Mother and Son
After picking Carmillia's brain with the limited energy she had left on this humid summer day, Mary Frances hobbled toward the 3rd floor elevator, cane in hand, along with a huge canvas purse with green stenciled drawings of three Shih Tzu pooches on front and back, a gift from her daughter, Hanna, who owned three of the nervous creatures. As usual, some kindly soul helped Mary Frances into the elevator. By the time the two reached the ground floor, Mrs. Cohen had issued a half-dozen, "what's" and received an equal amount of "What's that's." The conversation continued all the way to the swimming pool nearest Mary Frances' building, a healthy jaunt that would take a young person about 5 minutes, and our gentle octogenarian nearly 25.Jade Winds' easternmost swimming pool was a source of rich data for Mary F's computer-like mind. On any given afternoon she'd find a group of Russian men and women alternatively speaking their national tongues and Yiddish, the multi-textured, polyglot lingo that Jews from around the world ingeniously created to make communication possible even as they moved from homeland to homeland, chased away by one form of bigotry after another. Although a typical discussion among Mary Frances and her Russian neighbors could test the will of a marathon runner, Mrs. Cohen always left with plenty of gossip and historical information which she gladly shared with her family members.
"You know that old woman with the curly red hair?" Mary Frances said.
"What woman with curly red hair?" her middle-aged ne'er-do-well son replied.
"You know. Mrs. Cherbov , the one with the son whose ex-wife lost their estate in a poker game."
At this point, Donald Cohen would inevitably revert to his I can't understand you maneuver, even though he had acquired a fluent understanding of Mary Francesese over the decades.
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