► Listen to this article.

I ran various ideas by the kids. Robin, at age ten, shrugged and said, “Sure, sounds good, whatever you guys decide.”

Thirteen-year-old Julie took the discussion seriously, and we pored over brochures and travel guides from the library. The most sensible idea that emerged was a resort-like place, not far away, with enough to do to satisfy our varied ages and interests—a place where, once we arrived, I wouldn’t have to think. A bonus would be to pick a place we had never been, one that was an antithesis to anything we — or more to the point, he—would have chosen.  The solution: a week at a “Borscht Belt” Catskill resort!

The Catskill Mountains vacation area, about two hours’ drive from New York City, dates back to the 1920s, providing a reprieve from the terrible living conditions of the Russian and Polish Jews crowded into the tenements of the Lower East Side. The moniker referred to borscht, the cold beet soup that was a staple in most of their homes. Originally nothing more than boarding houses, the sites developed and became glorified throughout the ‘40s and ‘50s. Well into the ‘60s, these grand Catskill Mountains hotels were a premier vacation destination for a largely Jewish-American clientele. These resorts were “all inclusive” before such things were commonplace and featured top entertainment. Most stand-up comics, singers, and big bands performed there, either as new upstarts or seasoned celebrities.

But we chose to go there in 1985, most definitely on the downside of the glory days. A more sophisticated traveling public had abandoned the Catskills to seek newer, more exotic venues. The smash hit movie Dirty Dancing, inspired by these resorts, created a bit of nostalgic interest, but it wouldn’t be released until 1987. The “marvelous” Miriam Maisel hadn’t yet debuted in her streamed series. Almost all of the expansive resorts had gone the way of the wrecking ball or been reborn as yoga retreat centers.

I selected one of the survivors. It had been owned and managed by the same family for more than a century. The current family/owners were still present on site, welcoming guests as they had been doing for almost forty years.

The hotel advertised indoor pools, a ski hill, an ice-skating rink, hiking trails, and an incredible variety of activities. There was a night club with entertainment and three humongous meals a day.

Just perfect for us.

I turned the key to our room and held open the door.

Robin, the first to enter, immediately said, “Ewwww, it stinks in here,” pinching her nose to emphasize her reaction.

“Ahchoo, ahchoo, ahchoo,” blasted from Julie, adding to my sinking heart.

Oh, damn, I thought.  This was a mistake!   But I said, “It will be fine when we open a window a bit.”

“I am not touching that bedspread. Get it out of here,” demanded Julie. “I hope they washed the sheets.”

“Mommmmm, there is something orange around the tub drain,” shouted Robin from the bathroom. “It’s yucky looking.”

“It will be fine,” I replied in the strongest voice I could muster. “The room just needs a little airing out. I’ll stuff the bedspread away. And Robin, that’s only a little rust. You can take showers!”

I turned toward the window so the children wouldn’t notice the tears threatening to escape my eyes.

“Look at that view we have of the mountains. Really, it will be fine.” My reassurance sounded thin. What had I done? Why had we come here?

Squelching my bubbling nausea, I allowed myself to look around while the kids were busy discovering every flaw in the room. Shabby chic did not apply to our very tired and worn accommodation, where we were scheduled to stay for eight nights. The dark blue flowered wallpaper was more like faded gray, the flowers looking like they’d died several years back.

We set out to explore the rest of the resort while the room was airing out and hopefully improving in smell, while relieving itself of allergens. The public areas had seen better days as well, with stuffing making its way out of couches, dust bunnies dancing under tables, and eau d’ mildew permeating the atmosphere. A poster resting on an easel outside of the nightclub touted the entertainment for that evening—a crooner who I thought had breathed his last breath years ago.

We could have overlooked all that, I suppose. We were the real problem; we clung to each other, partly for support but mostly to make sure no one of the three of us floated away.

When we approached the dining room for dinner the first evening, we were greeted by a smiling, over-chipper maître d’.

