{"id":5121,"date":"2020-04-14T11:16:27","date_gmt":"2020-04-14T16:16:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/julijasukys.com\/?p=5121"},"modified":"2020-04-14T11:17:55","modified_gmt":"2020-04-14T16:17:55","slug":"on-the-occasion-of-birutes-funeral","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/julijasukys.com\/?p=5121","title":{"rendered":"On the Occasion of Birut\u0117’s Funeral"},"content":{"rendered":"

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I think I was around 6 when I learned that my aunt Birut\u0117 didn\u2019t know how to swim. My father Algirdas (her brother) told me this on the drive from our house to hers one Sunday.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo way,\u201d I said, \u201cI don\u2019t believe you.\u201d<\/p>\n

I had been swimming since before I could remember. Swimming, to me, was like breathing. It seemed impossible not to know how to do it.<\/p>\n

\u201cAsk her yourself,\u201d my father said with a shrug.<\/p>\n

I burst through the door of her house at 66 Aberdeen Road and posed my question before even saying hello. Birut\u0117 laughed and confirmed that, yes, it was true, she didn\u2019t know how to swim. Between the war and the DP camps, \u00a0she\u2019d simply never had the chance to learn.<\/p>\n

The story stayed with me into adulthood. Before that day, Birut\u0117 had simply been my aunt with the beehive hairdo, immaculate house, and tidy garden \u2013 a woman without a history. But after that day, I became curious. I wanted to understand who she was. I wanted to know what kind of path had led to a life without swimming.<\/p>\n

Swimming or no swimming, Birut\u0117 was a woman of great style and dignity. She was exacting and demanding of herself and those around her. To a child, she was even a bit scary. But as I grew, I began to see more and more evidence of a different Birut\u0117 \u2013 a devoted, loving, complicated, wounded, and generous one. I noticed how she forged strong bonds and maintained them. In particular, her late-in-life friendship with a woman named Habiba delighted me. Over the past few years, I heard stories about Habiba\u2019s trips home to Africa, her family there, her delicious cooking, and her beauty. I know I\u2019m not alone in my gratitude and appreciation for Habiba\u2019s care and affection.<\/p>\n

Birut\u0117 was the last living connection to our grandparents (for some of us, our great-grandparents, and even great-great grandparents) and to their story of tragedy and survival. She was our repository of memory and family history. She was my connection to the past and to people I wish I\u2019d known better or lost too early. Her death has left me with a sort of ache, as if something (a limb, perhaps?) has been cut away. I will miss her always. Now that she\u2019s gone, I will try to remember as she did, so that, when I\u2019m old, our children and grandchildren can hear the stories of their ancestors.<\/p>\n

Ils\u0117kis ramyb\u0117je, Birute.<\/em> You were loved.<\/p>\n

[Photo: simpleinsomnia<\/a>]<\/p>\n

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