion was on Sunday morning when we gathered at the JNF Tree Planting Center at Ein Kerem, the location of Hadassah Hospital. Each of us present planted a tree, symbolizing the 300 trees which were purchased and are now a permanent commemorative as the Gilinsky/Gavendo Garden. A beautiful poem, written by Helen Smolack, was read along with all of the names of those in whose honor and memory trees were being planted.
As it evolved, ours was less a Reunion than it was a Union. We came as relatives who had not met before. We left as new-found friends, most of whom were relatives.
We had started our Reunion by honoring the memory of those who came before us. We acknowledged their importance to our existence today. We demonstrated our hope in the future of our families, in the future of Eretz Yisroel, by planting symbolic Trees of Life. Not only had we not forgotten, but we looked forward!!
After the Reunion, we visited the Museum of the Diaspora. Some of our family information is in their records. When we have incorporated all the information collected at the Reunion we shall send the Museum an update. At that time an updated edition of the family Blue Book will be ready, as well.
We gratefully acknowledge the contributions, both financial and otherwise, of the many members of the family (and David Kanter) who contributed so much to make this event the success that it was.
With great appreciation and warm regards to all,
Lillian and Gil
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Some photos I wanted to share
Here are some photos of the family that were taken last summer when we all went on vacation together to New Hampshire.
Eulogy for Giggy Garber by his Grandchildren
Eulogy for Giggy Garber by his Grandchildren
May 25, 2007
Our Dear Grampa Giggy,
Not many grandchildren can claim the same close relationship with their grandfather as we had with you. You made an effort to create a close-knit family. Despite the great physical distance, you always ensured that we would do things together. From treating all of the grandchildren to many vacations, the log cabin and many weekends together at Eastman, you always wanted us to feel close with you and each other.
Throughout the years we engaged in many long conversations ranging in topic from solving the problems of the Middle East, our various professions and interests to our different views about American culture and sports (and I should say you made me, an Israeli who knew nothing about football, a Patriots fan); all of this just gave you an excuse to say how proud you were of us.
You were a man who lived by your values and you were a true example of the American dream—you embodied the concept and were a living model of it. You built yourself up so that we would have everything that we would ever need. You used only hard work to get you far, and you made sure that we would always be able to accomplish everything that we believed in. You put your life on the line to fight for America and you provided for us so that no external worries could have prevented us from realizing our dreams.
With every milestone in our life, every graduation or achievement, a great part of our pride was to see you so proud of us. We knew that we had done something right.
You and granmums provided us with an incredible example of love and friendship. As we each find our partners in our life, we look to you and granmums for inspiration.
We began to worry more than a year ago that you didn’t have much time left, but you made it perfectly clear that you would be at Toby and Boaz’s wedding. And indeed you were.
When Zohar was born you were able to extend your love to yet another generation. Zohar loved playing with you and we all saw how much she touched you. Your title may have changed but it didn’t have to—you already were a great grandfather.
It is so difficult for Yasmin and me, Ben and Shira, Toby and Boaz, Nadav and Lexi to say goodbye. We are relieved that your suffering is over, but we will really miss you. Our Grampa Giggy may physically be gone, but your strong presence will always be with us.
We are proud to be Gilbert Garber’s grandchildren.
May 25, 2007
Our Dear Grampa Giggy,
Not many grandchildren can claim the same close relationship with their grandfather as we had with you. You made an effort to create a close-knit family. Despite the great physical distance, you always ensured that we would do things together. From treating all of the grandchildren to many vacations, the log cabin and many weekends together at Eastman, you always wanted us to feel close with you and each other.
Throughout the years we engaged in many long conversations ranging in topic from solving the problems of the Middle East, our various professions and interests to our different views about American culture and sports (and I should say you made me, an Israeli who knew nothing about football, a Patriots fan); all of this just gave you an excuse to say how proud you were of us.
