Aunties THIRTY-FIVE WRITERS CELEBRATE THEIR OTHER MOTHER

Chapter 1 Laundry SANDE BORITZ BERGER My great aunt Irene is the oldest living relative in our family, the only link to a past that began in a tiny shtetl in Lithuania over a century ago. A petite Clairol blonde nearing ninety, Irene is visiting my home on Long Island for the weekend. It's a little past nine on this Friday night, when she taps on my bedroom door, simultaneously apologizing for the intrusion. "Come in, come in," I say, hoping to convince her she's welcome. She approaches my bed balancing a leaning tower of clean laundry she has finished folding. Somehow, laundry touched by my aunt's warm hands never needs pressing. There is something magical in the way she arranges all things domestic, never a loose thread or speck of dust to be found in the tidy world she inhabits. "Tired, Mommele?" she asks, using an endearment I remember from childhood. I see her gazing around my disheveled room as if searching for survivors of a twister. A week's worth of clothing is strewn over the backs of chairs, and books stacked like dominoes sit on the night table. But I don't feel judged by her: not now, not ever. I relax back on my corduroy reading pillow and motion for her to come sit near me on the edge of the bed. "Why is he so late?" my aunt asks, still standing, squinting at the digital clock radio. I tell her that my husband had a dinner meeting and she shouldn't worry so much. I stifle a laugh when instantly reminded of the roots of my own paranoia. There is doom and disaster stamped into her light brown pupils. "Do you want I should put away the clothing?" "No thank you, just plop it all on top of the dresser. And please, sit down." She walks slowly, kneeling with the pile as if she were bearing gifts to royalty. I wonder what makes her so comfortable with servitude as she carefully creates a temporary home for the laundry at the edge of my dresser. Again, her eyes peruse the room. I think she is stalling and really wants to talk. I shimmy my body over to make more room for her. She slips off a beautiful pair of beige leather pumps, and examines them. As a child, I was constantly trying on her shoes and begging her to save them for me. She promised, but one summer my feet grew two sizes larger than hers. "Will you save those for my Jenny?" I ask, grinning. But she's distracted and doesn't seem to connect to my wave of nostalgia. "Auntie, do you need a pair of slippers?" "No, darling, I'm fine." She's come prepared for this visit with her chintz housecoat, a relic from the 1950s, terry-cloth slippers, pink plastic hair rollers, and several washcloths. She knows my two teenage girls and I walk around in our underwear, and use cotton balls to clean our faces and noisy hair blowers to dry our hair. It's only a few hours since her arrival, and already she's emptied the refrigerator of fuzzy unrecognizable objects, polished the flatware, and refolded every towel in the linen closet. Her pink mottled hands look years older than her face, and her fingers are gnarled from years of fixing and touching. My aunt has the soul of an immigrant, always anxious to earn her keep. I imagine this stems from the many years she spent living under the roof of her brother (my grandfather), after he sent the money for her and her older and only sister to come to America. When she was still just a teenager, in his home, she baked, cleaned, and cooked, helping to prepare elaborate Sabbath dinners, which were a family ritual every Friday evening. "I miss him," she says, unexpectedly bursting into tears. "Who?" I ask, dazed, thinking ofSturgis, Ingrid is the author of 'Aunties THIRTY-FIVE WRITERS CELEBRATE THEIR OTHER MOTHER', published 2004 under ISBN 9780345452696 and ISBN 0345452690.