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| Jason Moscovitz |
By Jason Moscovitz
It
has been a crazy summer. The Trump business has gotten as bad as it gets,
although, as always, it is difficult to know where the bottom is.
Here,
in politically civilized Canada, the election is around the corner. There are
so many things to think and write about. But somehow, for me, as the summer
ends, there is only one subject that I feel like writing about.
The
subject is family. This is about having a chance to be a grandfather in real
time and in person with all of my family in the same time zone. Please excuse
me, but my chances do not come that often as my five grandchildren come from
three different countries: Israel, Great Britain and the United States.
The
two oldest are almost four and almost five. They are certainly old enough to
engage with each other – as well as with their grandparents – once everyone
figures out which language they can do it in.
Shalev
is the little boy from Jerusalem who speaks French and Hebrew. He undoubtedly
understands English, but does not speak it yet. Beatrice, the New Yorker,
speaks French and English.
My
daughters deserve all the credit in the world for honouring their mother’s wish
to see their French preserved for another generation – not an easy thing to do
in New York City and Jerusalem, but they did it. Good thing too. Without their
French, the young cousins wouldn’t be able to talk to each other.
Culturally,
welcoming grandchildren to what to them is a foreign country leads to fun
moments. Shalev, my first-born grandson, sees everything. He often remarks on
how big the houses are in Canada. He often points out that three floors in a
house is a lot.
After
he returned home, he asked his mother why they lived in such a small apartment.
She told him houses in Israel are smaller than in Canada. He looked around and
said, “Well, there
is one good thing about that: in a small house you don’t have to run to the bathroom when you have to make
pee-pee.”
Despite
the infrequency of his visits, Shalev’s Canadian blood runs strong. He never
leaves a park without finding and collecting huge maple leafs. At the cottage,
he lives to go canoeing. When there is no one to go with him, he sits in it
alone on shore with a paddle in his hand pretending to be a voyageur.
Shalev,
who loves music and can sit for hours watching street performers, got a special
treat this year. His parents took him to Gatineau where he saw Cirque du
Soleil. He still can’t believe what he saw and heard.
His
cousin Beatrice is almost four, but when she speaks you think she is six. New
York City can’t be an easy place to grow up and the street smarts a child
develops are uncannily real. She lives in Queens, where the overhead subway
runs outside her bedroom window. Once asleep, believe me, Beatrice can sleep
through anything.
When
I visit there, I always think of the childhood flashback from “Annie Hall” when
the family dining room and china shook from the nearby roller coaster on Coney
Island. New York City is a noisy place, but resilience can see you through.
Beatrice
goes to a multinational daycare and the class photo would make the Statue of
Liberty proud. She can sing “Happy Birthday” in Spanish and Mandarin with
perfect accents in both. Her mind is wide open.
Emile
from England will speak French and Hebrew, but his Israeli father insisted he
soon get a tutor once a week to begin his English lessons. So I guess I can
look forward to a grandson with a British accent by next summer. I think it
will make me laugh.
Aurianne
from Jerusalem is always smiling. At 14 months, this was the first visit to
Canada she might remember. The same goes for Felix, who’s a month younger. He
is the lucky New Yorker. His bedroom is on the other side of the apartment. The
subway is not outside his window but I can’t say his room is silent.
Being
“Papa Jason” to all five is my treat, wherever, and in whatever language.
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