You were a man who lived by your values and you were a true example of the American dream—you embodied the concept and were a living model of it. You built yourself up so that we would have everything that we would ever need. You used only hard work to get you far, and you made sure that we would always be able to accomplish everything that we believed in. You put your life on the line to fight for America and you provided for us so that no external worries could have prevented us from realizing our dreams.
With every milestone in our life, every graduation or achievement, a great part of our pride was to see you so proud of us. We knew that we had done something right.
You and granmums provided us with an incredible example of love and friendship. As we each find our partners in our life, we look to you and granmums for inspiration.
We began to worry more than a year ago that you didn’t have much time left, but you made it perfectly clear that you would be at Toby and Boaz’s wedding. And indeed you were.
When Zohar was born you were able to extend your love to yet another generation. Zohar loved playing with you and we all saw how much she touched you. Your title may have changed but it didn’t have to—you already were a great grandfather.
It is so difficult for Yasmin and me, Ben and Shira, Toby and Boaz, Nadav and Lexi to say goodbye. We are relieved that your suffering is over, but we will really miss you. Our Grampa Giggy may physically be gone, but your strong presence will always be with us.
We are proud to be Gilbert Garber’s grandchildren.
Lexi’s Eulogy for her Grandfather
Eulogy for my grandfather, Gilbert Garber
Lexi Garber
May 27, 2007
I would call him grandpa Giggy. He would teach everyone what was right and what was wrong. He would believe in every one of us and never yell. My father is his son. Most, if not all, of the things that Giggy taught my father has come down through him to me. My father always wanted me to love golf but I never did. But when Giggy tried to teach me tennis I would do it for him and then found out that it was sooo much fun.
I used to curse A LOT and my father made a deal every time I heard him curse I would get a dollar. Giggy made the deal that if he ever cursed I would get five dollars…I never got the five dollars from him.
Giggy would teach me chess. I have learned the games and the tricks from him. I am not close with my mother’s family so it was like Giggy was my only grandpa. At my end of the year concert the 8th graders sang the song “Do I Make You Proud.” I was singing it to my teacher and I was crying with everyone else. But the only difference between them and me was that I was not only singing it to my teacher, I was singing it to Giggy. Giggy I hope that I have made you proud.
This past Saturday (May 19,2007) I had my 8th grade prom. Before I left for it I found out how bad Giggy was doing. When I first got there it seemed like my night would be ruined. But it wasn’t instead my friends came and comforted me. My newest friend, Brandon, told me that he had lost both of his grandparents and to make the most of the time left. He really helped me understand that no matter what happens they will always live in your heart.
I have recently found out that I was the last grandchild to have any “real” time with him. He played chess and he beat me both times. He was always making us laugh and treating us like it was his last day…for me it was his last. I never got to see him again. I had the choice of coming up to Boston before he passed away…but I couldn’t. I wanted to remember him as the chess master that he is. He will always live in my heart.
Your granddaughter,
Lexi
Lexi Garber
May 27, 2007
I would call him grandpa Giggy. He would teach everyone what was right and what was wrong. He would believe in every one of us and never yell. My father is his son. Most, if not all, of the things that Giggy taught my father has come down through him to me. My father always wanted me to love golf but I never did. But when Giggy tried to teach me tennis I would do it for him and then found out that it was sooo much fun.
I used to curse A LOT and my father made a deal every time I heard him curse I would get a dollar. Giggy made the deal that if he ever cursed I would get five dollars…I never got the five dollars from him.
Giggy would teach me chess. I have learned the games and the tricks from him. I am not close with my mother’s family so it was like Giggy was my only grandpa. At my end of the year concert the 8th graders sang the song “Do I Make You Proud.” I was singing it to my teacher and I was crying with everyone else. But the only difference between them and me was that I was not only singing it to my teacher, I was singing it to Giggy. Giggy I hope that I have made you proud.
This past Saturday (May 19,2007) I had my 8th grade prom. Before I left for it I found out how bad Giggy was doing. When I first got there it seemed like my night would be ruined. But it wasn’t instead my friends came and comforted me. My newest friend, Brandon, told me that he had lost both of his grandparents and to make the most of the time left. He really helped me understand that no matter what happens they will always live in your heart.