“You young ladies will be welcomed in the children’s dining room, where you can make new friends and have a great time,” he informed the kids, pointing the way with a wide swing of his arm. We looked at each other as if he had suggested they be sent off for brain surgery.

“No,” I said.  “We prefer to eat together.”

He made several more attempts to convince us of the lunacy of this idea before he finally shrugged and went off to have a table for three set up in the “adult” dining room. We were an island in a vast room, where adults grouped in tables of eight to ten were having marvelous fun.

Ugh to fun.  We wanted each other.

It got worse. We didn’t want amusement. We didn’t want new friends. We felt out of place in this resort that had already seen better days. We were three people who couldn’t quite see better days to come.

But gradually something started to change. We began to take advantage of some of the outside beauty that the setting provided. The sky was a glorious, vivid blue, and the sun tempered the cold weather. We rented ice skates and laughed as we slid and bumped into each other—yes, we laughed. We played bingo. We enjoyed spending time in the well-worn library, reading books by the robust fire.

Then Robin made a friend. “Mom, they have this clown class. Can I go with Lisa?  She seems nice, and she said the class looks fun so she’s going. Please, please can I go?”

A “cute boy” attracted Julie and she asked if she could go to the Teen Club.

I joined some adults in a photography group and enjoyed the company of others as we documented the winter scenes out our doorstep. The fresh air outside seemed to lift away the dust and grime inside.

On day three, my daughters and I gathered around our little table for dinner.

“The clown class was sooo cool,” said Robin. “Lisa and I couldn’t stop laughing. Sorry, I didn’t get all the makeup off, but I’m sure it will wash off in the shower.”

“I thought Teen Club would be dumb,” Julie reported, “but it was actually pretty fun. We all learned to Salsa. That’s a Cuban dance, and the music is lots of drums and horns and those shaker things and you do lots of wiggling.  And there was a bunch of kids there. And they served us pizza, too.”  She was talking so fast I could barely keep up.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw one of my photographer friends give a wave and a smile.

Half-way through the week, the girls joined their new friends in the kids’ dining room, and I was alone with grown-ups for the first time in months. Grown-ups, who didn’t know my sad story.  Grown-ups who weren’t in mourning themselves.  Grown-ups who weren’t family or friends, hovering over me. For the first time in months, I actually felt like a living, breathing, card-carrying grown-up myself!

Within the walls of this dumpy, has-been Catskill resort we each began to find ourselves. We weren’t done with our sad trek through the darkness of grief by any means. But we emerged from the week with renewed love for each other and the budding confidence that we could live with joy again.

From Seed to Tree to Fruit: A Daughter’s Memoir of Grief and Healing

by Rebecca Williams Mlynarczyk

    For young Becky Williams, a transplanted Northerner living in the segregated South of the 1950s, childhood was cut short when her father, a researcher at Oak Ridge and a beloved biology professor at the University of Alabama, suffered a psychotic break. He died three months later at Bryce Hospital in Tuscaloosa, the state mental institution. In this heartfelt memoir, Mlynarczyk searches through family scrapbooks, old letters, and her own childhood memories in a quest to understand her father’s mental illness and sudden death. Readers who revisit the past alongside her will see what can be gained by looking back on our loved ones in all their complexity. If we are fortunate, we experience healing as we learn to love them in new and unexpected ways. “This remembrance is a poignant love letter to the father Mlynarczyk has spent a lifetime grieving.” — Kirkus “Haunted by her father’s psychic crisis and his early and unexpected death, Mlynarczyk brings us on a poignant journey, exploring her father’s violent breakdown and coming to terms with a past weighted with fear and silence.” — Julia Miele Rodas, author of Autistic Disturbances “This memoir exemplifies the healing power of writing as a path through pain.” — Mindy Lewis, author of Life Inside: A Memoir “From Seed to Tree to Fruit does what good memoirs must do: explain the present by helping us to understand the past.” — Wendy Ryden, co-author of Reading, Writing, and the Rhetorics of Whiteness Available from Amazon, Bookshop, and Barnes and Noble.

Find this and more in ArtsMart