January 6, 2023 Laura

When I was in elementary school, our family moved into the house my folks had designed and built on the Clinton River. It was in between two other custom-built homes. The house east of mine, and its occupants, was fascinating to me. Every day I would hear the most beautiful piano music coming from that house, and I could see from my brother’s window that it was being played by a girl with dark, shoulder length hair.

In fourth grade in the winter of 1964, I finally screwed up my social courage and stopped this girl’s sister on the sidewalk for the express purpose of being her friend. Julie was in the sixth grade then, but the gap in our ages meant nothing. She and I are still friends after 59 years.

For many years after I met Julie, I became an unofficial third daughter in her family. There was Julie, of course, and the mysterious girl was Laura, almost two years older than Julie.

When I knew Laura best, before she went off to college about three years after we met, she struck me as reserved, talented, extremely intelligent and not given to frivolity or overt demonstrations of joy. She was also kind, and thoughtful of others. At times, she was impatient with people and with circumstances, but rarely with us.

The interplay between Julie and Laura in the home ranged from two peas in a pod to sisterly war. It scared me when they were at odds, which wasn’t often, and to my recollection, was centered around only a few things: control of their shared bathroom, clothes and us going into Laura’s room, usually to borrow a book or two from her Encyclopedia Britannica. When they fought, their language was mean and a cloud of mutual animosity surrounded them. These disagreements lasted only a short while and within a day or two, all was well again.

Laura played King’s Corner with us sometimes, a simple but fun card game that I still play, and we made bets paid with Hershey’s Kisses. Julie and I would be talking about various things in her room, and sometimes Laura would hear our discussion and come in for a while to join us.

Rather distant relatives dropped in once while I was there. I recall that these people tried to ingratiate themselves with my adopted family by referring to their shared Jewish roots. There was no other common ground between them. Laura was disgusted with them and spoke of her disgust while we three were alone in the same room, then became silently angry. Afterward, she resorted to her piano for solace.

Laura was adamant that I go to a fine arts camp, Interlochen, in the summers. Laura wanted to finish her high school years at their Academy, but she was not permitted to go.

I saw almost nothing of Laura after she left for college, but I heard about her from Julie and her mom. I recall that after she was married, she had chickens in her yard. Laura and her husband were unable to have children, so they went to China to adopt Anne Mai.

Tragically, this beautiful woman found that in August, 2008 she had become afflicted with brain cancer. Laura succumbed to this invasion in January, 2010. A member of my adopted family was gone.

On a personal note, there are tears in my eyes as I finish this.