I have recently found out that I was the last grandchild to have any “real” time with him. He played chess and he beat me both times. He was always making us laugh and treating us like it was his last day…for me it was his last. I never got to see him again. I had the choice of coming up to Boston before he passed away…but I couldn’t. I wanted to remember him as the chess master that he is. He will always live in my heart.
Your granddaughter,
Lexi
Steve’s Eulogy for his Dad
Eulogy for my dad, Gilbert Garber
Stephen Garber
25 May, 2007
I stand before you with respect, with honor and with love. – and with a profound sense of humility. My father was truly one of the Greatest Generation. He did so much for so many and with so much integrity, I feel deeply humbled to be his loving son and to eulogize such a wonderful man.
My father had opinions. Oh did he have his opinions. And, he would often share them with you whether you asked or not. Just ask his nieces and nephews…his sons in law, and anyone with whom he worked. As his son, I heard his opinions of my choices and behaviors with…candor.
One of Dad’s opinions was that most eulogies were like glossy photos, retouched after passing, losing the essence of the truth. To honor you, Dad, I will speak my truth.
You were and are a great man. We are measured not by our words, but our deeds. You will be measured by the legacy you have left, and it is profound.
Start with where we are:
I remember the first time I sat on this Bima on The High Holy Days, and saw over 1000 people here to pray. This is the house that you built Dad – with lots of help from your best friend and one of mine – of our entire family’s – Gerry Segel, as well as many others of course. You had the vision when there were 100 families to build for 400. You had the persuasion skills to get it done. You often simply would not take no for an answer. Some people had trouble with that – and, you got it done. My sisters were married here. I became a Bar Mitzvah here, and now we have filled this sanctuary – for today it is truly our sanctuary - with the sadness of your passing and the honor of a life so very well lived, Dad, This is the house of G-d that you built.
There is no way to talk about you, Dad, without celebrating your love for Mummy. It was and is an inspiration to us all. You and she taught us so much about LOVE. You taught us to honor and adore, to respect and support, to give and to be kind – and to express. Oh, did you teach us to express love. Most of us found the right life partners to express our love to. Some of us are still working on it.
Dad, you were a lover and a partner to Mummy right to the very end – something she and I will never forget, you asking her blessing to surrender to death. And, Dad, the way you lived and the way you died, with courage, love, and dignity, will be a guidepost for many people for many years. The way you never complained, the way you literally and figuratively took your medicine. The way you chose your time to die and had all your children and your wife with you. Your dignity remains the mark for me to reach…
You were an amazingly organized person – and you did ‘projects’ like no other man. And, to your great comfort, you passed that on to your offspring. Unfortunately, it all went to Ronda. So, wherever and whatever heaven is, we all know it will be better organized now that you are there – and at the lowest cost possible.
I need to thank you for so much, Dad. Without your amazing project and networking skills, we never would have been able to get our Lexi out of Hungary. She is my world Dad, just as all your kids and grandkids felt like we are to you. I loved how you played chess with her, cuddled her and supported her just 2 weeks ago.
Humor is so much of your legacy, Dad. Whether it was vying with Uncle Ira for the silliest puns and jokes. Or your own stories that regaled us all. Or the practical jokes like playing the hotel clerk at Rick and Ellen’s honeymoon – your were funny, right up to the end: I told you that I would miss you. You told me that you would miss you, too.
Being a gentleman and acting with integrity was so much of who you are, Dad. You told me that you were not sure you deserved all the love and devotion that you were getting, because you knew you had been tough and made mistakes with people. After quickly agreeing with you, I reminded you then, and I remind you now, Dad. People always knew you cared – that your intention was good, and that your heart was in the right place. You even came out of your semi-coma to look the nurse in the eye who had just bathed you and changed your bed and put out your hand to shake – a good firm handshake, Dad. A big symbol of who you are…
Dad, thanks for teaching me integrity, honesty, commitment, and mostly, Love. You created Love wherever you and Mummy went. All of the medical team from the most prestigious of doctors to the nurse’s aides felt your love. Laurie cried when I told her how she was a reflection of the love she saw in you and Mums. It was as high a compliment as she could get Dad. That is how powerful your love – and your love with Mummy is.
