So Sue Me

Don't think I don't hear you.

They found me dead, sitting at the table on the balcony with my head on my folded arms and Tel Aviv’s sun flickering down on me.

I’d been cooking all day, expecting my son Ben and his wife for dinner. I was thinking about roasted eggplant salad when a wave of fatigue washed over me and black spots danced in front of my eyes. I put down my wooden spoon and went out to rest in the fresh air a little.

I was so tired. I put my head down. The sun on my back felt good, lulling me to sleep.

I did sleep. Never woke up again though.

Mom had a heart attack, they told friends who came to the shiva. Sudden cardiac arrest. It was all over in a few minutes, they said. At least it was a peaceful death. Someone piously quoted a Yiddish saying: her soul left as gently as a hair drawn out of milk.

What did they know. I was out there on the balcony alone with the Malach HaMaves - the Angel of Death - for hours before Ben and Ilana turned their key in the lock and walked in.

It had been a good heart. It served me 75 years. It gave out eventually, a consequence of diabetes. What can I say, I loved to cook and to eat, and I’d hated exercise. It was OK as far as I was concerned - dying. But Ben, a big man in middle age, fainted when he saw me slumped over the table, as heavy and unmoving as a sack of potatoes. He staggered back into the living room and just keeled over. Good thing he didn’t hit his head on any sharp edge of furniture, or there would have been two of us.

My daughter-in-law, Ilana, is altogether a more pragmatic type. She turned pale and gave a shriek, seeing me unmistakably dead in my chair; but she pulled herself together quickly. First she attended to Ben, who lay cross-ways on the sofa and was about to fall off. I like that about Ilana, she keeps her head. It was more important to deal with Ben than with my corpse at that moment. I mean, I was dead, right? Another few minutes wouldn’t make a difference.

When Ben came to and sat up, sipping cold water, they discussed what to do next. Call the ambulance, Ilana said practically. Somehow she’d heard that a home death requires medical confirmation that it wasn’t a murder, or anything weird like that. Which I think is stupid: murders can happen in hospitals too, and probably do, every day.

So the paramedics came, together with the police, and soon after, the Chevra Kadisha, the organization in charge of handling corpses and burials according to Jewish law. What with locating my ID card, which was in my purse, signing papers and arranging the time for the funeral, Ben and Ilana managed alright. It’s all set up efficiently, everyone is kind and they tactfully walk you through all the procedures. I went through it too, when my husband Murray died, he should rest in peace.

I was present, just disembodied. I heard everything; saw the Chevra Kadisha guys bring in a stretcher and carry my corpse with the blue hands and feet out the door. Ben turned his head so as not to see me going out feet first. I felt sad for him, but there it was, I was dead.

Ben notified his boss that he’d be out of the office for the shiva week. Ilana covered the mirrors with scarves from my drawer and had black-bordered funeral notices printed to paste around the neighborhood. I was touched to see she was sorry I’d gone. My grandkids cried, then went back to school and told their friends about their Grandma dying.

I didn’t enjoy the funeral much, watching my grandchildren hugging each other and weeping, and old friends wiping their eyes, and Ben, white-lipped, acknowledging condolences.

But it was nice, in a way, feeling mourned. Allow me that pleasure, OK? I’m due to face the Heavenly Court and account for myself pretty soon, and I’m not looking forward to it.

I’d left the apartment to Ben and money in trust for the grandkids. And had what they call a living will stating how I was to be treated if I became non compis mentis. But that wasn’t needed in the end, was it? I never guessed I’d be compis mentis after death, but then, who does?

I wasn’t ready to let go. I asked my buddy the Malach HaMavis if it was okay to stay in the apartment a little while. He doesn’t talk, you know, just nods or shakes his ghostly white head. I don’t really want to hear him talk; I’m sure he sounds really creepy. This time he nodded, drifted through a window, and was gone.

Don’t get me wrong. I had no intention of interfering with the family in any way. No sudden apparitions, no poltergeist activity like moving furniture around in the middle of the night, none of that crap. I had enjoyed living in the big, sunny apartment. I only wanted stay a little longer, absorbing the energy still vibrating there. The memories. Our lives. My kitchen with the array of pots and appliances and my fifteen wooden spoons.

The thousands of lunches and dinners, and Shabbat meals and Passover seders. Ben, and later my grandkids, sleeping as I sat up planning the next day’s meals. And grumpy Murray sitting in the recliner, asking when’s dinner already. In his last days he lay in our bed, his hand reaching for mine and his eyes brimming.

All that was over… Over.

Ben and Ilana decided to rent the apartment out. So I lingered, listening and watching them go in and out, arranging things. I guess you can say I was haunting the place.

When they weren’t around, I floated around the silent empty rooms. The light filtered through the windows, bright at morning, slowly dwindling in the long afternoons to darkness. What was the point in hanging around alone, I asked myself. I’d have to leave pretty soon.

But I longed to hear Ben’s voice, my grandkids’ voices. Just a little more time with them, I thought; just a little more, before the Malach HaMaves returns, and beckons, and I fade away for good.

Also, I was in no rush rejoin Murray, he should rest in peace.

The apartment was in good shape, but the kitchen was full of food that needed disposal. There were casseroles and babkas and lasagna in the freezer, a whole chicken needing to get roasted. There was a shelf of preserves I’d put up, not because I couldn’t afford to buy preserves but because I enjoyed making them.

I viewed the food I’d left behind, thinking Ilana would probably take most of it home. Okay, somebody should eat it. I sure couldn’t. At least, I thought, sniffing around, they’d thrown out the garbage.

After the shiva, Ilana and twelve-year-old Shoshi came over to sort out the kitchen. Ilana’s eyes lit up when she found a jar of cherry liqueur with the cherries still in; it was a favorite dessert, my Black Forest cake topped with those boozy cherries and whipped cream.

“Grandma was such a great cook,” she said, and sighed. She was thinking she’d have to make Shabbat and organize the holiday meals now I’m gone. But her food would never measure up to mine, and everyone would always be comparing. Don’t ask me how I know, I just know.

Shoshi opened the fridge and took out a covered Tupperware box.

“Oh, look at this, Mom,” she said, prying the lid off. “Grandma’s rice pudding. I love her rice pudding, she always put orange peel in it. Yum.”

“We can heat it in the microwave and finish it up,” Ilana said, rummaging around the pantry. “Hey, what’s this - tofu? Grandma never ate tofu. Said it was bad for the thyroid.”

“What’s a thyroid?” Shoshi said. “Anyway, isn’t it creepy, eating food that a dead person cooked? Even if it was Grandma’s?”

“We’ll eat it specially because it was Grandma’s,” Ilana said firmly. “You know how she was about waste.”

Shoshi stuck a finger in the cold rice pudding, something I’d never have allowed, and licked it thoughtfully. She said, “Yeah, she didn’t care how many helpings you had, as long as you ate it all up. And if you left food on the plate, she’d make you wash the dishes.”

Ilana snorted. “Did you know, she’d go back afterwards and wash all the dishes again? She didn’t believe anyone ever got them clean.”

“No, really?” Shoshi said, smiling. “Good ol’ Grandma.”

“Obsessive Grandma,” Ilana muttered.

That was unkind, I thought. So what if I’d been a little picky? Did it ever hurt anybody? So sue me!

I couldn’t resist it: I floated over and pinched her tush.

“Ow,” Ilana said, swatting at her behind. “What was that?”

A little hint from the Great Beyond, I thought with satisfaction. Don’t speak ill of the dead.

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