Tales of a Bubbe

By Abby November PhD

While growing up in Brooklyn, Abby November’s grandmother, Bubbe, always told her, “You’ll miss me when I’m a candle.” Soon, it became evident that Bubbe’s uncanny wit was genetic as November transformed into a kid who loved creating amusing repartees.

In a collection of personal essays, prose, poetry, and recipes, November shares insight into her life experiences and relationships while being raised in a multi-generational home in Brooklyn, New York, with her parental grandparents, Bubbe and Zayde, whose zest for life, liverwurst sandwiches, an egg cream at Crazy Joe’s candy shop, and sitting on the stoop naming constellations became an integral part of November’s upbringing. While November’s writings detail how she eventually left to attend an internship program in Boston, married and had two children, earned three degrees, and became a stand-up comedian, they also shine a light on how the wisdom of her elder family members became a north star for her to follow through her adult life.

Tales of a Bubbe is a collection of personal essays, prose, poetry, and recipes shared from the heart and mind of a woman reflecting on love, laughter, and wonderful memories.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Archway Publishing
• Release date: Apr 22, 2022
• ISBN: 9781665722056

Abby November PhD

Abby November was born in Brooklyn. After attending Hunter College and marrying, she completed her dietetic internship in Boston and earned a Master of Science in nutrition at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Years later, November was awarded a PhD at New York University. She has performed stand-up since 1993 and currently resides in San Diego, California.

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Copyright © 2022 Abby November, PhD.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means,

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except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Archway Publishing

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views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

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models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

ISBN: 978-1-6657-2204-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6657-2205-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2022907558

Archway Publishing rev. date: 04/19/2022

Contents

Part I

The First Half of My Life

Introduction

Etiology of Bubbe’s Desire to be a Bubbe

The Beginning

Zayde’s Words

Stars Over Brooklyn

Here’s to The One

Kosher Trash of Brooklyn

Growing Up November

Basketball

The Door Slammed

The Bullet

Early November Health Habits

Mom’s Life Lessons

Ode to My Zayde

Esta’s Words

Sweet Face

Untaught

Wedding Night Lesson

Last Words Spoken

The Tempest

Lies My Mother Told Me

Funnel Clouds

Life in The Slow Lane

Sunshine

The Boogeyman

Autumn Dreams

Festival of Lights

Dark Cloud

The Substitute

Dreams Can Come True

Upon Visiting Aunt with Alzheimer’s

Conundrum

Alone

Pill Boxes

Ouch

Rocks

Pain

Redux

CIS: Confinement Insanity Syndrome

Nine Weeks of Getting Greyer, Fatter and More Frightened

Marriage Wisdom

Some Enchanted Evening

55th Anniversary

McNamara’s Band

Part II

Tales of the Street

The Invisible Ones

Our Trash

Pay it Forward

Hal

A Home of Sorts

Homeless

Music Man

Book of Isiah

Every winter I die

Weather and the Homeless:

Meryl Streep Doppelganger

Part III

Recipes

The ingredients of my love

Why recipes are optional

Cup of Love From Me: And the

Importance of Hot Tea

Part IV

From this moment: My recipe

Transition 4/18/21

About the Author

PART I

The First Half of My Life

I was born and raised in Brooklyn, even married there. Thereafter I lived in Boston, MA for a year, Providence, RI for three years and Stony Brook, NY for sixteen years. Then on to the Deep South of Athens, GA for five years, two months and fifteen days (but who is counting), Austin in the Great State of Texas for twenty six years and in San Diego, CA for the remainder of my life on this planet.

Introduction

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A Legacy is a gift of property, but also anything handed down from the past as from an ancestor or predecessor.

So dear friends and family, if you are reading this, I am not in my physical self - maybe not in my mental one either. But these writings, as primitive as they are, serve as my legacy to you.

Where I came from, the people in my life that mattered, the forces that shaped me physically, emotionally and intellectually will hopefully come across in my stories and poems.

Words are difficult for me, l usually use humor to deflect true, but painful insights.

This doesn’t mean a lack of feeling. This doesn’t mean humor was used in my early years in Brooklyn, lying dormant through menopause, resurfacing in 1993, when my comedic journey began.

I use it to deflect anger, anxiety and even deepest vulnerability to love.

I only discovered the written word in my seventies, this after my good friend Sandy