Thanks for loving us for who we are – and for loving so many so powerfully.
Thanks for being the father, the husband and the citizen you are.
Thanks for showing me how to be a good man, a gentle man – and a man of greatness.
To President Marcos, you were a president. To all great men and women, you are a great man.
I love you, Dad. May you rest in peace.
Stephen Garber
25 May, 2007
I stand before you with respect, with honor and with love. – and with a profound sense of humility. My father was truly one of the Greatest Generation. He did so much for so many and with so much integrity, I feel deeply humbled to be his loving son and to eulogize such a wonderful man.
My father had opinions. Oh did he have his opinions. And, he would often share them with you whether you asked or not. Just ask his nieces and nephews…his sons in law, and anyone with whom he worked. As his son, I heard his opinions of my choices and behaviors with…candor.
One of Dad’s opinions was that most eulogies were like glossy photos, retouched after passing, losing the essence of the truth. To honor you, Dad, I will speak my truth.
You were and are a great man. We are measured not by our words, but our deeds. You will be measured by the legacy you have left, and it is profound.
Start with where we are:
I remember the first time I sat on this Bima on The High Holy Days, and saw over 1000 people here to pray. This is the house that you built Dad – with lots of help from your best friend and one of mine – of our entire family’s – Gerry Segel, as well as many others of course. You had the vision when there were 100 families to build for 400. You had the persuasion skills to get it done. You often simply would not take no for an answer. Some people had trouble with that – and, you got it done. My sisters were married here. I became a Bar Mitzvah here, and now we have filled this sanctuary – for today it is truly our sanctuary - with the sadness of your passing and the honor of a life so very well lived, Dad, This is the house of G-d that you built.
There is no way to talk about you, Dad, without celebrating your love for Mummy. It was and is an inspiration to us all. You and she taught us so much about LOVE. You taught us to honor and adore, to respect and support, to give and to be kind – and to express. Oh, did you teach us to express love. Most of us found the right life partners to express our love to. Some of us are still working on it.
Dad, you were a lover and a partner to Mummy right to the very end – something she and I will never forget, you asking her blessing to surrender to death. And, Dad, the way you lived and the way you died, with courage, love, and dignity, will be a guidepost for many people for many years. The way you never complained, the way you literally and figuratively took your medicine. The way you chose your time to die and had all your children and your wife with you. Your dignity remains the mark for me to reach…
You were an amazingly organized person – and you did ‘projects’ like no other man. And, to your great comfort, you passed that on to your offspring. Unfortunately, it all went to Ronda. So, wherever and whatever heaven is, we all know it will be better organized now that you are there – and at the lowest cost possible.
I need to thank you for so much, Dad. Without your amazing project and networking skills, we never would have been able to get our Lexi out of Hungary. She is my world Dad, just as all your kids and grandkids felt like we are to you. I loved how you played chess with her, cuddled her and supported her just 2 weeks ago.
Humor is so much of your legacy, Dad. Whether it was vying with Uncle Ira for the silliest puns and jokes. Or your own stories that regaled us all. Or the practical jokes like playing the hotel clerk at Rick and Ellen’s honeymoon – your were funny, right up to the end: I told you that I would miss you. You told me that you would miss you, too.
Being a gentleman and acting with integrity was so much of who you are, Dad. You told me that you were not sure you deserved all the love and devotion that you were getting, because you knew you had been tough and made mistakes with people. After quickly agreeing with you, I reminded you then, and I remind you now, Dad. People always knew you cared – that your intention was good, and that your heart was in the right place. You even came out of your semi-coma to look the nurse in the eye who had just bathed you and changed your bed and put out your hand to shake – a good firm handshake, Dad. A big symbol of who you are…
Dad, thanks for teaching me integrity, honesty, commitment, and mostly, Love. You created Love wherever you and Mummy went. All of the medical team from the most prestigious of doctors to the nurse’s aides felt your love. Laurie cried when I told her how she was a reflection of the love she saw in you and Mums. It was as high a compliment as she could get Dad. That is how powerful your love – and your love with Mummy is.
