? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Question? EdItoR's NoTe Do you know a child who will be age 5 by December 31? Answer: If yes, then you must hear about our Award Winning kindergarten Program Thursday. January 15, 1998 7:30 - 8:30 p.m. KINDERGARTEN INFORMATION NIGHT Congregation Shaarey Zedek Applebaum Jewish Parenting Center 4200 Walnut Lake Road • West Bloomfield (at Green Road) Call Rena Weintraub, Director. for further information or to R.S.V.P. (248) 681-4235 STUDENT ENROLLMENT IS LIMITED remember, and remembering is the' n the bookshelf in our den only gift I can give these children. is a collection of stories Today, I look at Caps For Sale whose titles would be and know that it was Pamela who familiar to almost everyone, but read it. Sometimes I would like to whose particular association here call her parents and say, "I think means something unique to me. often of you and your daughter, and I have Caps For Sale, a book how one evening you let me into about a horse named Bonny and your lives and told me everything another about a bear. Each of these about her life and death." represents - a memory, but a memory I want to reassure them that I did- that is alive. n't just write a story Throughout my 10 and then forget every- years as a profession- thing. But of course I al journalist, no stories won't. It's not that I troubled me more than think I can begin to CAPS those in which chil- understand these par- "- FOR SALE dren died. I spoke to kel 11:sle ,,f a Poltler. , ents' grief; I cannot. I 9 mid Their parents whose sons don't even think there and daughters had are words for such been killed accidental- anguish. But there is ly or murdered, some such power in memo- whose lives ended in ry, even from a disease. Often after stranger. these interviews I An elderly woman whose life wa.---/\ would wake in the middle of the coming to an end once told me, "It's night and, like a restless ghost, not my impending death that's so haunt my own house — walking hard, but the fact that everyone else back and forth across our wooden in my family and all my friends are floors, numbed back into sleep only gone, and I didn't have children. after an hour or two of television. No one will remember me." I never hesitated to ask questions, Sometimes I drive past a cemetery and parents never hesitated to that's the final resting place of a answer. They wanted, they needed, baby about whom I once wrote. He with a kind of desperation I have died when he was only months old, never seen before or since, to talk leaving little memories for his parents about their children. Details were who, in any case, have long since key: the kind of music their son or died themselves. I don't have a daughter loved, their hobbies, their book to remember this baby. I know favorite vacation spots and, invari- so little of him, but I think of him — ably, their favorite books. a lonely song of memory — when-' I would immediately go out and ever I drive by the cemetery. buy these books. If it was impossible These days, few stop by at the to secure them right away, I became child's grave. His most regular visi- agitated and impatient, calling tors are the cemetery caretaker and friends and family, asking them to the birds who perch atop his snow- go in search. At first it seemed to covered tombstone, their tiny voices make no sense whatsoever, and I calling to one another in the thick became angry with myself for my air, piercing the terrible silence. desperation — but still it persisted, like something heavy across my heart. Over time, I came to understand that it wasn't the books themselves Elizabeth Applebaum that were so important but rather AppleTree Editor what they did. They helped me S111.111 . N1911 Winter Walden Ski It Snowboarding Club for Children * Professional instructions * Classes For all skill levels - beginner to expert * Special program for the younger skiers (ages 6-9) * Small classes * Adult classes too! * Charter buses Saturday & Sunday winter walden W ski club (248) 855-1075 Teaching Kids to Ski is Our Business Celebrating our 23rd Season! aTOM Get Results ...Advertise in our Entertainment Section! Call The Sales Department (248) 354-7123 Ext. 209 QIN DETROIT JEWISH NEWS 1/9 1998 GO vt isileifvu