Part 3: Getting to know Aunt Lisl: “poor Daddy”, politics and placards.

The next day I rested and gave Lisl and Rosie a day to rest. I had much to process, and I appreciated commuting in Toronto by walking and transit which gave me time to think, meditate and pray and allowed my emotions in this rather risky family encounter the space to be deeply felt and also to fluctuate wildly, of which they did both!

It was all rather surreal to me, and there was so much I did not know and could not predict in terms of how I should interact each visit….I wasn’t sure of her mental status and memory, nor how I would be received, although so far she had seemed oriented to time, place and person, most of the time.

I telephoned Rosie at noon to check whether it was OK to come. “Of course, she is your Aunt!! Come!!” Rosie was a huge part of making all this happen, reassuring both Lisl and us…Rosie was thrilled that her beloved Elizabeth had family, and we were equally thrilled that Lisl had Rosie in her life and was so well cared for!

I came that day in the mid afternoon, bringing some ground almond biscuits and also brought clothes and shoes for Israeli folkdancing later that evening 🙂

Taking a deep breath and with a silent prayer for strength and discernment for the visit, (this whole experience definitely took energy), i walked up the path and unlatched the chain link gate.

Aunt Lisl was awake when I arrived and Rosie brought me in, announcing me as I followed her into the bedroom.

Lisl was propped up fairly high today and looked very awake.

“ Hello sweetie! Sit here!” She waved me to a chair by her bed. I stretched over the hospital bed rail and gave her a kiss on her cheek, holding her hand and sat down.

Without any small talk, she looked seriously and directly into my eyes and asked: “Where is my father?”

Somewhere in my musings about this whole venture, i had resolved to allow Lisl to bring up the past if she wished, rather than me fishing for stories….

Suddenly and unexpectedly, here was the past!

A few quiet seconds passed as I searched for the right response, then I gently said: “Your father is buried in Wien.” ( using the German name for Vienna).

“Poor Daddy”, she said, looking down at her bedclothes, “ poor Daddy….”

Then she looked at me again saying quite strongly: “ Your money doesn’t matter, your money doesn’t matter…”, and this she repeated several times.

In my mind I could hear my own mother’s voice saying: “Your belongings don’t matter, your ‘stuff’ doesn’t matter….”

This was these girls’ takeaway from their traumatic experience of losing their father ( at ages 18 and 16), to die in the hands of the Nazis; he had stayed back in Vienna to pack up their possessions while they fled by train to Switzerland.

The next day I brought a photo of her father ( from his wedding day), and showed her: “Very handsome, We can make a portrait….” she gestured with her hands. I took it in to have an enlarged copy made, which then was framed and sat on the shelf behind her bed. I also told her we were plannng to place a memory stone on the street outside their Vienna apartment where he had been arrested by 11 Gestapo police, after they stole all the contents of the apartment ( in 4 truckloads!!) as well as the flat itself, and moved one of their men into it.

 

 

We didn’t speak of her father again until my brother Peter came. He has a strong resemblance to our grandfather, especially the eyes and forehead. Lisl was somewhat confused and distressed the day Peter visited, and she did mention her father again.

Through the week, I had lots of time to hear stories about our Aunt Lisl from Rosie.

I learned that Elizabeth had lived in Italy for about 18 years n the 50’s and 60’s, working as a translator, and that she was in fluent in German, English, Italian and French, as well as knowing some Polish and Swedish. She had kept an apartment in Montreal during this time, but moved to Toronto in 1970 after the FLQ crisis.

I learned she had become an animal rights activist and was active locally in Toronto as well as being connected to international groups. She was still involved in her 80’s, and she used to ask Rosie to come with her to protests ( recall Rosie only met Lisl when she was 85 years old!!) Rosie was not eager to particpate as she was applying for her PR status and wanted to keep her record clear!!!

Down in the unfinished basement of Lisl’s bungalow were stacks of placards used for picketing. She herself designed them and activists came by to borrow or buy them for their demonstrations: they were neatly arranged in stacks by topic: puppy mills, rodeos, research animals, etc. I also came across a banner for the Green Party.

