Eulogy for my aunt, one of the most important people in my (our) life, Joyce Bernstien.
No cut. Keeping it here. Skip if you like.
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Writing things like this is hard. It is a heavy responsibility. To write about someone's life. It is hard not to litter it with heavy handed words and synonyms and metaphors. But with love as simple and as pure and as alive as the love that my sister and I shared with my aunt Joyce, it's impossible to use any language but that of a child's. Because she was our childhood.
Now I apologize if I do not awe you with poetry, or impress you with astounding eloquence as you might expect. I would just like to share a few memories that I had of my auntie Joyce. They are sporadic, not arranged in any special way. Just as my psyche spit them out. Think of it more as a scrapbook of memories, except less organized. Either way, I hope you enjoy.
The first memory I have on my aunt Joyce is from a very long time ago. I must have been about 4 or 5 at the most. I clearly remember being in her apartment in a strange place called Virginia. I remember being tiny and the apartment being full of an impossible amount of sunlight. Everything was golden and unreal. Aunt Joyce was the coolest. She wanted to have some fun with us so she set up a tent in her bedroom for us little twinlings to play in. We set up our camp there. She turned the lights out so it was a dark, just like real camping in the forest would be like. She cuddled up with us inside. I held a flashlight while she read us poems far past our comprehension level from a thick book with light yellow pages, while we listened attentively. A dark stuffy tent, two identical, squirming little girls and their aunt reading them poetry. If that doesn't say love, I do not know what does.
She showed us things we had never seen before. We sat outside on her balcony. Just us, my mom, aunt Joyce and a couple of potted plants. Aunt Joyce sat eating lemon yogurt, something I had never encountered before. I was convinced aunt Joyce was the only one with such an amazing rarity as lemon yogurt. It soon became my favorite. But I digress.
The most amazing thing aunt Joyce made happen was the rain. It was raining yes, but the sun was out. As if that wasn't a big enough deal, there was not one, not two but three rainbows out. All in a row. At the age of 5ish, nothing more awe-inspiring and wonderful had ever happened to me. And as far as I was concerned someone who could conjure tents inside, lemon yogurt, sunny rain and triple rainbows was magical. Pure magic that people wrote about with simple words in the big colored fairy tale books I had back home.
She did this thing where she would magically show up places. Out of thin air. Every dance recital where we paraded around in sequined costumes based off of The Wizard of Oz or what have you. We'd hop off the stage and our overly made up faces would be wearing huge smiles as we would be welcomed with a big hug from our aunt Joyce, telling us how wonderful we had been.
She would be there every Christmas to hear us sing in the choir, even though we were surrounded by about 30 other "singing" brats, most of which blocked us from view.
She would be there on just about any important event of our lives. Any sort of blip on the twin radar, she would be driving up to Jersey. Or flying. Or whatever her magic vessel of choice was that could always get her up to see her nieces in seconds flat when there were any hints of possible fun.
Aunt Joyce barely ever missed a birthday, and she made it her job to help make sure we had the most unique and fun parties. We still have people today telling me how great she was as Ms. Frizzle in our Magic School Bus themed party when we were 7.
Don't even get me started on the beach. Aunt Joyce was the epitome of the beach. She even smelled like the beach. Or the beach smelled like her. Probably both. And we never went without her. She wore colorful hats and drove up in her small white car full of groceries and giant fuzzy purple towels that the two of us could easily both wrap ourselves up in. We did just about every beach activity that has ever existed together. We would go crabbing and fishing just about every day, always happily throwing back all of our catches. We would go on boats with captains who would sing silly (and kind of inappropriate) versions of Popeye the Sailor and would take us clam digging. On rainy days she would take us to the aquarium to look at candy colored fish and touch horseshoe crabs, or take us to see the latest Disney movie. On sunny days before crabbing we’d go to the bait and tackle shop and gaze at the hundreds of shells, poke petrified puffer fish and hold jaws of sharks in front of our faces. We’d bob around in the ocean together. We’d give her our favorite shell discoveries of the day.
The most special memories I had of her were of waking up early to see the sunrise. She would nudge us awake at about 5 am. We rubbed the sleep from our eyes as we bundled up to stave off the chill of the beach in early morning. We would pile into her car and drive down to the Wawa and she would buy us hot chocolate and listen to this, she would let us pick out any donut we wanted. Told you she was the coolest. We’d drive to the beach, usually sharing it with some early rising seagulls and maybe someone walking a dog. We would huddle under a heavy blanket together, trying to cool down our hot chocolate, questioning her how she could drink coffee cuz it was gross and contentedly nibbling our donuts. We’d get real quiet right before the sun came up. The silent awe, the same kind as when you look at triple rainbows. The sun’s accent gradually increasing and we’d bolt up and dance around in the sand, kicking water and seashells about.
I know that’s where she is right now.