Thanks for loving us for who we are – and for loving so many so powerfully.
Thanks for being the father, the husband and the citizen you are.
Thanks for showing me how to be a good man, a gentle man – and a man of greatness.
To President Marcos, you were a president. To all great men and women, you are a great man.
I love you, Dad. May you rest in peace.
Ronda’s Eulogy for her Dad
Eulogy for my Dad, Gilbert Garber
Ronda Garber Jacobson
May 25, 2007
My Dad would tell me to start with a joke, to warm up the crowd. I should intermingle a few humorous comments, another joke, and end with a motivational message. While we video-taped him telling some of his favorite jokes, he didn’t want us to tape him telling some of his best. He didn’t want to be remembered as a dirty old man.
He was the youngest of five children – a blued eyed boy with golden curls. His father suffered from heart disease starting when my dad was about 7, and he died when my dad was an adolescent. My dad had happy memories of his father, and difficult memories from his family’s financial struggles thereafter. He always told us, he didn’t know how to be the father of children beyond their early teens –kids don’t come with a manual and he had no role model past that point.
As a child of the depression, he respected hard work as well as material objects. He couldn’t understand purchasing something new, if a repair was possible. His first job, at age 7, was selling magazines – and over the years he perfected his salesmanship. He didn’t want to turn his friends into clients. He wanted his clients to become his friends.
He taught famous people to drive, and was welcomed as a member of many groups, clubs, and associations as he planned congress and convention travel. He mentored many -- driving instructors, travel agents, young people who sought his counsel, and, of course, his children.
He was a great protector. He offered his children a dime to carry with us always – just in case we felt unsafe and needed him to come get us –anytime, from anywhere. He actually kept up with inflation, increasing the coinage as necessary.
I learned so much from my Dad. He gave excellent advice, and always had my best interest in mind. He was a focused listener, and never forgot a word said. In fact, he held us accountable for every thought we’d ever shared.
My Dad was an honest man, as honest with others as with himself. He could be so outspoken as to be thought judgmental – but he was almost always right, ‘though it sometimes took years for others to come to the same conclusion.
I remember that my dad was very upset with my sister for allowing a Hebrew School carpool to tear the roof of my mother’s Thunderbird convertible, a car that was returned to Garber Leasing Company at the end of a contract. My sister had no knowledge of how or when it could have happened. Weeks later he came home from work and gathered the family in the kitchen. He stood on a chair and hung his head. He had met the former leaser of the car, and the man had told him that he’d loved the car, but turned it in because of the tear in the roof. My father ate crow very well.
He was my most trusted advisor – he had only my best interests in mind, he worked with me to achieve my goals, and he believed in my strengths and could not see or accept my weaknesses. He took pride in my accomplishments, and only complained that I "took on too much."
So many of my strengths I learned from him.
He made fun of what a planner I am, but as a travel agent, organizing excursions for hundreds of travelers, he knew how to create and implement complex arrangements. He was a teacher, and a life-long learner. His family had to teach him to articulate his expectations for family vacations – but what vacations and celebrations we have shared. We’ve danced and laughed and enjoyed being together.
He marveled at my skill with computers, but even toward the end of his days, he was still learning from our “adopted brother David” how to use any number of software programs on his new Mac.
He delighted in my meaningful friendships, and became friends with my friends, all of whom expressed their appreciation and love of my parents. He once told me that all my close friends had mishegas. I explained that that works fine for me, since I have more than a bit of mishegas myself. He declared that he had No Mishegas – to which I responded, “And that, Dad, is your mishugas.”
