How Just $7.00 Changed My Mother's Life

My Father (Herbie Pompeii Pilato) died of lung cancer on April 6th, 1995, and my Mother (who would have turned 93 on November 4th) followed him to Heaven on May 5th, 2008 (after being challenged by dementia and heart disorders).

After my Dad left this world, it was rough road for my Mom. They were very close, and she was very dependent on him (as she didn't drive, etc.) So I tried to do the best I could for her, even once attempting to move her to LA with me (to disastrous results).

But once she was settled back in Rochester, New York she became a member of the Pinegrove Senior Center in the suburb or Irondequoit, New York. And every Monday through Friday, from June 1999 to nearly the day she died, my Mom enjoyed that Senior Center.

In all, it cost her about $6.00 a day - a price that included lunch and service for the van (that picked her up and drove her home).

So, thirty bucks a week for a senior's regular activities wasn't bad at all.

In addition to enjoying a nice daily lunch at that simple-treasured Senior Center, my Mom also played cards, went on picnics, and played bingo. She especially loved the bingo. A whole lot.

I never realized how much really.

Until, one day, when I started giving her "extra" quarters with which to play the game.

Not a lot of quarters. Just seven dollars worth.

Not ten.

Not nine.

Just seven.

Every other day, I walked into her apartment, and interrupted her daily viewing of Seinfeld or The Golden Girls, walked over to her, kissed her, and asked her to open up her hand.

At that moment, I poured out the seven dollars in quarters.

As I did this, her reaction was one of astonishment. She looked as if she won the lottery or the mega-jackpot in Vegas.

"Oh, Herbie J," she'd say with so much joy, "...what a great son you are! I have to pay you back! I have to pay you back!!"

"Ma," I would reply, "You just go have fun at the Center."

And she did, all the more...with that mere extra seven dollars.

Not a million.

Not a thousand.

Not nine.

And not ten.

Just seven.

Seven.

Happy Birthday to my beautiful father....

Happy Birthday to my beautiful, Dad, who passed into the Light in 1995.

He would have been 104 today.

Love you forever, Dad...and Mom, too!

7 years ago today that Mom went to Heaven

It's been seven years since my beloved Mom passed away.  

She was a beautiful person on Earth and she remains a beautiful soul in Heaven.

I will miss her and my Dad forever and yet I know they are doing just fine.

For whatever good that is in me was placed there by God through them.

They always supported every good thing I ever accomplished in my life and career.

As such, I owe them any and every measure of sincerity that I posses - and which I make every attempt to share.

They instilled in me the truest of priorities and humanitarian values.

I'm not always perfect and none of us are - but my parents came pretty close.

God bless you always - "St. Frances of Turri" and "St. Pompeii".

20 years today that Dad went to Heaven

It's been twenty years today since my beautiful Dad went to Heaven.

And I know he's doing just fine - with my beautiful Mom right by his side.

My sister and I (and everyone who knew them) will Love them both forever.

We were blessed to have them on Earth - and we remain blessed to have them as Angels.

May each of you be as blessed with even a morsel of the kind of sincere and pure Love my parents imbued and embraced.

Peace to you all.

Love,

Herbie J and Pam

My Parents were so right - on so many levels.

When I wrote The Kung Fu Book of Wisdom in 1995, I dedicated it to my Dad who, at the time, was dying of lung cancer.

He attained no formal education, and ultimately acquired nothing of what this world causes "secure," but he was one of the wisest and "richest" people I ever knew.

He used to say things like, "Anything tastes good when you're hungry," and "It's all nice when it's new," which are two of his quotes that I included in my Kung Fu Book of Wisdom dedication to him.

But both he and Mom always knew the deal.

They both loved and understood Star Trek, and they both loved and laughed at Seinfeld.

You have to be intelligent to appreciate science fiction and humor.

I remember when I realized just how intelligent my father was.  We were watching Star Trek: The Next Generation (which he really did not prefer to the original Trek series; another sign of his intelligence!), and the scene involved Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) and Dr. Crusher (Gates McFaden), both of whom were behaving erratically.  At that point, my father turned to me and said, "Is it something in the atmosphere, Herbie J?  Is that why they're acting that way?"

I glanced back to him in awe and astonishments and said, "Yeah...Dad.  That's right.  It's something in the atmosphere."

My father was intelligent after all, and I was the ignorant one for never fully appreciating his or my Mom's wisdom when they're alive.  Certainly, in caregiving for them in their later years, I loved and appreciated them as much as I could.  I just wished I would have done more of that while they were both healthy and raising me and my sister.

But I know they're watching over me now.

And meanwhile, to this day, I quote both of them, or utilize their insight, even in simple every day ways.

Things like, my father saying that Tide is the best laundry detergent.  I've tried them all - and he was right - it IS!

Or how my Mom used to tell me that Chiquita Bananas are the best brand of bananas  and she was right: they ARE!

But more than anything, whatever good that lives inside me today, was placed there by Heaven - through my parents.

So, truth is, my PARENTS were the BEST - and remain so - IN Heaven...as my guardian angels, helping me in ways there were unable to do so while on Earth.

The Anniversary (from Erie Street to Greenleaf)

It was November of 1977.

We had just moved from our red-brick, home on Erie Street in the inner-city of Rochester, New York. 

Eastman Kodak had long purchased the house, but the city's Landmark Society would not allow it to be torn down.

