by Lisa Ben-Shoshan
A warm sweater coat, wrapped around me like my grandmother's arms, flapping in the wind as I walk the streets to work. It's thick and long, and gathers leaves behind me, sweeping them under my booted feet as I hurry. The sleeves are overly long, dangling past my cold fingertips even though they are rolled up twice, for style. There are pockets hanging way down low, too low to be of any real use, for style again. It's all about style, isn't it? How we dress, what we choose to represent ourselves. Why put on a boring article of clothing, why buy it, even, if it isn't going to make you feel that you are in your element? So the long sweater coat, which is really something I would love to curl up with on the sofa at the end of the day, is more than my protection against the elements. It is a reminder of love, of grandma's sweaters she used to knit for me when I was young when she was still here, of the Afghans she knit which I still keep and pull out when I want to feel that sense of remembering, that sense of sorrow. How lucky am I to have these small reminders of what family is, almost like it has been captured in a poem or story. And how lucky am I that I can pass these things on to my children, like letting them read the story, and hopefully have them appreciate it as I do.
Like my grandmother's arms, my time is a circle, I think, of time and family and love and remembering. Time, moving around the inside of my head marking the passing days and weeks and years, spinning now, spinning even faster as I get older. I hold onto the memories, I hoard the old sweaters and Afghan quilts, I hoard the letters and stories and photos and faces. I keep them in my mind, and I make the dead come to life again, or live still, in my mind. I delve into the memories of family, of my ancestors, searching for links through genealogy, connecting me to my past and theirs. I'm searching for a sense of continuity, of connection, a glimmer in an old photograph, faded and torn, which shows me that I have my great-great grandfather's eyes, that my son looks like my father, that the bits and pieces that make up all of us, our hair, our coloring, our skin and blood and bones, are more than pieces of DNA and dust. The things we remember, the pictures, the pieces of jewelry handed down, hearing my mother say I am just like my father—it is all part of who I am, and who I am is forever connected to the living pieces of everyone who has ever come before me. They live in me, in my mind, and so they never die.
Lisa Mellen Ben-Shoshan wrote and illustrated her first book, entitled “Valentine Wish” when she was in the first grade; the single edition was treasured by her parents. An avid journal keeper for many years, she parlayed her skills into a career in marketing communications. A positive outcome of her encounter with breast cancer set her on a path of investigating her family genealogy where she keeps the memories of everyone who came before her alive.
