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Family Affair
Volunteering family gives time
to Fleischman residents.
Family
volunteers:
(standing)
Susan and
Lynne Golodner I Special to the Jewish News
E
very Wednesday morning,
Jewish Senior Life (JSL) hosts
an entire family of volunteer
women. Matriarch Helen Klau, 86, her sister
Florence Schuman, 88, and Heleris daugh-
ters Susan Klau and Robin Wine arrive at
the Fleischman Residence/Blumberg Plaza
together to socialize, teach jewelry making
and play card games with residents.
Schuman remembers joining her mother
to volunteer in Detroit during World War II.
"Even though we didn't have a lot, we were
always taught to share, to be generous" she
says.
Now a resident at the Hechtman
Apartments in West Bloomfield, Schuman
honors her parents' teachings by volunteer-
ing weekly at Fleischman with her sister and
two nieces.
Schuman and Wine join another JSL
longtime volunteer, Barbara Frankel, to teach
residents how to make jewelry. The founding
Helen Klau,
member of the jewelry-making class, Frankel
encourages residents to make fashionable
necklaces, eyeglass and napkin holders for
themselves and as gifts. Some of Frankel's
students' wares were even taken to Israel to
be distributed to nursing home residents
there.
"They're just so excited, so proud of their
designs" Schuman says. "They get a real
chance to show off. But the best part is doing
something meaningful while being with my
sister and nieces:'
Helen Klau of Southfield, who has been
volunteering at JSL since 2011, says, "I love
it!" She first intended to assist her daughter,
Susan, in the jewelry making class, but they
had enough instructors.
As Klau observed activities, she noticed a
group playing cards where no one enjoyed
dealing, so a staff member asked Klau if she
could help.
She obliged and, after a year of dealing
(seated)
Robin Wine
and Florence
Schuman.
cards, she learned the game so well she now
plays every Wednesday, morning and after-
noon.
"It keeps me young" Klau laughs. "If I can't
get a ride with my daughters, the SMART
bus takes me. I never miss."
Klau's daughter Wine, 60, of Orchard Lake,
began her experience with Jewish Senior Life
as a volunteer in the 1990s, teaching jewelry
making. She was there so often they offered
her a job, and for years she worked two days
a week in the programming department.
She finished the job, but continued her
relationship with JSL as a volunteer. Wine
now spends Wednesdays with her mother,
playing cards with residents.
She has grown close with many residents,
attending family celebrations over the years.
"[Fleischman] is a great place to be," Wine
says. "I have met so many nice families
here. That's really the best part, all of the
warm, wonderful families I see."
Susan Klau, 61, also of Southfield and
Helen's daughter, has been volunteering at
JSL for 14 years. "I like being with my family
all day," she says. "All of us together, we're like
a clown car when we roll up. It's fun."
Even Wine's daughter, Jamie Wine, 29,
of Oak Park, used to volunteer when she
was a teenager, making it a three-genera-
tion dynasty of generosity. *
Lynne Golodner owns Your People LLC and assists JSL
with public relations.
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