We recently traveled to New York to be part of our granddaughter’s birthday celebration that took place in a few days. The plane was half full and, except for the two-year-old twins across the aisle, pretty quiet! The kids (and their parents) were going to visit Grandma and Grandpa, and as I watched their activity level, I hoped that Grandma and Grandpa would have a great garden and lots of energy.

I already knew what to expect from our (almost) 7-year-old granddaughter. He would take us by the hands and lead us to his bedroom, close the door firmly, and place us on his bed. Then it would show us all of your most recent acquisitions. Many of them would have some connection to the movie “Frozen”, his most recent obsession. Ooh and aah at the right times and she and I would apply age-appropriate makeup, nail polish, and skin glow that would peel off in 15 minutes. She would sing some of the songs from “Frozen” to us and then we would go to the living room to play the “Sorry” game. What fun!

My husband keeps saying that if we had known that grandkids were so much fun, we would have had them first! But we both know they are so much fun because we’ve already been through all of this raising three children. Now I understand why it is better to live in “villages”, to have an extended family around you to share the bad and the good moments; to take some of the burden off overwhelmed parents and share some of the wisdom gained over the years.

I know I know! Sometimes this “wisdom” is less than wise, and sometimes it just adds more stress to young parents trying to do everything at once. But in general, I think the saying “it takes a village to raise a child” is valid.

Neither of our parents lived nearby when we were raising our children. That was partly because we were looking for jobs and opportunities and partly because we chose to live apart from parents who, we feared, could simply add more stress to our lives. We were probably right about the latter, but I wonder now that I am a grandfather, if we do not deprive ourselves and our children of really knowing their “village”.

My “village” consisted of three great-uncles, great-aunts, my grandmother, and a variety of cousins, some who lived in the city and others who visited in the summer. My uncles and my grandmother had traveled from Lithuania to Virginia, Minnesota in their twenties, seeking more opportunities and trying to escape pogroms targeting the Jewish community in their home country. They literally left their village behind and later recreated it in a small town in northern Minnesota.

I remember vacations at Aunt Bess and Uncle Carl’s house, poker games every Saturday night at rotating houses, and fishing trips in wooden rowboats that carried too many people. I remember my grandmother who gave me unconditional love and died years early. My most vivid memory of my grandmother is visiting her on Friday afternoons and walking over the newspapers placed on the wet floor of her kitchen, my nose filled with the wonderful aroma of chicken soup simmering on the stove. The freshly washed floor and the good smells of dinner were in preparation for Shabbat, which came at dusk.

When Grandma died, we moved into her house above the store and family poker games were often held at our house. Both men and women played and the mixing created nights filled with loud conversation, good food, and a lot of tension. Most of the time, the game ended in a heated argument and threats to quit the game. Usually this lasted until the end of the following week, when it was time to meet up for the next poker night. My brother and I would hide under the table or try to disappear into a quiet corner so they wouldn’t send us to bed and lose all the excitement.

In the summer, my family often gathered at Uncle Carl and Aunt Bess’s cabin on a small lake that offered good walleye fishing. This is where I learned to swim and meet older cousins ​​and their families returning from places like Minneapolis and Detroit, where they had settled after leaving home. We were scattering, like all second-generation American families.

I always knew that I would not settle in Virginia. As much as I loved it, the city had less and less to offer as the iron ore that had funded the original boom was mined. I think my parents realized this too and knew that once my brother and I were sent to college, we would never live there again.

So my husband and I have created our own villages in every place we live; first in southern California, then in upstate New York, and finally in Florida. Our extended families visited us and we visited them, trying to keep the bond alive. But now our children are doing the same; creating their own towns where they live. We all work hard to keep the family bond alive with frequent visits, phone calls, and emails, and I’m so thankful for the airplanes, the phones, and Skype. They all help to keep our villages intact when we don’t live on the same street.

After landing in New York, I ran to collect my luggage, hoping to see the reunion of the twins and their parents with their grandparents. And there they were, lifting the suddenly shy children in their arms for lots of hugs and kisses. After our bags arrived, we too were on our way in a taxi to spend time with our daughter, son-in-law, and our nearly seven-year-old granddaughter. And for a few days, part of our village was together and we made new memories for our granddaughter to take into her future.