Uncategorized, nostalgia, memories, The Holy

A dream

Mary Elyn Bahlert

My dad loved life. He loved my mother, he loved us, and he loved his life. After having been diagnosed with colon cancer in the year after he retired from his work as a steelworker at age 65, he was always grateful for the life he was able to live during the 10 years after. He came to realize that he could live much as he had before the arrival of the cancer, and so he returned as much as possible to the life he’d had before the cancer diagnosis and the colonoscopy. He rode his bike all around his neighborhood in Milwaukee, and he and Mom drove clear across the country from Wisconsin to visit my mother’s brothers in California. Mom and Dad enjoyed every moment of that trip, my father at the wheel, my mother pointing out sites and reading from the AAA trip-tick that guided their trip. Both my parents – my father had an eighth grade education in a country one-room school house, my mother had received her GED when I was in college – were interested in life. As I remember them, I count the quality of having an interest in life as important, not only to them, but to me, as well. I’m grateful.

My dad loved life. He spent many weeks in a hospital bed at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Milwaukee, knowing he would not leave that room – ever. More than anything, he missed being able to ride his bike, especially now that spring was coming to the Midwest; it was April. He was 75; he would never make it to his 76th birthday. Now that I’m 76, I think of that fact – often.

Before I left his hospital room for the last time, before I traveled back to Pleasanton, California, where Jeff and I lived, I said to Dad: “Let me know you are all right.” I was clear: after he passed, I wanted a sign from him. As I said those words to Dad, he didn’t speak. He nodded. He understood.

The dream came some time later, months after Dad died in April of 1986. It was a simple dream, a clear dream. I saw my Dad, dressed in a suit, standing with a group of people, looking away from me. He had a humble look on his face as he stood with the others, his hands held together in a simple gesture, below his waist.

When I awoke, I knew immediately that Dad had kept his promise. He had come to me. And he had let me know that he was all right.

Uncle Johnny must be angry at Dad – he’s about to push him into the pool… They had fun together.
photo, circa 1983, San Jose, CA.

memories

how to say goodbye

Mary Elyn Bahlert

I expect I’m not the only human who has wondered how to say what would be a last goodbye to someone they loved dearly. Even as a pastor, I wondered. I saw the faces of folks who would show up in church for worship in the days after they had said goodbye to the one person they loved and cherished the most. How did they say goodbye?

I remember one goodbye, in particular. In the weeks before my father – I called him FRB – died, his room at St. Joe’s Hospital on the North Side of Milwaukee was often filled with visitors. Friends of mine – Joanne, who he greatly loved – friends of my Dad and Mom, his sister Edna, who drove from Ellison Bay alone to say good-bye to her brother, and my uncles from the Bay Area of California, Pete and Johnny. I made a visit the few days before he died, and I was there as the room filled with people. My Dad was the extrovert in the family, but he didn’t talk much as he lay in bed, in his last days.

I knew I would not see him again when I left his hospital room that last time. My mother, sister and I had had an intimate moment with Dad as Mom – who rarely cried – cried out, “I love you so much!” I watched as FRB nodded.

Uncle Pete and Uncle Johnny had a flight to catch before mine. In my memory, the room was still full of people. I sat in the chair next to his bed. As Johnny and Pete left the room, Johnny stood at the end of Dad’s bed and said, “I don’t know when I’ll see you again, Frank.” A few hours later, it was my turn to go. How to say goodbye? I looked into my Dad’s eyes and said, “I don’t know when I’ll see you again, FRB.” Dad nodded as I walked out of that lonely hospital room.

I cried all the way home on the plane.

Richard – I called him Ricardo – Joanne, and my Dad in Milwaukee. Who took the photo?

memories, reflecting, remembering, Uncategorized

the day that Grandpa died

Mary Elyn Bahlert

I don’t remember my Grandpa Markowski, my mother’s father, but I had heard the story, many times, of how he was with me to witness my first steps. He died a few months after I had turned one – on November 25, 1950.

