Bubby Leiba

Tonight marks the sixth anniversary of my Bubby Leiba's passing. As she is father's mother, and we are one of a zillion grandchildren on that side, and my father being third to youngest in a family of nine, we did not spend tons of time with her. The fact that we lived over an hour and half a way in Connecticut didn't help much either. However, my dad, with his enormous respect for his parents made sure we visited often enough.

My sister Sara and I would go to Bubby Hecht’s sometimes. We once went for Shabbat and Bubby was serving carp fish. We loved white fish with bones but she wouldn’t let us eat it. “You’ll choke on the bones,” she told us in her Hungarian accent. Upon begging for grape juice to drink, “you’ll get drunk if you have too much.” Me and Sara were devastated, plus, we knew you couldn’t get drunk from grape juice and we would try our best not to choke on the fish bones either.

When we were all little, we would go to Bubby’s and she would give us back packs filled to the HILT with candy. She got these backpacks from the Synagogue where our grandfather was a Rabbi, they gave them out on Simchat Torah, she would make sure to get a lot of them for her many many grandchildren. They always had fruit rolls ups, rock candy, laffy taffys galore. We would beg my mother to let us eat the candy and treats until food coloring was dribbling down our chins and were about to collapse in a sugar coma.

Bubby always had candy dishes filled with, what my mom called, "stale candy." To us it was heaven. Honey candies, sesame candy and those chocolate lentils that were pastel colored and minty. Not exactly the kind we would choose, but candy is candy and we would sneak them and eat them.

When we would visit, Bubby would send us to the back room to sit on the floor or the pull out bed there to watch videos or tv. I remember watching Casper the Friendly Ghost on more than one occasion as well as the Brady Bunch.

 Bubby and Zaidy’s bathroom upstairs was all marble and shiny. Whenever I would use it I felt like I was visiting a palace. It was a bit scary getting up the high flight of stairs, but I loved going up to see what was new or interesting there. I also remember going down to the basement. It was creepy and unfinished, but that was where the laundry room was as well as one of the guest rooms.

 I remember; Bubby never let Zaidy eat a thing unhealthy, but she always took two portions of whatever because she had diabetes and could “give herself an extra insulin shot” and get away with eating the junk. She always asked why we didn’t bring some eggplant parmesan or pizza when we came to visit. Many times, my dad would drive to Kings Hwy to pick up a pie or two to bring. It was always a special treat.

My grandmother was very generous. On Chanukah after Zaidy would give out his pre-written checks, Bubby would call us over with a huge smile on her face and give us some extra cash on top of it. She would watch our faces as the extra $20 put us over the edge.

 My favorite thing about Bubby Hecht was that although she kvetched, she had a zest for life. She traveled, she read juicy books, she had her friends, her TV and her foods that she loved. And even in her last days that I spent with her, she always wanted to look nice if someone was visiting and took real joy in seeing my baby daughter, her great grand-daughter play on the floor next to her.