My story begins...

My story begins with Meyer Miller, the first of his family to come to America. Barely five feet, he cast a long shadow as he established citizenship and sent for his wife and sons and daughters and sons-in-laws to eventually join him. Twenty-one years after he died, shards of broken clay laid upon his eyelids would presumably rise off when this newborn great grandson was named after him. I would eventually learn other things he and I have in common, sensing connection with this Zadie through a thread of DNA binding men with the same initial from different worlds.

I make regular visits to his grave and recite an ancient Jewish prayer as I bring my mother to pay respects to her parents in their nearby plot. “He would love that you do that,” she observes, often while bending to pluck weeds or gather pebbles to leave on his monument as a sign she was there. I sometimes pick one near his wife’s grave in a separate location and place it by his since their section of Old Montefiore separates men and women, though I understand their marriage was not characterized by any show of affection.

Another trait we share is our gift for writing stories of other people’s lives. During his early days in New York, he earned pennies by composing letters for other immigrants who could not. He sat with them and asked for details of their lives while writing pages to be mailed to loved ones in the old country eager for report. “He had excellent penmanship,” Mom recalls. In exchange, he’d receive a loaf of bread, some milk, occasional coin.

I collect stories of the family who followed him. His daughter, my Grandma Clara, was matriarch to my generation. Her sister, Aunt Sonia, an endearing, enduring character would never be forgotten by any who knew her. Both lived 99 years. The tree housing my nest extends most durably from them.