I don’t know much about his life, either, but I bring to mind my own thoughts about how life was for him after he immigrated to the United States. He worked in a foundry in Milwaukee. He returned to Ukraine – which would soon be swallowed whole into what was the Soviet Union – to bring his wife, my grandmother, Feodosia, to the United States. I know that many immigrants left family in the Old Country, never to see them again, to start a new family. In his new country, Vlas Markov Srebny would lose his name, to take up a name more easily understood: Alex Markowski. When I return now to stand at the grave at the cemetery on the north side of Milwaukee where he and my grandmother – her name in the new country was Frances – are buried, only the name he acquired in his new land remains. I’m always saddened to think of this. It’s a common story, I’m sure.

These past few days, I’ve been sifting through old pictures again. I like to look at them from time to time. During the early days of COVID, I spent several days sitting in our yard, sorting through several large boxes of pictures. I got as far as grouping them into decades. I think that’s as far as I’ll go with them. I’d been looking for a particular photo of my mother and my brother Ronnie, but I didn’t find the one I was looking for.

I did find a treasure this time. I’m not sure how I missed it before. My mother had told me that the day my Grandpa Markowski died, he had come to the door of our family’s upper flat, asking for money. She had said no to his request for money – probably knowing he’d spend it on liquor – but he’d declined, and walked away. The treasure I found included more details, details I had not been told.

In my mother’s handwriting, two yellowed pieces of paper, apparently torn from a notebook, maybe a notebook intended for family history, recounted:

“Alex Markowski was born Vlas Markov Srebny on February 11, 1881. He was born in Kiev, Ukraine. In 1903, he joined the Army. Also, he married Feodosia Maksuda in 1903. Of this marriage were born Ivan ((John), George, Michael, Mary and Hannah, and Peter. Of these, only John, Michael, Mary, Hannah and Pete remain.
He came to America via Boston, Mass., and the Great Lakes to Milwaukee in June, 1910. He returned to Ukraine in the year and returned to America with his wife.
He received naturalization papers on May 25, 1943.
He taught himself to read and write. He was always alerted to the affairs of the entire world.

May he rest in peace.

On Saturday, November 25, 1950 at 8:30 Dad collapsed on North Eleventh and West Reservoir. It was a very cold day which stimulated his heart. Added to this, he climbed up and down three flights of stairs, and bucked a sharp wind up a steep hill, where he collapsed. He passed away immediately.”

*

memories, nostalgia, Uncategorized

“while we still have our health…”

Mary Elyn Bahlert
Istanbul at night, looking over the Bosporus, May, 2023
photo by Mary Elyn Bahlert

I first noticed when I was a pastor. From the time I entered the ministry until my retirement, the churches I served were filled with older folks. These “older folks” were people in their 70’s, 80’s, and even 90’s. Being part of a church community had been important to people in the generations before mine, and so, as a young pastor, I was often pastor to folks who were 40, 50, and even 60 years older than I was. Even in the years before I retired at 65, many church-going people were of the generation before my generation, The Baby Boomers. Having always identified with being young, even now I think of myself as young, healthy, full of energy.

A look in the mirror should bring that fallacy into focus, I think.

As the pastor to older folks, I was aware of a phrase used often by the people I came to serve – and to love. Before setting off on a vacation that they had dreamed about for years, someone might say, “I want to do this, while I still have my health, ” or, “I’ve wanted to visit my grandparent’s homeland, to go back before I die.”

Now, although I don’t say it out loud, I’m reminded of that simple wisdom as Jeff and I talk about places we’d like to visit, of places we’d like to see again. I, too, want to crowd as many travel adventures into this time in my life, when I can still travel freely, and when I can enjoy the trips we take completely. As I pack now, I count out the pills of the medications I take carefully, and sometimes I remember a time when I could travel without counting out pills beforehand.

As we plan our adventures together, I think: “will I be able to enjoy this trip, a year from now? I hope so”. The idea of a lifetime of years and adventures ahead of me doesn’t exist anymore. With each year, with each day, that lifetime of years and adventures is moving – quickly, quickly – away from me.