He was a Lion and a Mason, and a member of Club 62 of the Knights of Columbus. He worked for his synagogue, his Town, his condominium communities in Lexington and in New Hampshire. He brought in environmentally sound energy and water use. When geese inundated the Pond at Potter Pond, he had fountains installed to discourage their nesting. His last project, yet unfinished, was the planning for windmills for electrical generation at Potter Pond.
My Dad was not quite dapper, but a stylish and careful dresser. As a kid, I often accompanied him for his shave, haircut and manicure at the Statler Hilton downtown. He and my mom cut a handsome figure on the dance floor. I could never quite keep my feet out from under his when we danced, but he never gave up on me.
He was a delight to watch on the tennis court, but watch out for that serve. He played a mean game, and was always out to win! He was a sly Scrabble player and enjoyed astonishing and frustrating his opponent with a last-minute 7-letter word after clogging up the board with a very tight game.
My dad made friends everywhere – and frustrated that so much of his time in his last years was spent going to doctor appointments, he charmed so many on his outstanding team at Brigham & Women’s and Dana Farber. Dr. Jerome Ritchie guided him and encouraged him over more than 15 years. Dr. James Kirshenbaum with Kathleen Kilrain kept his heart from breaking. Dr. Julian Seifter and Dr. Nidyanandh Vadivel managed his kidney disease. Dr. Elliot Israel fit him into his busy schedule to help us with his lung issues. Oncologist Dr. Oliver Sartor became so dear to us. Nurse practitioner Laurie Appleby meant the world to my dad. Every visit began with a hug, and ended with a kiss. We cannot thank Laurie enough for her competent loving care. The 11th floor reception committee – Coach Chris Clancy, Tanya and the others -- greeted us with a smile and the warmest of welcomes. The 10th floor infusion nurses made him feel loved, admired and cared for in a very special way.
As we wended our way through the medical system, Mum, Dad and I formed a team. My sister and brother, and all the grandchildren were valued members, but we were the core. My dad was a great captain.
He believed that as we age we become more and more of what we had been as younger people. If one is cranky, he'll become crankier. If one is demanding, that too will increase. I learned that my dad was sweet. As he became older and increasingly ill, he became softer and sweeter, and more and more loving.
My dad, who lost his dad, brother, sister and nephews at young ages, recognized that he had lived a full, interesting, rich life. He had married his childhood sweetheart, and was as much in love with her on his last day as he was when he jumped a hedge at age 13, just to impress her.
He said, “Every day is a blessing.” May all your days be a blessing. May we learn the lessons you taught us well. We understand that Mum will have to carry the ball, and the full team goes forth. We’ll miss our quarterback, star pitcher, and beloved Dad.
Ronda Garber Jacobson
May 25, 2007
My Dad would tell me to start with a joke, to warm up the crowd. I should intermingle a few humorous comments, another joke, and end with a motivational message. While we video-taped him telling some of his favorite jokes, he didn’t want us to tape him telling some of his best. He didn’t want to be remembered as a dirty old man.
He was the youngest of five children – a blued eyed boy with golden curls. His father suffered from heart disease starting when my dad was about 7, and he died when my dad was an adolescent. My dad had happy memories of his father, and difficult memories from his family’s financial struggles thereafter. He always told us, he didn’t know how to be the father of children beyond their early teens –kids don’t come with a manual and he had no role model past that point.
As a child of the depression, he respected hard work as well as material objects. He couldn’t understand purchasing something new, if a repair was possible. His first job, at age 7, was selling magazines – and over the years he perfected his salesmanship. He didn’t want to turn his friends into clients. He wanted his clients to become his friends.
He taught famous people to drive, and was welcomed as a member of many groups, clubs, and associations as he planned congress and convention travel. He mentored many -- driving instructors, travel agents, young people who sought his counsel, and, of course, his children.
He was a great protector. He offered his children a dime to carry with us always – just in case we felt unsafe and needed him to come get us –anytime, from anywhere. He actually kept up with inflation, increasing the coinage as necessary.