 

Elizabeth Rhodes (she used her married name for politics) ran for the federal Green Party in the Canadian federal election of October 1988. It was only the second election in which a Green Party candidate ran, the party having been officially formed in 1983. She was the candidate in the Toronto- Danforth riding, the same riding that Jack Layton of the NDP later ran in during the early 2000’s.

Rosie mentioned that Lisl had taken an active interest in Canadian politics and regularly followed the provincial legislative sessions on her television. Only very recently she did not actively follow.

Again, I had much to process about this newly found aunt!! Although she did not like nor get on with her mother, I was realizing she was very similar to her – a strong and opinionated person who acted publically on her convictions: privately she was a committed vegan and even published a small vegetarian cookbook. Publically, she was active in animal rights work and preservation of the environment, to the point of running politically!

At the end of the week, I said goodbye to Aunt Lisl. I told her I was so happy to have met her and that I was very proud of her. “But why?” she said, genuinely surprised….” “Because you have done so much to help with our environment and animals and look after our earth.

In my heart, I was feeling tremendous respect for what she had done with her life, and I was surprised…from the very very little I knew of her, I had the, obviously very wrong, impression that she had not had an interesting or “successful” life, however that may be defined!

I booked another visit in 3 weeks (physically, she was still quite weak, and given her age, I felt I wanted to go back to see her progress sooner rather than later).

Blue eyes and pink roses: our Aunt Lisl. Part 2: champagne and celebration!

Before I left, late that first afternoon, I asked Aunt Lisl if I could come back the next day and what time would be good for her. This was on Rosie’s prompting, as she told me Elizabeth liked to make her own decisions… ( fair enough, I thought). “Yes, do come back, come at 3 in the afternoon.” I let her know my brothers were hoping to come some time and was that alright…? Yes. Then I texted my older brother saying “Do come, John!”. He was free the next day and later texted to say he had managed to get a flight, arriving 2:30 PM and would need to be back at the airport by 8pm. Our brother Peter said he could come the next weekend 🙂

That evening, I went to a beautiful family Kabbalat Shabbat service at Holy Blossom Synagogue and the next morning attended a Messianic Shabbat service. (Interestingly, I enjoy doing Jewish things when in Toronto….I have time when there, and the community is so much more obvious than in Vancouver; for several years I had walked to Jewish graveyards near our NGO guesthouse, wondering wistfully about my family,  and now I finally knew my great Uncle Frederick and great grandmother Malvine Mahler were buried in Holy Blossom Memorial garden. I had real family ties here. And now, even more so, an alive Aunt Lisl!!!)

I left early from the Saturday morning service and rushed to the airport to meet John, getting lost….bus drivers tried to help me, but i ended up twice taking buses in the completely wrong direction….it’s so hard to tell direction in Toronto!! In Vancouver I always have the mountains to tell me which is North and all else falls into place….in Toronto…omg!!!

Anyhow, I did meet John on time, and we found a big bunch of pink roses, which Rosie had told me were her favourite, and hopped into a taxi to Lisl’s home.

John came in like an excited child and, unlike me, went directly into the bedroom to see Lisl, who was sleeping. Right away he noticed her resemblance to our Granny.

John had kindly brought a beautiful First Nations wool blanket for Lisl and gifts for Rosie and the nurses.

When Lisl awoke, Rosie brought us in and he said hello and gave her the blanket and we gave her the bouquet of roses….she told us we were so kind and repeated “Thank you for coming” many times. Then she said we could put the flowers on her grave and said she wanted a simple grave and it could be anywhere, she only wanted recognition for her work in animal rights. I suppose because she had been quite ill with pneumonia, she thought we may be there to visit before she died. However, on the contrary, we had come to celebrate that she was still alive and that we could meet her finally….John sweetly emphasized he’d been waiting almost 60 years!!!

I emphasized several times that the flowers were for celebrating that we had found her alive and could meet her….eventually it sunk in, and she said she’d like to give us a glass of champagne, saying: “celebrating is the best thing one can do in life!”
Rosi suggested we order in Greek food; Lisl broke from her vegan diet to eat fish, she wished Tilapia, and I noticed she took a keen interest in what she ate. She wanted to treat us, but we treated her! Rosie ordered all and went out in a taxi to pick it up….