Lately, Jeff and I have been making arrangements for a trip together to North of Boston. Since I was in Miss Ross’s English class at Peckham Junior High School in Milwaukee, I’ve wanted to see the places that I read about as I studied for papers I wrote about the lives of great American poets, as I memorized many of their poems.

And as we plan, I think about the many travels that Jeff and I have enjoyed together. Through the years, Jeff has taken on the duty of planning our trips, down to the details. Now, I take on some of the work load. And we often talk about places we’d like to see, countries we’d like to see again, and new places. Each time we talk, I wonder to myself, “will I be able to travel then? “ That’s a new thought for me, but I expect I’ll not let it go.

I remember a moment when my dad – I called him FRB – looked at me, a look of sadness or grief in his eyes, and said: “It goes so fast.”

memories, reflecting, Uncategorized

Downtown

Mary Elyn Bahlert

“When you’re alone and life is making you lonely,
you can always go downtown
When you’ve got worries,
all the noise and the hurry seem to help, I know, downtown…”
Words and music, Tony Hatch, 1964

The words and music drop into my head and I can hear Petula Clark singing the melody of “Downtown” as I sit down to write, today. And I’m remembering the adventure of going downtown, along with a friend, during my high school years. That must be when I fell in love with cities.

Linda Andersen and I took the number 23 bus from the North Side of Milwaukee to 6th and Wisconsin Avenue on a Saturday afternoon, when we were juniors in high school. I’d known Linda since Junior High Days. Like me, she was a product of Milwaukee’s North Side, and like me, she was a student at Washington High School. Unlike me, Linda was an only child, and her mother worked – unusual for the kids in my working class neighborhood. Linda was a nice girl, quiet, smart. I liked her, although I have never counted her among my really good friends from that time. Even so, Linda was the friend who was with me when we had our adventure in downtown Milwaukee.

After we exited the bus at 6th and Wisconsin, we walked East along the street, whose sidewalks were still filled with busy, fast-moving folks in the 1960’s. We stayed along the South Side of Wisconsin Avenue and walked over the Wisconsin Avenue Bridge to the more upscale part of Wisconsin Avenue between the Milwaukee River and the shore of Lake Michigan. On the East side of the Avenue, the sidewalks were wider and the businesses more expensive; certainly I knew that my people would not shop in the stores there. On the North side of the street on Wisconsin Avenue stood the Pfister Hotel. To me, the Pfister was the place for rich people who came to Milwaukee to stay. Years later, on our wedding night in 1984, Jeff and I spent the night in the honeymoon suite at the top of the Pfister, looking out to the East from our room as snow fell over Lake Michigan; it was the first day of spring (Wisconsin-style).

We walked over the bridge and stopped to look at the Marine Bank – 111 East Wisconsin Avenue -,newly built along the River. Next to City Hall, the Marine Bank was the tallest building in downtown. We were excited. We looked at each other and walked into the building. No one questioned our being there. We made our way to the elevator and hit the button for the 22 second floor. We had heard that coffee cost $ 5.00 a cup to drink at the restaurant at the top of the tower. We never got to verify that, however.

As soon as we’d made it to the top of the Marine Bank, we took the elevator right back down to street level, walked back out onto Wisconsin Avenue, and continued our adventure, walking all the way to the shore of Lake Michigan, before we found the nearest bus-stop and waited for the 23 bus to take us back home to the North Side.

I didn’t know it then, but my world was beginning to grow – just a little bit. I’m a city person, through and through. Jeff calls me a “city girl.” I like to say that you can drop me in a city anywhere and I’m comfortable. As I write this, we’re back only a few weeks from a trip to Japan, where I spent a lovely morning walking through the busy streets in Tokyo, blocks from our hotel, alone. That walk was a high point for me.

It’s safe to say that all adventures begin somewhere, and with a few steps. My adventures began then.

Walking in Tokyo, March, 2026. Photo by Mary Elyn Bahlert