Love, Natalie B

Casino Night in Clearview, 1988

I miss the daily wake up calls that started my day. It is amazing that even though we spoke the night before, we had what to talk about early in the morning.

Tamara, Adina, Dassy and Bim, 1988

I miss going over for coffee before school or sitting on my little porch having coffee after school.

I miss Eva playing Mahjong on a weekly basis, or forcing her to play on other nights of the week.

Mommy's 40th Birthday Party at Irving & Sandy Katz's

I miss the many Shabbat meals that we spent together.

I miss the phone calls from Costco, Shoprite, Pathmark, & Moishes asking each other, "do you need anything?" And causing us to have an ongoing cheshbon (tally).

Norwegian Cruise, 2008

I remember the cruises, the trips to A.C., the trips to the mall and all of the other "Yenta" good times.

Norwegian Cruise, 2008

I cannot imagine being in Clearview without Eva.

There is not a waking moment that I do not think of Eva or miss her. Eva was a wonderful friend, mother, and grandmother to her children as well as to mine.

Love,
Natalie Baitner

Love, Shoshanna K

Mommy and Shoshanna in Clearview

Your mother and I were quite a team. No matter what we did, something went "different."

My best shopping experience ever

When we went to the bungalow, we shared a car for the summer. Our outings were relegated to grocery shopping, fruit and vegetable shopping, meat shopping and some miscellaneous stuff. We went every place together. Remember, Wednesday and Thursday were days that we shopped and schlepped and schlepped, etc...

One day, we went to Mountain Fruit in Monticello. I spent time carefully picking the best canaloupes that I could. I put them in my wagon and a young Chasideshe man (about 20), came up to me – very red in the face – and suggested that I might want to take some stickers off my shirt. I thanked him and looked down. Well, on two protruding spots, were two stickers. Each marked $1.49.

I couldn't contain myself. I thanked the young man for bringing this to my attention as this could be quite embarrassing. I couldn't stop laughing. I ran through the store until I saw your mother. She thought that I must have lost my mind (again) and I just kept pointing to my shirt. When she finally realized what I was pointing at the two of us were in tears. That was my best shopping experience EVER at Mountain Fruit.

And we can't forget...

Dena, of course will never forget YOU HOO, U.P.S. MAN...And Yitzi who kept saying, "this looks like a little dirt road." It wasn't our fault that we were on the wrong side of the mountain!

Yitzi and Mommy

Summer cars

One of our wonderful summer cars had a very interesting windshield wiper system. The wiper worked so well that it even wiped the SIDE window. Unfortunately, as it reached the driver side window, it did not retract to the front until it was manually pushed. This was when we were younger and your mother did not drive on the highway. We wanted to go to Middletown (we had to escape). Unfortunately, it began to rain. Need I say more?

When we reached Middletown, I was soaking wet. My window had to stay open and my left hand kept pushing the wiper bak into position as I drove with my right. We laughed all the way to Middletown. It's a wonder we got there at all.

Bubby and Mommy on the porch...always knitting

Ice Cream

In later years, your Bubby needed blood tests every week and we had to go to Harris Hospital. One day, while I was sitting in the waiting room, I noticed an ad for an old fashioned ice-cream parlor in Mountaindale. I love ice-cream!

I was so excited that it was hard to contain myself. As soon as we returned to the bungalow, we called and guess what? They only used Hershey's ice cream and it was kosher. That Saturday night, we DRAGGED our husbands to Mountaindale. It was a very dark road and no GPS in those days – but we were on a mission and wouldn't give up. Well, we had something called the KITCHEN SINK (it's a bit of everything). Boy were we sick, but it was great. We tried to keep this place a secret as long as we could, but somehow other people in the bungalow started going and somehow the first time was still the best.

(And then there was the day) it was Erev Tisha Ba'av ad I NEEDED ICE CREAM. Marley's had already closed and I was desperate. So....we drove to Middletown to Friendly's. After we finished our yummy stuff, we began our trip home. There was a funny noise coming from our car. We pulled into a gas station and the attendant assured us that everything was fine. It was just our muffler which would definitely stay on the car to Monticello and we shouldn't worry. So, we took off again and LOST the muffler as we got on to Route 17.

My Best Friend

Your mother was my second half, my grounded half...my best friend. I never had to start a thought at the beginning...she knew exactly what I was thinking and exactly how to guide me. Of course, sometimes, I went a little off course. She was the straight man and I was the comic relief...She was thoughtful (everyone came before her), kind, sincere and was always there for me. A true best friend.

Many people go through their whole lives without finding a best friend. I had Eva and I consider myself one of the luckiest people on earth.

Shoshanna