Seasons of Love and Loss

It’s the holidays. You probably noticed. Personally, I like regular days and weeks. Holidays tend to build too much expectation, which can lead to disappointment. I know, I know. You like it. You like the traditions. You like the music and the bustle and the hustle and all that, and I’m sorry I have to be the crabby Jewish girl here.

 Of course I like holiday parties at my friends’ houses and the way NYC looks in December and I’m happy for everyone who feels cozy and connected to it, but here’s the truth: I didn’t grow up with Christmas and I don’t like the pressure and emphasis on giving and getting, and to gloss away everything else. It’s just a bit … extra. Let’s spread that cheer out, you know? January through April could benefit from a tiny bit of the intensity we bring to December (and June – but I’ve written that blog post before).

I am, however, thinking about gifts, and the forms they take. I’m thinking about 2019 and what it has meant for me as a mother and as a friend. So much has changed since last December, when my friend Heather Tilev got really sick, really quickly, and passed away. 

 Heather was a part of a group of women I’ve depended on for laughter and love through the daily slog of #momlife for the past 7 years. Our older kids met in elementary school and we all were drawn to each other, as my friend Kerri, says, like magnets. Heather’s loss has been seismic, and has led me to a place of deep contemplation about what it means to be mid-life and unprepared/ready for anything.

 Since the day she died in February of 2019, I knew I had to look into the face of loss, so I decided on a season of the podcast devoted to the subject, which I would examine through the lens of motherhood. 

I noticed, while booking guests for the Loss Season, that I was drawn to women like myself, who have a need to write through something in order to process it. Back in August, I spoke to Lauren Mechling about her book “How Could She,” and to Dina Bryk Pearl about her book, “Raised.” Their episodes are thoughtful and connected, covering the topics of female friendship, shedding past selves, and becoming the parents we need to be to ourselves. I urge you to go back and listen to them if you missed them. I’m very interested in how we lose ourselves naturally, as in friendships that change and evolve the self, and unnaturally, as a part of a trauma, like with my friend Dina’s story of losing both parents at a vulnerable age. Both women write with exquisite detail about women in their 30’s in New York City, and they are an interesting complement to each other. They are both terrific women and have beautiful styles of expression.

Following Dina’s piece, I settled in with two big projects in my family life. The first was preparing for my daughter’s Bat Mitzvah in early October, and the second was helping her apply to high schools. These were in direct succession, and were the focus of my fall.

Photo by Heather Phelps Lipton

 The Bat Mitzvah involved a lot of thought and planning, obviously, but in addition to making sure Zoe was studying her Torah portion and writing her speeches and schlepping her to her lessons, I watched as she solved problems and navigated relationships. It took time and nudging, but I saw her find pride in learning and leadership within her community. Truthfully, the process leading up to the weekend was exhausting, but the event itself was exhilarating. I was so proud of her and of my family. I put my all into making sure she was seeing, really seeing, how lucky and priviliged she is to live where we live, and to have the opportunities and experiences we have. I was also thinking deeply about where we are as a nation and as a Jewish people, when things have been so violent and scary this past year, and how we have to keep vigilant and teach our kids that values that have been passed on to us through generations, and kept Jews vibrant in the face of hatred. Also, I planned a killer party, I have to say, with the help of friends who are designers and photographers and event people, and we drank and danced celebrated life with all of our beloveds. We really took a moment to look around and be present, and it was sweet. 

Directly after the Bat Mitzvah, Zoe had to apply to high school for next fall. Which sounds innocuous, but if you live in NYC you know that it is filled with stress, a scarcity mentality and true competition (also, trying to get 13 year olds to do anything is hard – add in tutoring, applications, auditions, tests and essays for specialized school, tours you have to be on lists for, etc) It is the reason people fear New York, and honestly, I get it. Conquering the public school system is impossible, but the experience was also fascinating. I want a kid who can deal with adversity and will be able to compete, because she is smart and fierce but needs to learn how to operate in this world if she wants the good stuff. That doesn’t mean it was easy or fun to navigate, and I would say that those two months of guiding Zoe toward high school was one of the hardest times I’ve had as her parent. But we got through it, and I learned to give her some agency, even though it is hard to let go. Again, loss rears its head – in the form of control. 

Meanwhile, I was interviewing the Dumbo Bitches, as we affectionately call ourselves, for the finale of The Loss Season. The Heather episode has taken all these months to make, and it was happening in real time – we were grieving as a group and individually, while all going through high school applications, teenagers, job stuff. I started my interviews the week Heather died, and completed the last one in September. It has been really tough, but I feel like I got somewhere with understanding how people grieve differently, and how our identities and communication styles affect each other. I listened to hours and hours of my dear friends talking about our beloved Heather, remembering her life, and processing her death. I have found this experience very helpful, though of course grief is a never ending road and this is just one stop along the way.