I learned so much from my Dad. He gave excellent advice, and always had my best interest in mind. He was a focused listener, and never forgot a word said. In fact, he held us accountable for every thought we’d ever shared.
My Dad was an honest man, as honest with others as with himself. He could be so outspoken as to be thought judgmental – but he was almost always right, ‘though it sometimes took years for others to come to the same conclusion.
I remember that my dad was very upset with my sister for allowing a Hebrew School carpool to tear the roof of my mother’s Thunderbird convertible, a car that was returned to Garber Leasing Company at the end of a contract. My sister had no knowledge of how or when it could have happened. Weeks later he came home from work and gathered the family in the kitchen. He stood on a chair and hung his head. He had met the former leaser of the car, and the man had told him that he’d loved the car, but turned it in because of the tear in the roof. My father ate crow very well.
He was my most trusted advisor – he had only my best interests in mind, he worked with me to achieve my goals, and he believed in my strengths and could not see or accept my weaknesses. He took pride in my accomplishments, and only complained that I "took on too much."
So many of my strengths I learned from him.
He made fun of what a planner I am, but as a travel agent, organizing excursions for hundreds of travelers, he knew how to create and implement complex arrangements. He was a teacher, and a life-long learner. His family had to teach him to articulate his expectations for family vacations – but what vacations and celebrations we have shared. We’ve danced and laughed and enjoyed being together.
He marveled at my skill with computers, but even toward the end of his days, he was still learning from our “adopted brother David” how to use any number of software programs on his new Mac.
He delighted in my meaningful friendships, and became friends with my friends, all of whom expressed their appreciation and love of my parents. He once told me that all my close friends had mishegas. I explained that that works fine for me, since I have more than a bit of mishegas myself. He declared that he had No Mishegas – to which I responded, “And that, Dad, is your mishugas.”
He was a Lion and a Mason, and a member of Club 62 of the Knights of Columbus. He worked for his synagogue, his Town, his condominium communities in Lexington and in New Hampshire. He brought in environmentally sound energy and water use. When geese inundated the Pond at Potter Pond, he had fountains installed to discourage their nesting. His last project, yet unfinished, was the planning for windmills for electrical generation at Potter Pond.
My Dad was not quite dapper, but a stylish and careful dresser. As a kid, I often accompanied him for his shave, haircut and manicure at the Statler Hilton downtown. He and my mom cut a handsome figure on the dance floor. I could never quite keep my feet out from under his when we danced, but he never gave up on me.
He was a delight to watch on the tennis court, but watch out for that serve. He played a mean game, and was always out to win! He was a sly Scrabble player and enjoyed astonishing and frustrating his opponent with a last-minute 7-letter word after clogging up the board with a very tight game.
My dad made friends everywhere – and frustrated that so much of his time in his last years was spent going to doctor appointments, he charmed so many on his outstanding team at Brigham & Women’s and Dana Farber. Dr. Jerome Ritchie guided him and encouraged him over more than 15 years. Dr. James Kirshenbaum with Kathleen Kilrain kept his heart from breaking. Dr. Julian Seifter and Dr. Nidyanandh Vadivel managed his kidney disease. Dr. Elliot Israel fit him into his busy schedule to help us with his lung issues. Oncologist Dr. Oliver Sartor became so dear to us. Nurse practitioner Laurie Appleby meant the world to my dad. Every visit began with a hug, and ended with a kiss. We cannot thank Laurie enough for her competent loving care. The 11th floor reception committee – Coach Chris Clancy, Tanya and the others -- greeted us with a smile and the warmest of welcomes. The 10th floor infusion nurses made him feel loved, admired and cared for in a very special way.
As we wended our way through the medical system, Mum, Dad and I formed a team. My sister and brother, and all the grandchildren were valued members, but we were the core. My dad was a great captain.
He believed that as we age we become more and more of what we had been as younger people. If one is cranky, he'll become crankier. If one is demanding, that too will increase. I learned that my dad was sweet. As he became older and increasingly ill, he became softer and sweeter, and more and more loving.
