I love old timey menus—such as the one I shared with you several years back which showed the fare available at the Revere House on May 18, 1851. But no menu from yesteryear is so personally important as the one describing a meal served in the Temple Auditorium Catering Hall at 251 Rochester Avenue, Brooklyn, New York on January 24, 1954.

The reason this meal matters so much to me is because without it, I wouldn’t exist!

The menu below records what was served at a reception and dinner following the wedding of my parents, Barney and Toni Edelman, 62 years ago this month. I discovered this document mixed in with my mother’s letters and photos after she died on December 30. Until then, I had no idea it even existed.

My favorite part of the meal? That the roast turkey wasn’t served with just the usual sides of cranberry sauce plus carrots and peas, but with stuffed derma as well.

Any meal featuring stuffed derma is my kind of meal … whether or not it leads to my eventual birth.

I wish I could have been there. But, of course, I wasn’t to show up for another 14 months.

I brought home thousands of photographs after my mother died last week , and for the most part I recognize the people in them and know the circumstances under which they were taken. But a few are a mystery. Some because they’re of friends and relatives I don’t remember, others because they’re of events in which I didn’t take part.

For example, who is this guy to the left of my father? What is that scrap of paper he’s handing over? Why was this moment worth memorializing?

And then there are these two, happy to be holding that same scrap of paper. (more…)

My father, who died six years ago today, was a modest man, and far less likely to brag about his accomplishments than I am. Which means it wasn’t until recently, as I emptied out the desk in his studio while helping my mother pack for a move, that I learned he’d won the Jesse H. Neal Editorial Achievement Award for his work as the Art Director of Engineering & Mining Journal.

Folded tightly into a small presentation box with his award was the following telex from 1970.

I would have been 14 years old. (more…)

My father, Barney Edelman, should have turned 82 today. But instead, I lost him on January 27, 2009, when he was only 76. I’m missing him, and one of the ways I’m dealing with that is by communing with his artwork. Luckily, he left behind a lot of it.

I’ve shared many of Dad’s paintings with you before, and here he is with four more, a quadriptych of birds he painted to fill a large wall in our new home.

He was an artist his entire life, and his output consisted of far more than the oil paintings I’ve previously posted. Earlier this year, I brought home more than 100 pieces of his artwork, and this morning I looked through them again. Here are just a few. (more…)

I learned of Mike Nichols’ death yesterday, which set me to thinking of my second cousin, the actor Herb Edelman. (At least I think he’s my second cousin. Perhaps he’s my first cousin once removed. I’m not entirely sure how genealogists parse these relationships. He was my father’s father’s brother’s son, if that makes things any clearer. Probably not.)

The reason thinking of Nichols had me thinking of Herb is because it was their accidental meeting that got my cousin into the acting business. Per Wikipedia, after getting out of the Army, Herb “enrolled in Brooklyn College as a Theater student, but eventually dropped out. He later worked as a hotel manager and as a taxicab driver. One of his fares was director Mike Nichols, who in 1963 cast Edelman in his breakthrough Broadway role, as the bewildered telephone repairman in Neil Simon’s Barefoot in the Park.”

An interesting factoid. But you might ask, where’s the serendipity?

Here’s the serendipity. (more…)

While visiting my mother in Florida today, I remembered that during a recent phone call, she’d mentioned the time my father had appeared on one of the magazine covers he’d designed when he was an art director for McGraw-Hill. Back when she’d told me that, I’d searched online for old issues of Coal Age and Engineering and Mining Journal, two magazines I knew he’d worked on, but no matter how many I could turn up—no Dad.

Luckily, something made me remember that cover earlier today, so I asked her about it, and …

Which explains why I hadn’t been able to find the cover. I’d never even heard of National Petroleum News!

Dad would have been around 44 years old there, and coming face to face with him in a photo I’d never seen before got me all choked up. In fact, I almost (but not quite) burst into tears.

It’s been more than five years since I lost Dad, but I still miss him.

And I’m not alone. As my search results show, I’m not the only one missing a father.

I miss my Dad. And as it turns out, the rest of the Internet misses their Dads, too.

I was checking the search strings that have led people to this blog, and discovered that several hundred people a month have been getting here as a result of looking for words to say when a father passes away.

Here are some examples.

Who knew there were so many variations on that sentiment? I’m amazed. (And there were dozens more.)

I’m not sure whether what people found when they got here helped. But I’d like to think it did. At least a little.

I dreamed about my father this morning, which made sense, because today is his birthday, and he was supposed to have turned 79. I write “supposed to,” because he died on January 27, 2009.

