I Never Learned the Song

In my mind's eye, I can imagine my Great-Grandmother, although I never met her as she lived in the mid to late 1800’s in Russia.  Although my Great-Grandfather had good profession, a tailor, it must have been a very difficult life.  As a Jewish family there were extra hardships that they endured besides the reality that life itself was not easy.

My Dad often told me a story about a song my Great-Grandmother made up, a lullaby, that she would sing to her children at night when she put them to bed.  It was a song he knew well from his father…. also a man that I don’t remember as he passed away when I was two years old. 

This special song was sung in Yiddish, the language my father’s family mostly used when communicating. Whenever I would ask, my Dad, who had a really lovely voice, would sing the song to me, translating the words afterward.  Sadly, I never learned the song well enough to sing it myself.  (Not that my singing holds any talent)  The song, my Dad used to tell me, expressed the love of my Great-Grandmother for her children.  It softly conveyed how she wished them good health and strength.  The song went on to say how her love would be with them always and that she would keep them safe with everything she had in her.  All of her children had the memory of this song deep in their hearts forever.

Many years later, my Grandfather left Russia for a better life in “The Land of Opportunity”, America.  My Grandfather had fallen in love with my Grandmother, a woman who worked in the tailor shop of my Great-Grandfather.  Because of their love, he was forced out of the business.  In those days, status was held in very high importance and my Great Grandfather did not approve of my Grandfather marrying someone from what he considered to be a “lower” status.  My Great Grandfather as a sign of his disapproval blacklisted my Grandfather and my Grandmother from working in the tailoring business, the only business they knew.  Since they were unable to find work; they were forced to leave their home.

My Grandfather came to the United States first and opened his own tailor/manufacturing shop in Philadelphia.  He became a “Yankee Doodle Dandy”.  From everything I have learned of my Grandfather, he was a character.   He loved having the biggest, newest car on the block; he adored his children, and loved life in America.  I wish I could have known him.  I am sure that a lot of my Dad’s vivaciousness and warmth came from him.  The one thing my Grandfather perpetuated from his younger days, however, was the lullaby his mother sang to him.  My Dad told me that he sang the lullaby to him, his brother and sister and that when he did, he would have a wistful look, as if he was channeling his own mother.

When WWII broke out, my Grandfather still had family in Europe.  His nephew, Saul, unbeknownst to my Grandfather, was taken to a Concentration camp with his wife and daughters.  My father served in the army in WWII, but he never mentioned whether or not he realized that close family was being held in the Nazi camps.  Of course, being Jewish, there was a feeling of family in general, but of close relatives, I don't know if my Dad knew of them.

As it turned out, Saul suffered unimaginable loss in the camp.  His wife and daughters were slaughtered in front of him, but somehow, he managed to survive.  After the war, he knew he had an Uncle who lived on the east coast, somewhere, in the United States of America.  He found the means to make it here and started his quest to find his Uncle Joseph.

In those days, telephones weren’t in every home…they were in candy stores or other stores down the block.  Children would earn a penny running to someone’s house to tell them they had a phone call.  Saul took any job he could find as he searched for my Grandfather.  He worked his way along the East Coast calling every Joseph Snyder along his way.  He searched and searched as he took various jobs, moving from area to area.  He had learned the importance of family and needed to belong to one once again.

Finally, unfortunately I never learned how long it took him; Saul called the right Joseph Snyder.  Now, my Grandfather had “made-it” by his standards.  He had a successful manufacturing shop and felt like a wealthy man.  He didn’t know of any nephew that he had, let alone one that had been forced to suffer such horror as Saul did in the Nazi Concentration Camps.  (I remember seeing the numbers on Saul's arm, the "branding" of the concentration camp was with him his entire life.)  When my Grandfather was told there was a call for him from someone claiming to be his nephew, he was skeptical, to say the least.

Thankfully, my Grandfather took the phone call.  Saul must have told him all the names of his family in Russia, many of whom my Grandfather knew and many he had never known.  My Grandfather thought this could be some type of swindle…. he wanted proof, somehow some proof, that Saul was indeed his nephew.

It was then that Saul said, "I know something no one but Mishbukha,(family) would know, something that can make you feel sure I am who I say I am."  With that said, he started singing the lullaby that my Great-Grandmother had made up so many, many years ago in such a different world.  After hearing the first few lines of the song, my Grandfather joined in and together they finished the well loved lullaby.  He knew, from that miracle of a song, that Saul was his nephew and Saul was welcomed into the family from that day forward.

Before my Dad passed, I wish I would have learned to sing that oh so special lullaby. I can hear my Father’s voice, gentle, loving, but I don’t remember any of the words because it was more of a melody to me as the Yiddish was something I never learned.  My Dad’s sister, my Aunt Elsie, also knew the song and during one visit to her at her home on the bay, she sang it to me and my husband…. getting that same look in her eye that my Dad did.  They must have heard their father’s voice in their heads, as he heard his mother’s voice in his.  But, they learned the song and kept it going. 

Writing this blog is my way of keeping that very special song alive.  I may not know the words, but I understand the emotion of my Great-Grandmother ~ wanting to keep your children safe…and look how that song ended up keeping her grandson safe in some way in the end ~ helping him find his Uncle. 

I will always regret not learning the lullaby, and there is no way I could ever learn it now as everyone who sang it is gone.  Always take the time to learn from those you love while they are with you.  I will always wish I had learned to sing my Great-Grandmother’s song ~ I hope this blog honors her and in some way keeps her song, and her love, alive.