Note the pink roses and the lily-of-the-valley on the TV and the Opera Plus channel on.

We enjoyed champagne together with Lisl, who after a sip or two, needed to rest and then sleep. We ate and then went out to Tim Horton’s with Rosie and her boyfriend Sergei, who then drove John to the airport and then dropped me off for the night.

A truly special and quite unimaginable visit!!

Blue eyes and pink roses: my Aunt Lisl. Part 1: first impressions.

 

I woke late in the morning because of the time change in Toronto. I took the subway and transfered to bus, thankfully knowing which bus number and direction because of helpful directions from a friend, and then had a five minute walk to Aunt Lisl’s home.

At the curve of a quiet street lined with older well kept homes and gardens, I found myself in front of the bungalow style house my brother had found on google….the green grass was lush and the huge unpruned tree in the open front yard was still bare. The chainlink gate in front of the carport was latched. I walked up the short path, clutching my little bunch of lily-of-the-valley, opened the gate and found myself in an empty carport with garbage and recycling cans and two doors.

The glass door to a small covered entrance porch was covered in stickers concerning animal rights and the other door had a penciled note saying “please ring bell”, which I did.

I stood back to wait briefly, and then a sweet face appeared at the glass door, accompanied by a sweet voice saying, “Hi Jenny, come in!!”

And so I met Rosie, whom I had chatted with several times on the phone in the past 2 weeks.

Rosie told me Elizabeth was sleeping, ( I caught a glimpse as I passed her bedroom on the way the the washroom ), so we sat on the floor in the living room, as the chairs appeared a bit ricketty….Rosie had dug out two photo albums which I looked through…they were taken after her move to Canada, and there were some lovely ones of Aunt Lisl, new to me, as well as a special photo that Rosie was given as a gift, which she proudly showed me!

 

I also came across photos of my brothers and I when very young with our mother and father. So Lisl had been updated about us with photos but had never visited nor told Rosie about us!

 

I met Cooney, Aunt Lisl’s huge elderly cat! It was obvious the cat was well- loved and spoiled….four food dishes were on the kitchen floor for him, with a different flavoured dry cat food in each!! I also noticed a framed award from the World Animal Protection to Elizabeth Aszkanazy in 2014. https://www.worldanimalprotection.org

Putting this together information with the stickers on her glass porch door, I realized my Aunt Lisl was an animal rights activist!

 

After a while, Elizabeth awoke and called out to Rosie; she was hungry, and she was spoonfed pureed veggies and fruits, freshly-made daily by Rosie. A little later an agency nurse came for a brief shift; she helped Rosie turn Elizabeth and attend to her care needs. It was obvious from the sounds that she was still experiencing some pain. (Recall that Lisl had fallen less than two months previously, breaking her hip, which she had surgically fixed with a metal rod; then she had an aspiration pneumonia and spent two weeks in hospital; she was slowly gaining strength with Rosie and team’s excellent care.)

Finally, Rosie came out of the room and said….Ok, she’s ready to meet you!!

I peeked around the door and saw her lying in the hospital bed, with the head raised slightly. I came round to the window side of the bed…she smiled welcomingly and reached out to me with her arm saying: “Hello Jenny”, as I was saying “ I am Jenny” and holding out the lily-of-the -valley blooms. She took them, saying: “Thank you” with a strong European accent and brought them up to her nose to smell, sniffing and smiling. We found a small vase for the bouquet, and I sat beside her off and on through the afternoon as she dozed. Her arms reminded me of my Granny. Opera from a channel on the TV was playing continuously, and reminded me of my Mum. I knew I was with family and that I was welcome 🙂

Rosie explained that Elizabeth liked her privacy, liked to be alone much of the time and would call if she needed anything. Although Lisl had sponsored Rosie as a househelper eleven years previously when she was 85 years old, she had never wanted Rosie to actually live with her.

I happily sat with Rosie and nurse Anisha by the dining table just outside Aunt Lisl’s bedroom door and soaked up the many stories about Aunt Lisl from Rosie, filling me in on my newly found Aunt’s interesting life!!

Parts 2 and 3 to come soon!