by Michael Schulman
My grandmother lived to age 104.
My grandmother lived to age 104.
At 70, while baking schnecken, she went to re-light the pilot in her gas oven and it backfired, singeing her eyebrows. She bought false ones.
At 80, she played 9 holes of golf every day, drove her friends to the movies (they talked about Kramer Versus Kramer for months) and baked schnecken.
At 90 she had a fall, and started a slow decline, but her overall health was still excellent. She learned to settle for store-bought schnecken.
At 95, she complained "I don't have any pep." Specialist after specialist dismissed her in frustration, finding nothing tangibly wrong with her. Even my brother-the-Doctor gave up on trying to help.
When I visited her in God's Waiting Room (Miami Beach), I asked, "Gramma, do you think it has something to do with the fact that you're NINETY-FIVE years old?" She turned away, smiling with the defiance of a child.
At 100, two "girls" moved in with her: home-health aids (with grown children of their own) who cared for her round the clock.
Four years later, one of the women made the frantic call to my mother: "She was sitting at the table, and I was feeding her soup, and she just closed her eyes and died."
My mother called her friends, and one she knew the longest asked, "What was in the soup?"
My mother called her friends, and one she knew the longest asked, "What was in the soup?"
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Michael Schulman has his grandmother's recipe for schnecken, and will take it with him to his grave. Visit him at www.manforallseasonings.com.
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