My dad, who lost his dad, brother, sister and nephews at young ages, recognized that he had lived a full, interesting, rich life. He had married his childhood sweetheart, and was as much in love with her on his last day as he was when he jumped a hedge at age 13, just to impress her.
He said, “Every day is a blessing.” May all your days be a blessing. May we learn the lessons you taught us well. We understand that Mum will have to carry the ball, and the full team goes forth. We’ll miss our quarterback, star pitcher, and beloved Dad.
Linda’s Eulogy for her Dad
Eulogy for my dad, Gilbert Garber
Linda Garber Sagiv
May 25, 2007
Dearest Dad,
How can we, your 3 children, thank you enough? How can we thank you for your example of what it is to be a good man?
We realized early on that you were dedicated to our mother and deeply in love with her. You showed us how a man loves a woman, how a husband cherishes his wife.
We watched you be a family man. You were a son who honored your mother and honored your father – a man who died when you were just 14- but whom you brought alive to us.
You were a good brother. There were moments of being together with lots of kibbutzing. There were moments of friction. There were moments of bereavement and there were many celebrations.
We watched you as a loving and caring brother-in law.
We saw you be an uncle! You were such a good uncle! It was a position which suited you well.
Sometimes you were a shoulder to lean on.
Sometimes you were a sounding board.
You asked questions.
You listened and took interest.
You gave good advice.
You were fun.
Look at each of the wonderful uncle-niece, uncle-nephew, and grandniece and grandnephew and great grandniece and nephew relationships you have!
As our father you were firm, demanding and generous, teaching us propriety and responsibility, giving us support and love.
And Dad – you have been an outstanding grandfather. Your grandchildren, in order of appearance in your life: Ilan, Ben, Toby, Nadav, Lexi, Yasmin, Shira and Boaz are so blessed you were their Grampa Giggy.
We all klibed nachos as you delighted in being Zohar’s great grandfather.
Dad, you were literally a man of the world, a man with knowledge and insight, a man of unending curiosity, and a very good sport!
Your sons-in-law Josh and Menachem join us as your children as we thank you for your example of integrity and determination.
We thank you for everything and we really can’t thank you enough.
May your soul go in peace.
May your soul rest in peace.
Love, Linda the Elder
Linda Garber Sagiv
May 25, 2007
Dearest Dad,
How can we, your 3 children, thank you enough? How can we thank you for your example of what it is to be a good man?
We realized early on that you were dedicated to our mother and deeply in love with her. You showed us how a man loves a woman, how a husband cherishes his wife.
We watched you be a family man. You were a son who honored your mother and honored your father – a man who died when you were just 14- but whom you brought alive to us.
You were a good brother. There were moments of being together with lots of kibbutzing. There were moments of friction. There were moments of bereavement and there were many celebrations.
We watched you as a loving and caring brother-in law.
We saw you be an uncle! You were such a good uncle! It was a position which suited you well.
Sometimes you were a shoulder to lean on.
Sometimes you were a sounding board.
You asked questions.
You listened and took interest.
You gave good advice.
You were fun.
Look at each of the wonderful uncle-niece, uncle-nephew, and grandniece and grandnephew and great grandniece and nephew relationships you have!
As our father you were firm, demanding and generous, teaching us propriety and responsibility, giving us support and love.
And Dad – you have been an outstanding grandfather. Your grandchildren, in order of appearance in your life: Ilan, Ben, Toby, Nadav, Lexi, Yasmin, Shira and Boaz are so blessed you were their Grampa Giggy.
We all klibed nachos as you delighted in being Zohar’s great grandfather.
Dad, you were literally a man of the world, a man with knowledge and insight, a man of unending curiosity, and a very good sport!
Your sons-in-law Josh and Menachem join us as your children as we thank you for your example of integrity and determination.
We thank you for everything and we really can’t thank you enough.
May your soul go in peace.
May your soul rest in peace.
Love, Linda the Elder
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