My friend Nancy Halpern and her colleague Jane Magee are, among other things, the town gardeners of Natick, Massachusetts, responsible for the town’s public gardens. Last fall, they helped select and then plant a tree in memory of Betty Fancy, who had devoted herself to Natick Fair Housing, an organization that helped low-income families find housing in Natick. The tree they selected was a Kousa dogwood, whose large, white, showy blossoms brighten the spring. When it turned out that the tree would cost more than the memorial organizing committee had planned to spend, one of its members, Bob Hickman, offered to make up the difference.
Recently, he told Nancy that he and his wife were digging up some yellow irises in their garden and asked Nancy if the town would like them. Nancy was happy to accept the gift on behalf of the town. The Hickmans dug up the irises – about 250 plants – and put them into their garage, where, covered with dirt, they remained until it was time to plant them.
On the day before the tenth anniversary of 9/11, Nancy felt ill at ease. She saw two possible activities for herself the next day, and neither one was attractive. She could sit in front of the television, watch memorials to the catastrophe, and feel depressed, or she could plant the irises, which would be a lot of work. Undecided about what to do, she began reading the edition of The New Yorker magazine devoted to 9/11.
In the second Talk of the Town piece, by Ian Frazier, she read about a beloved bus driver, Salvatore Siano, who, ten years ago en route for Manhattan, succeeded in turning his bus around before reaching the Lincoln Tunnel, which had been closed. He had seen smoke rising from lower Manhattan, and another driver had told him about the crash into the North Tower. He retraced his route, dropping off passengers along the way, returning tickets or making refunds.
Retired now, he recently talked to a "fan-passenger," telling him about another former passenger, a man who perished on 9/11. “He was such a pleasant human being. A man about my height, wore glasses. I had seen him just the week before.” This man's obituary mentioned that he worked in homeless shelters as a volunteer, often sleeping there to experience their conditions. His name was Howard L. Kestenbaum.
That name electrified Nancy, for she knows his brother. The next day she would plant the 250 yellow irises in memory of Mr. Kestenbaum. It would be a second memorial in the Natick public gardens for a person concerned with the housing plight of the poor, although the only one who would know it was for him was Nancy. The task did not feel like drudgery, for it was infused by a purpose even higher than that of making a town garden more beautiful. We're all linked to one another, even if the links are not always apparent. When Nancy heard the bell toll, she knew it was for her.
2010-2011 Anchises-an Old Man's Journal All rights reserved
Do see a movie on Showtime, if you have it, or on DVD when it comes out, called "Rebirth." It's a documentary following the lives of 5 people touched directly by 9/11. Deeply moving, but educational, too. By showing us five people, year by year for the decade following the attacks, we find out that anger and grief have finite shelf lives. At least, in their acute forms. I recommend it highly.
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