~ ~ ~
More happy update sometime soon. I have a lot of cosplay/AnimeNEXT stuff to post about.
~ ~ ~
Writing things like this is hard. It is a heavy responsibility. To write about someone's life. It is hard not to litter it with heavy handed words and synonyms and metaphors. But with love as simple and as pure and as alive as the love that my sister and I shared with my aunt Joyce, it's impossible to use any language but that of a child's. Because she was our childhood.
Now I apologize if I do not awe you with poetry, or impress you with astounding eloquence as you might expect. I would just like to share a few memories that I had of my auntie Joyce. They are sporadic, not arranged in any special way. Just as my psyche spit them out. Think of it more as a scrapbook of memories, except less organized. Either way, I hope you enjoy.
The first memory I have on my aunt Joyce is from a very long time ago. I must have been about 4 or 5 at the most. I clearly remember being in her apartment in a strange place called Virginia. I remember being tiny and the apartment being full of an impossible amount of sunlight. Everything was golden and unreal. Aunt Joyce was the coolest. She wanted to have some fun with us so she set up a tent in her bedroom for us little twinlings to play in. We set up our camp there. She turned the lights out so it was a dark, just like real camping in the forest would be like. She cuddled up with us inside. I held a flashlight while she read us poems far past our comprehension level from a thick book with light yellow pages, while we listened attentively. A dark stuffy tent, two identical, squirming little girls and their aunt reading them poetry. If that doesn't say love, I do not know what does.
She showed us things we had never seen before. We sat outside on her balcony. Just us, my mom, aunt Joyce and a couple of potted plants. Aunt Joyce sat eating lemon yogurt, something I had never encountered before. I was convinced aunt Joyce was the only one with such an amazing rarity as lemon yogurt. It soon became my favorite. But I digress.
The most amazing thing aunt Joyce made happen was the rain. It was raining yes, but the sun was out. As if that wasn't a big enough deal, there was not one, not two but three rainbows out. All in a row. At the age of 5ish, nothing more awe-inspiring and wonderful had ever happened to me. And as far as I was concerned someone who could conjure tents inside, lemon yogurt, sunny rain and triple rainbows was magical. Pure magic that people wrote about with simple words in the big colored fairy tale books I had back home.
She did this thing where she would magically show up places. Out of thin air. Every dance recital where we paraded around in sequined costumes based off of The Wizard of Oz or what have you. We'd hop off the stage and our overly made up faces would be wearing huge smiles as we would be welcomed with a big hug from our aunt Joyce, telling us how wonderful we had been.
She would be there every Christmas to hear us sing in the choir, even though we were surrounded by about 30 other "singing" brats, most of which blocked us from view.
She would be there on just about any important event of our lives. Any sort of blip on the twin radar, she would be driving up to Jersey. Or flying. Or whatever her magic vessel of choice was that could always get her up to see her nieces in seconds flat when there were any hints of possible fun.
Aunt Joyce barely ever missed a birthday, and she made it her job to help make sure we had the most unique and fun parties. We still have people today telling me how great she was as Ms. Frizzle in our Magic School Bus themed party when we were 7.
Don't even get me started on the beach. Aunt Joyce was the epitome of the beach. She even smelled like the beach. Or the beach smelled like her. Probably both. And we never went without her. She wore colorful hats and drove up in her small white car full of groceries and giant fuzzy purple towels that the two of us could easily both wrap ourselves up in. We did just about every beach activity that has ever existed together. We would go crabbing and fishing just about every day, always happily throwing back all of our catches. We would go on boats with captains who would sing silly (and kind of inappropriate) versions of Popeye the Sailor and would take us clam digging. On rainy days she would take us to the aquarium to look at candy colored fish and touch horseshoe crabs, or take us to see the latest Disney movie. On sunny days before crabbing we’d go to the bait and tackle shop and gaze at the hundreds of shells, poke petrified puffer fish and hold jaws of sharks in front of our faces. We’d bob around in the ocean together. We’d give her our favorite shell discoveries of the day.
The most special memories I had of her were of waking up early to see the sunrise. She would nudge us awake at about 5 am. We rubbed the sleep from our eyes as we bundled up to stave off the chill of the beach in early morning. We would pile into her car and drive down to the Wawa and she would buy us hot chocolate and listen to this, she would let us pick out any donut we wanted. Told you she was the coolest. We’d drive to the beach, usually sharing it with some early rising seagulls and maybe someone walking a dog. We would huddle under a heavy blanket together, trying to cool down our hot chocolate, questioning her how she could drink coffee cuz it was gross and contentedly nibbling our donuts. We’d get real quiet right before the sun came up. The silent awe, the same kind as when you look at triple rainbows. The sun’s accent gradually increasing and we’d bolt up and dance around in the sand, kicking water and seashells about.
I know that’s where she is right now.
~ ~ ~
More happy update sometime soon. I have a lot of cosplay/AnimeNEXT stuff to post about.