I’m finding myself humming “Seasons of Love,” from Rent this week, a.) because I deeply love that earnest show, and b.) because that song always resonates around these holidays. Five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes. How do you measure a year?  There are so many ways to do so. Mark it how you need. Wrap your gifts, take a video your kids holiday show you’ll never watch again, and cuddle with your loved ones. With this season of loss finale, I take off my curmudgeon hat, pluck the gift of friendship from the pile next to the menorah, and share it with you. I hope you like meeting my girls and hearing them tell you about Heather, who was a MILK, and most likely, an angel. Happy Holidays.  Xoxoxo

Lossy Lossowitz

Mid May to Mid June is my loss trigger crunch time. I write about it every year because it’s a thing.  Mothers Day: May 12. Mom’s B-day: May 24th. Mom’s Deathiversary: June 6. Miles’s Birthday: June 8. Grads/dads, and end of the year events like karate belt tests and tween Instagram posts exacerbate the nostalgia and the milestones that matter to like 3 people in my life, one of whom is gone.

I miss my mom, but she drives me forward, always.

The investigation I’m doing with MILK Podcast: The Loss Season, is fueling me. I’ve done 8 interviews so far this season and have more episodes to come, every other week. I have so many questions about loss to ask.

My sister Lanie Kasdan Francis in one recording studio, and me in another

I was able to interview my middle sister Lanie about her work as an oncologist and about how her life changed when my mom had cancer. Like MILK Caroline Schrank of Down to Earth Funerals, Lanie is able to discuss end of life with knowledge and compassion because she is not afraid to confront it. She has contributed so much to conversations around integrative oncology, patient and nurse advocacy, as well as writing her own rules in the medical world. She is an inspiring doctor, person, and sister, and I am super excited to share this interview soon. I’m thinking about how much our mom would appreciate us talking about how we parent and what we learned from her example. 

I love what I’m making right now, how I’m connecting with my communities, and how being a parent is challenging in a new way. The kids are more complex emotionally then ever, and there is that that loss of the mom I was — to babies, toddlers, elementary schoolers. I’m loving and treasuring my female friends, and finding ways to feel joy and pleasure despite the calamitous state of the world. 

I’m also thinking about success, and what that means to me in these times, at this age, with these concepts of loss in mind. I’m making this show, this season, the way I want to make it because I’m on a mission to understand how loss shapes this half of life as a parent. But I’m also trying to make a living, as my industries are changing and I’m here with the skills I’ve honed, wanting to create and earn. Especially with my kids having needs in new and surprising ways, that are different from the early, messy, desperate years of baby and toddlerhood. So I’m trying to grow this and make it better and collaborate and make a living doing it. Its a new challenge. I’m having to pivot and learn new skills.

I am aware of my talent and experience. Hungry for meaning and for some wins.    

I’m thinking about how I want to set examples for my children, teach them how to show up for people, to connect, to use their empathy and creativity to help and support.  I’m thinking about amplifying people where I can and watching them shine. Because my mom did this.

Brazitte Poole, JD, Duquesne Law School class of 2019

I’m thinking about Brazitte Poole, a wonderful woman from my hometown of Pittsburgh, that our family met three years ago when she applied for a scholarship we set up in my mom’s name. Brazitte graduated from Duquesne Law School last week on my mom’s birthday, and we can’t wait to see the good work she will do in this troubled world. Judi’s legacy lives on through women like Brazitte.

Heather laughing at me. I miss her laugh.

And of course, I’m thinking about Heather as we roll into summer, her favorite season. I miss her. It is so weird, and so confusing that she is not here. So I’ll keep trying to understand and appreciate what it really means to be here one minute and then gone the next. I’ll dance to Prince and other dumb songs with the other mom friends and laugh and cry and talk and remember. I will be there for her family and for my own.

Stay with me on the loss thing. It’s real.

Mom's Got Her Thing Tonight

I’m lucky to know a variety of excellent women. It’s why I started MILK Podcast, for a chance to converse with and champion some of the passionate and fabulous ladies I come across.

Some of my most treasured women friends are ones I don’t see all that often: my gal pals from college, and they are a special little coven. We get together every few years for an unofficial reunion, and it is always the most replenishing and hilarious time. We drink wine, laugh constantly, tell stories about our kids and jobs, and of course, reminisce about who we were and what we wore while students at The University of Vermont. I always leave these weekends so inspired, so vibrant, with my heart so full. I remember things I had forgotten about younger versions of myself, and I’m moved by them, as if reconnecting with an old friend, and that friend is me.

These women: Heather, Whitney, Aimee, Danielle, Lisa and Cressida, are unconditional supports. We live in different locations (urban/suburban/country/east coast/west coast), and aren’t all in touch on the daily, but our choices and values overlap. We share honestly and vividly about our fears and accomplishments. In one breath we feel 19, and like we live on the same dorm hall getting ready to go see Phish play in our student center cafeteria (which we did). In the next we are aware of the responsibilities that challenge the free spirits we all once were (how many types of insurance can one person/family have, just for example).

