Kendal View November-December 2018

F.Y.I.

W

e have the usual variety of offerings for our final 2018 issue. Norman Sissman reviews some Amazon customer book reviews with tongue in cheek.

Martin Smolin remembers aspects of his childhood in Brooklyn. Debby O’Keefe recounts some of the history of the 250-year-old Mount Pleasant house she lived in before moving to Kendal.

Gene DuBow muses on different forms of loneliness. Ann Holloway turns to poetry to express some of her inner feelings. Doris Appleby bids hail and farewell to Sue Anderson, who provided us, for many years, with so much entertainment by accompanying the Kendal chorus and our summer sing-alongs. Pat Taylor summarizes the workings of the popular Trips Committee; a special feature illustrates this article with photographs of residents on some of the Wednesday trips. The photos were taken by Arthur Brady, and Arthur and Pat Taylor created the layout and wrote the legends.

Our cover photographs were selected and processed by Arthur Brady. On the front cover, Arthur captures a display of holiday lights at the Untermeyer Gardens in Yonkers. On the inside front cover are some wild mushrooms photographed by Martin Smolin. The two back covers are scenes from residents’ travels: inside the back cover is Arthur Brady’s view of the Grand Tetons in Wyoming. On the back cover, Norman Sissman presents a panoramic view of the imposing mysterious ruins of Machu Picchu.

Norman J. Sissman

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Overheard in the Bistro I am under the impression, perhaps erroneous, that many of you, my readers and fellow residents, find my mien assured and usually free of doubt. However, the actuality is quite the opposite; I frequently feel the need for support for my opinions from others, preferably those of more established credibility. So it was that recently I sought confirmation of my assessment of Gogol’s Dead Souls, after reading with much pleasure this old classic of Russian literature. As I have done in the past, I could think of no better or more convenient place for such an endeavor than that modern bastion of bibliographic information (and, coincidentally, commercial success), Amazon books. On its site, Amazon includes buyers’ reviews of almost every book it lists. I surmised that surely there I would find authoritative reviews with which to compare my own opinions. So, on a midnight dreary not too long ago, I trundled off to my computer and clicked until I reached the appropriate readers’ review site. Among the first of hundreds of submissions for Dead Souls, one immediately came to my attention. I quote it in its entirety: “For me it shows awful attitude to the job.”

Although, of course, this did not conform to my own reactions, I was so struck by the succinct self-confidence of the review that I conceived the idea of exploring more Amazon customer book reviews in the hope of broadening my intellectual horizons by exposing myself to more critical pearls such as this. What I found was so remarkable and enlightening that I feel compelled to share some of it with you. Here are a few excerpts from reviews of other classics, randomly selected: Remembrance of Things Past, recently retitled by modern translators, In Search of Lost Time.

By Michael Battaglia: “… the chunk of the first two parts are focused on his incredibly weird relationship with girlfriend, Albertine. When we last left our self-obsessed hero he was convinced that dear Albertine had an eye for the ladies, thus he had to marry her to keep her from straying to the ladies. He doesn’t get around to marrying her but convinces her to live in his house with him...while he goes off on his own to wallow in misery, since because of her he can never go anywhere fun, like Venice….”

By andre laplume: “The most overrated book on earth, Zero movement and endless ramblings about the filthy rich and pretentious in France.”

By a “customer” on June 20, 2000: “Pretentious, boring, obscure, obscene (though definitely NOT erotic – no matter what your sexual orietnation is) and self-glorifying (or self-delusional)….

Other than that, it’s a pretty good book.”

War and Peace:

By RMUNRO: “...I find his characters rather flat and the book is very slow... It isn’t a particularly entertaining or interesting book. It’s more like a badge, I can finally say, ‘I made it! I have read War and Peace. ”

By Sparkys_Fan: “It was OK until the curse words. Some books I don’t bother with when they start in with the profanity. I did not finish this one.”

By Scott Powell: “It’s true. These classic works appeared in serials in Russian literary magazines. and boy did the authors drag these stories out… the characters are insufferable….. frankly, if I ever wanted to read/watch about the folly of the over-privileged and under-worked, I could just watch Gossip Girl….”

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Moby-Dick:

By G. Granger: “...What sucks about this book are the assinine details and depths that Melville feels he needs to spend on a topic…. One chapter is devoted to measurements of whale skeletons, for which a quick trip to Wikipedia would easily be more useful. As far as tedious reads go, the only thing worse would have to be Tolkien’s The Simarillion.”

By lorabora: “I felt sad reading it at times, knowing that it was written in the 1800s when the practice of whaling nearly decimated the whole population….The ending leaves much to be desired and was not worth slugging through the whole book.”

By david maxwell blanke: “…Supposedly the style was revolutionary at the time, more fluid and natural than some of the old dogs writing then, like Hawthorne, but it sure doesn’t seem that way now. Maybe 50 years from now, Kerouac will seem slow-footed. Who knows? Moby Dick ranks up those as the most overrated novels in American literature, right up there with The Sun Also Rises, in fact.”

By timothy: “This was nice if you are into the English language. I learned: That people will follow strong leaders into death for no reason. Racism is very comical. And More.”

Ulysses:

By Robert Belilovsky: “For psychological masochists only.”

By Jon B: “I know, I know, it’s supposedly a classic… But after slogging through 180 pages, all I could decipher is that someone maybe had breakfast, probaby in Ireland….”