In my dreams, I never know that, though. When I see my grandmother Grace in my dreams, I’m always initially confused, and ask her, “Aren’t you supposed to be dead?” To which she always replies, “Yes.” And then I shrug, let it pass, and we go on with whatever else is happening in the dream.

But when I see my father in my dreams, I’m never confused, never think he should be dead and wonder why he’s still alive. I’m just happy he’s there, and that we’re doing together whatever it is we’re doing.

But he’s not here today, so we can’t do anything together. At least … not when I’m awake.

Because I can’t think of anything better to say to commemorate him, I’ll share again what I posted back on February 3, 2009, a week after his death:

My father, Barnet “Barney” Edelman, seen with me below in our last picture together, passed away one week ago today.

He had been ailing for quite a while from a variety of illnesses, including congestive heart failure, but what finally took him from us was either polymyositis or dermatomyositis. Though his agonizing symptoms seemed consistent with one or both of those, his doctors were never really sure, as he was not responding to any medications. As his body withered, his many physicians were puzzled, and wished they had a Gregory House on staff to solve the medical mystery. (more…)

I continue channeling my father by typing out the autobiography he sent to me a few years before his death. In the latest installment, he leaves the comfort of Brooklyn and heads off to boot camp.

Growing Up and Stuff: An Adventure
Part 4

It was only a few months later and there I was in the Navy, with groups of other fresh innocents straight from school and into a conflict for the love of country and the American way.

I managed to see romantic Eddy just before I left. He had gotten married and he and his wife were living in a one-room furnished apartment. They were happy and had a child on the way and were trying to scratch out a living and a life together.

I ran into Eddy years later on the streets of Manhattan. He was rushing to work in the garment district and had little time to talk, so we didn’t even exchange phone numbers.

I guess the years were taking their toll on him. He looked years older than his age and appeared stooped and of course still had a five o’clock shadow. We never did run into each other again.

I remember waking up on the day I was to report to the Navy. I wondered what I was getting into as I stood in front of a mirror combing my hair into my usual high pomp. After all, it had to be just right.

Here I was, right out of school, fresh from being one of the kids you see hanging around the local candy store or the kid that just delivered your groceries to you, all of us trying to grow up and find out what life was all about.

Next thing it’s the draft, thinking of my friends in the Army up to their crotches in mud. I went the Navy way and wound up up to my crotch in salt water.

I held the postcard in my hand, reading it slowly, making sure once again of the address of the place the Navy wanted me to report to. It was easy as pie. I go to the place, step forward, raise my hand in an oath. And follow a group of strangers onto a bus heading for a place called boot camp.

Boot camp turned out to be a very strange place. High fences and guards. As bus after bus rolled into this strange place, you stood around waiting for someone to tell you what to do.

Suddenly, my ears are filled with this loud sound. A voice is issuing a long string of commands loud enough to break the sound barrier, all of this without the aid of any electronic device … Oh, boy!

Here I am running around some sort of camp with people who all sounded funny to me when they talked. I must have sounded funny to them, since my main language was Brooklyn-ese. (more…)

In the latest installment of my father’s autobiography, which he sent to me a few years before his death, the Brooklyn boy is growing up … and war looms on the horizon.

Growing Up and Stuff: An Adventure
Part 3

Next on our hangout list was Happy’s Deli. Happy was a former professional boxer and had been a merchant seaman during World War II. He loved to sit with us and tell us stories of his fighting days as we sat eating large slices of salami.

Davey’s house was a great hangout for us. His father liked the company and enjoyed our laughter. Davey’s mother had passed away years before, and he always blamed a local doctor for it. We all avoided that doctor, through a combination of loyalty to Davey and just plain fear.

Davey had an older sister who would teach us the latest dance steps. Eddy was always hitting on her. He never got anywhere, no matter how hard he tried.

Another of our hangouts was Mendy’s house. His mother had also passed away, so that he and Davey had a sort of close understanding between themselves. Mendy’s father was a character. He was an avid gin rummy player and he could read the cards, memorizing what was out. He could almost tell you what cards you had in your hand. His local bootlegger supplied him with some great alcohol, which we sampled now and then.

Tuesday nights became almost sacred. It was Uncle Miltie night on television, and in those days the streets would be empty, because he was on. Televisions were expensive and not everyone could afford one. And so, on Tuesday nights, we’d drop into Jerry’s house and crowd in with his folks, sisters, brothers and all the neighbors and anyone else who showed up. We’d all sit in a darkened living room in front of a 12″ television set. (more…)