I have never gotten over what I felt standing there at the Foundling Hospital, that wheel, wood scarred, the darkness up under the eaves, how hard to turn and leave a life behind. Once again, it is November 28—but 40 years later. I am stunned by the passage of these years and how there remains a part of me that is just the same.

A woman in my childhood neighborhood, Mrs. Rubinstein, told how on Yom Kippur she would throw bread on the water to cast away her sins and my mother said she wanted to do that but thought she might have to go into the city where there are a lot of ducks eager to eat them up! We all laughed. When I asked Mrs. Rubinstein if it really works, she assured me that if you were sincere, then indeed it did.

December 7, 2013

I miss how fast I used to be, my mind so sharp, like it was on fire, spitting out several ideas at once, and I could hold them all in the palm of my hand. Now I sometimes wake and it takes a minute to remember where I am. Just the other day, I woke to the sound of the snow shovel, and it was a calm peaceful sound, from the street in front of our house, and I imagined my father, and I knew just what he was wearing, that heavy black wool overcoat, shovel in his hand, my mother in the kitchen sipping a cup of coffee.

I really think my dad stayed alive because of me; a lot of people might have chosen a different course, but he hung in there, giving me all that he was able. I think it is why I write these letters. I want you to know things like that. Sometimes, I imagine myself on the platform waiting for the train. I stand there in the winter chill, and it is always dusk, with Christmas lights slung up into the bare branches of trees. I hear music and laughter and glasses clinking. And as I stand there, breathing into the warmth of the scarf around my neck, I think of you two.

If your father is still here when I am not, please remind him of our word. Tell him I said, “Just because the Houdinis didn’t succeed doesn’t mean that we can’t.” I feel my mother has come and gone so many times over the years. In my dreams, in the wind, in odd little meetings with strangers when just the right word is said.