I came upon this piece on “The New Mid Life Crisis, Why and How It’s Hitting Gen X Women,” while researching an interview that I’m recording tomorrow with it's author Ada Calhoun. She also wrote a crisp and entertaining book of essays called  “Wedding Toasts I’ll Never Give,” which I loved and highly recommend. This essay, however, is a bit bleak, -- full of research both scientific and anecdotal about why women in their forties, like me and my UVM girls, would or could be struggling physically and psychically in this mid life place. It is very much worth reading and discussing. 

Coming off of this weekend, however, where Whitney hosted us one night in her cozy home, and planned our meals and thought of everything, I felt so loved and tended to. The second night we stayed in a hotel and met up some other college friends, and it was pure silliness and reconnecting with that fun time freedom we all took for granted in our college days. Meanwhile back at the ranch, our awesome partners tended to our kids. 

Thinking back on our reunion and considering this piece today, I do not feel in crisis. Perhaps this is because I am privileged to have a partner who will watch my kids, and friends with the means to host a lovely dinner and split hotel rooms for a night. That is my pure luck in this life to be able to afford these luxuries.

But I wonder also if I am feeling less mid life crisis-y and more optimistic lately despite the constant drum of bad news and our dire seeming, violent world, because I’m feeling free to be myself, finally, at this mid life crisis prone age. Being with these old friends allows access to the previous selves inside of me that I’ve been able to embody or else retire. Conjuring them up is intense, but feels like a release when I can let them go.

“Self-care” is a phrase that annoys me for no good reason, but letting laughter and love wash over me, and spending face to face time with people dear to me, really felt that way. As moms, women, humans --  our many selves need care, and we deserve it.

we are all the same

The other day we were all at this kiddie enrichment place. Z takes ballet there and they have free “open play” in their beautiful gym facility, which we try and take advantage of in order to justify the silly money we pay for classes there. That means getting online weeks in advance to reserve spots for the two of them, and then getting up there by 9ish on a Saturday morning, something we are not fabulous at doing. I always swear I’ll get the diaper bag ready the night before. The same with getting Z ready for school during the week – packing her lunch and laying our her outfit before she goes to bed. Say I’m gonna. Don’t do.

I’m frenzied on these Saturday mornings — grabbing 4 different satchels and cramming snacks, Ziploc bagged sippy cups and ballet clothes into to each one of them, not eating or drinking a thing besides 3 cups of coffee, and feeling like a complete freak for not being able to get my act together by 9:00 am – given that I’ve been awake for hours. This whole ritual kind of sucks, and I would say 7 out 10 mornings E and I end up fighting about who is winning the most annoying spouse contest. But once we get to the place and the 80’s hits are pumping, the kids start frolicking and E goes out and gets coffees and bagels, all the hustle is worth it. Both kids get an activity before noon when we have to get back for M to lunch and nap, and then it’s the reward of chill time for the rest of us.

This Kiddie Club is a funny scene. It’s a posh crowd, and many of the kids have names that for some reason irk me, which I won’t name here in case you have also named your kid Schmoopie or Schmoopae, but let’s just say on a morning that I’m feeling cranky, the names and inevitable tantrums, plus the sing-songing voices of the parents can wear on a gal.

Which is what happened the other day. My irritation did not stay at home with the breakfast dishes, strewn about clothes and plastic toy chaos, but travelled with me to kiddie enrichment place. I truthfully don’t know exactly why E and I were publicly hissing at each other about who got to eat their bagel sandwich, getting napkins wet with coffee cups that still had coffee in them, and who was or wasn’t chasing M into the toilets over and over, but there we were. Certainly not our finest moment.

Seething, I sat down to eat my cold bagel sandwich, and a woman I had seen carrying a wild haired toddler while trying to corral a second child in and out of a coat, stroller, leotard, etc, came running up to me breathlessly, plunked a business card down on the table and said: “We have to hang out. We have the exact same life.”

Now this is certainly something I have fantasized about doing. Seeing another mom who looks or seems or sounds a certain way, it is tempting to want to be pals with this person. I have plenty of friends and acquaintances and people to talk to from all facets of my life – some parents and some not, but for me there is the lure of this person out there in the universe who is your momfriend soulmate, who is cool and honest and not weird and competitive, you have no baggage with and perhaps your kids are exactly the same age and on the same schedules?

We don’t like to think so, because it dilutes our coolness or our specialness, but we are all just archetypes acting out rituals that parents have been doing forever. Maybe we vary in socio-economic status and the modern trappings that go along with having families, but here in our Brooklyn village we do appear to have similar lives. We have struggles and victories that matter, that are not trite or surface. But we also have the same annoying conversations about where to eat lunch and who is going to take the boots to the shoemaker, and worry about how much time we let our toddlers play with our phones. Of course some of us have deeper problems and secrets, but on a Saturday morning at 10:10 am, we are mostly just trying to get though the day without losing our minds.

What had this woman seen or heard that gave her the chutzpah to want to connect with me in this way? I actually love that she noticed that we were probably being ridiculous, and that the whole idea of a kiddie enrichment place is kind of ridiculous, and that by laughing and noticing and reaching out, she was making her morning a little better.

My interest is piqued. I think I’ll call.