Other homes in the neighborhood were gone, replaced by Kodak parking lots.  We were the only house left on the block; even Aunt Elva and Uncle Carl, who lived directly next door in our double house, had moved to Irondequoit, New York - a suburb of Rochester.

It was time for us to move on, too.

So we found Greenleaf Meadows, a beautiful rental community in Greece, New York, another suburb of the city.  It was close to the historic Charlotte Beach, which claimed Abbott's Frozen Custard and Schaller's Hamburgers as its own - places to which we had once traveled from Erie Street on only special day trips.

Now, we were living up the street from them.

When we first moved to Greenleaf, my sister and I ran up and down the stairs singing, "Moving On Up!" - the theme song from the TV show, "The Jeffersons."

It was a silly moment, but passionate and sincere.

We were sad to leave Erie Street, but happy to be at Greenleaf.

Not only were we now close to the beach, Abbott's and Schaller's, but we had a beautiful pool, tennis courts, a clubhouse and a brand new three-level townhome.

To help give things an even fresher start, my parents, Frances and Herbie "Pompeii," purchased new living room furniture.

But we still had an old dining room set.

It was my senior year (at Aquinas High School), and I had started my first job (as a box boy for  Bell's Supermarket).  So, I had saved some money.

My sister pulled me aside one day and told me about how Mom and Dad would soon be celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary (on November 29, 1977), and that we should do something special for them to commemorate the occasion.

"I have $400.00," she said.  "If you throw in $100.00, we can give them $500.00.  They've never treated themselves, Herbie J.  This is a big deal for them...moving here to Greenleaf.  And we can really make it a nice anniversary for them this year."

I didn't think twice about my sister's request.

I gave her the $100.00; she put it in a card - and after having a little cake, we gave it to our parents.

I'll never forget how it all played out because, even though we were happy to have moved to Greenleaf, it was a tough time for celebrations that year.  We would always spend the holidays on Erie Street with our big extended family.  But in 1977 things were different.

Not only had we and our relatives next door left Erie Street, but various aunts, uncles and cousins moved to Arizona and California; everyone in our family just kind of went their separate ways for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

That never happened before; and it was a lonely time - for everyone - in many ways.

So, when my parents opened the card and saw the $500.00 - spread out in brand-new crisp $100.00 bills - my Mom cried.  Then my father cried, then my sister, and then I joined in on the flood-gate.

Not sobbing...but gentle, sweet quiet tears of appreciation.

Within a couple days, we had a new dining room set...the modern kind with the real nice leather swivel chairs on rollers, and a big extension leaf that could be placed in the middle of the table - all of which my parents had purchased with the $500.00.

There wasn't a nicer set in town.

And the following Christmas, everyone who used to celebrate Christmas with us on Erie Street - were now reunited with us - at Greenleaf.

My Mom and My Mom's Vote Made a Difference

I grew up on Erie Street in the inner-city of Rochester, New York.

My family lived in a red-brick house that was built to last.  It's still there, in fact.  Eastman Kodak had purchased all the property in our neighborhood and turned the entire area into a parking lot.  But not our house.  They couldn't touch it.  The Landmark Society wouldn't let them.  The foundation to our home was too strong...too solid...and it was deemed a landmark.

In perspective, in more ways than one.

There was so much Love in that house, I can feel it today; that was its true foundation.  The house was built on Love that was placed there by my Mom.

She did so much for so many people for so many years.  In big and little ways.

I remember every year she'd visit homes in the neighborhood and collected money for what was then called the Leukemia Society charity organization.  There weren't many homes left in the later years, and many of those who lived in those homes had little or no money at all to donate.  But that never stopped my Mom, even during the winter months, when she mostly made her rounds for the charity.

There she'd be in the middle of February, putting on her coat in that big old-fashioned kitchen that we used to have.  She'd then take her little manila envelope with the tiny strings, and walked out the door.

One year, for some reason, I went with her.  She visited maybe only 5 or 6 houses and returned home with maybe just $5 or $6.  She knew it wasn't much...and even as a little kid, I knew it wasn't much either.  But I also knew Heaven thought that little $5 or $6 was worth a great deal. 

As such, my Mom's little neighborhood collections for funds from those poor families that would help an even needier group of people...who were dying...well...there's just no measure for the amount of Love that she collected - and that was collected for her...by the Angels.

There's no measure because...in the eyes of Heaven...she counted in so many other ways.

She made a difference.

Just as she would decades later...when she was in the early stages of dementia...which thankfully...never turned to full-blown Alzheimer's.

One voting year...in the last of her 86 years...I was going to the local fire station to place my vote in the local elections.

"I want to come, too," she said.

"Ma, but..."

"But nothing," she added sternly.  "My vote counts, doesn't it?"

How could I say it did not - and how could it not?

Of course, her vote counted in the local elections, because she counted...in my eyes...in the eyes of her friends at the senior center....in the complex where she lived...and in the eyes of Heaven - where she is the one that received countless votes.

Consequently, that one voting day in November '07, my Mom did come with me.

The voting booth organizers at the fire station said I could help her make her voting selections.

Truth is, she didn't know who was running for what office...and she was going to forget what she did and who she voted for about ten minutes after we got back to her apartment.

But for that moment in time, her vote counted because she counted.

She always counted, because she always did her part...whether for the Leukemia Society...or for the local elections...or for Heaven.

Either way, my Mom did her part and she counted.

And she still does, most likely more than I will ever know.

In this life.