GERTRUDE

On Elderhostels my traveling companions were Americans. I traveled with doctors, college professors, scientists, wealthy engineers, etc.

In Sicily I met a federal judge and his wife, Italian-Americans from Pennsylvania. One day they skipped the scheduled outing to rent a car and drive to a remote Sicilian village to see his father’s old uncle. That night at dinner I remarked that the ethnic Americans I knew (Greek-Americans, German-Americans, Norwegian-Americans, Italian-Americans) seemed to have more in common with each other than they had with relatives in the “Old Country”, whether it was Greece, Germany, Norway, or Italy. The judge said, “How true! How very true!”

In Sicily I also met Gertrude. With only a high school education, she told me she felt intimidated by all those doctors and Ph.D.’s. She had no need to feel that way. She is highly intelligent. Gertrude is also the kindest, most generous, and most tolerant person I know.

We hit it off immediately. We talked about books and theater. We laughed at the same things. As my roommate in Palermo, she didn’t complain about my noisy CPAP machine. One night I pulled the plug in my sleep. Gertrude woke and said, “What happened?” She laughed as I got me to plug it in again, saying, “The noise didn’t keep me from sleeping; the silence woke me up right away.” .

Our backgrounds could not be more different. I was raised as a Southern Baptist with ancestors who came to Texas in covered wagons. Gertrude lives in New York, where her Jewish grandparents fled from Russia a hundred years ago to escape the pogroms.

Gertrude has a friend in Albuquerque. When she came to visit Mary, she always took me to lunch and brought me gifts of tea and other goodies. When I went to New York, she arranged theater tickets. She never let me take her to lunch. Although she has a limited income, she always wants to entertain me. She says I am one of the two people she invites to stay in her tiny studio apartment.

Now that I am on dialysis and can not travel, I doubt we will see each other again. She sends me books. Gertrude is the only one, friend or relative, who calls every week to ask about my health. She has a serious heart condition. When I ask what her doctor says, Gertrude says, “I don’t want to talk about it.” She tells me about the off-Broadway plays she has seen – very few since tickets are now prohibitively expensive. We talk about politics. That, too, is an area where we totally agree.

Gertrude and I love cats. You know my Charlie. Gertrude had a cat which hid under her sofa. Who but Gertrude would feed and care for a cat for ten years and the beast never allowed her to touch him? As I said, the kindest, most generous, and most tolerant person I know.