By George Rowbottom: If I were a scholar of Irish history, the Catholic mass, and the Iliad, this might have been a fun read….”

By Douglas VenDerVoort: James Joyce’s books are ample proof of reincarnation. It is clear that [he] in an earlier life wrote the Book of Revelations which is equally incoherent…Why anyone read(s) Joyce… is a bigger mystery to me than “One God is actually three Gods” is a mystery to the Pope.”

I will refrain from displaying more quotes from the Amazon books site because of space limitations. I will not indulge in any speculation about what impels the quoted paragons of perspicacity to publish their pungent opinions on the pages of the Internet. And, finally, I will no longer consult Amazon customer book reviews in my search for intellectual validation; instead I will seek them out only when I am in need of some sadomasochistic literary fun. I will leave it to you, my readers, to devise your own practices regarding these esoteric sources of literary criticism.

Norman J. Sissman

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Tales from the Old Country After the First World War many apartment buildings went up along Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn. And there, in number 201, is where my parents rented apartment 6N prior to the beginning of the Second World War. Families were known by their apartment number. There were other Smolins in the building. Aunt Rose and Uncle Barney were known as “the 2G Smolins” and we were “the 6N Smolins.” Aunt Minnie was 5N. 201 was an enormous structure, occupying nearly an entire block. There were six stories and a penthouse with apartments designated by floor and the letters A through N. Because it was such an immense building, 201 necessarily had a labyrinthine basement. There were storerooms, laundry space, and the boiler room. We kids used to play hide-and-seek in the halls of the building and under the stairwells, but the basement was especially mysterious and terrifying.

“You kids wanna get killed? Stay away from them boilers. You'll get burnt.” The super and his frightening words remained etched inside me when I moved into our first house and was terrified to tend the much smaller boiler. The basement also contained modern conveniences: rows of tubs for scrubbing laundry. You brought your own washboard downstairs or stored it in the basement. There were huge gas-fired contraptions for drying clothes. A rack could be pulled out of the wall, and the housewife or cleaning lady would load it up with layers of wet clothes, then slide it back in the wall. Coins were inserted to start the mechanism igniting the gas jets and, with a roar, flames would (at a safe distance) dry the laundry.

Georgie and I were in the same class in school. He and his older brother, Arnie, would play ball in their apartment (4G) on days when the weather precluded going out. George also enjoyed roller skating on the waxed hardwood floors. Needless to say, Mrs. Brown beneath them in 3G, looked upon such activities unfavorably. There would come an angry broombanging from the ceiling below. When that proved unsuccessful in stopping George, the pipebanging began.

Pipe-banging had the disadvantage of annoying all the other tenants in the G-line, including Aunt Rose who knew how to speak out forcefully.

After school one day Georgie had a tempting offer. Come over after supper. The Noonan sisters get undressed and you can see them from my window! The Noonan sisters (3C) were maiden ladies of advanced age, shapeless and frail. Apparently their bedroom window could be seen into at night from Georgie's kitchen window. I appeared at the appointed time and we decamped to the kitchen, turning the lights out so we wouldn't be spotted. After what seemed an interminable time, one of the Noonans entered her bedroom, turned on the light and fussed around. At last she took off her shoes and pulled her dress off over her head. She was left in a teddy and a slip. The closet door opened and she went inside for a while, emerging in a long flannel nightie. This is it? I didn't see anything, I complained, disappointed and indignant.

Anyhow, George seems to have retained his early interest in anatomy since I heard he became a doctor.

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I used to go down one floor to visit Aunt Minnie (5N). She was widowed and lived with her daughter, Lydia, then a psychology student at Columbia University. Lydia used to practice giving tests to me and Aunt Minnie would stuff me, with food. My favorites were latkes and potato kugel. The kugel, made from potatoes (of course), onions, and chicken fat, smelled wonderful and tasted heavenly going down, but landed like a brick in the stomach refusing to be digested for hours. One day Minnie appeared at our door excited and distraught. Lydia, having locked herself in the bathroom, had fainted on the toilet. What to do? The super could be summoned, but what a scandal if he were to see Lydia in a state of dishabille. Even in a crisis, propriety had to be observed. Eventually Lydia came to and let herself out of the bathroom.

Aunt Rose and Uncle Barney's apartment (2G) was large and faced the front of the building with a vista that included century-old elms along the parkway. My cousins Robert and Jay shared a bedroom and Ella Mae Stevens, the colored maid, slept on a daybed in the dining room, I adored Ella Mae. I used to come downstairs whenever I could. She always found time from cooking and cleaning to tell me stories and play games. I didn't believe her, however, when she told me how North America and South America had fought a war and freed the slaves. I had never heard about that before. It didn't happen, I insisted. There weren't slaves and there was no war. As ever when I exasperated her, she tossed me out of 2G, leaving the door open on a chain so that I couldn't get back in but air could still circulate. That was my opportunity. “Ella Bella kissed a fella nine times down the cellar” I sang loudly in the hallway. Then the door slammed shut and the lock turned. Some years after the war, Ella Mae returned to live with her mother in South Carolina. Robert and she exchanged Christmas cards for many years until the cards stopped coming.

My cousin Robert, eight years older than I, was always doing interesting things. He had a fish tank with tropical fish. So I had to have tropical fish. When I was five, Robert introduced me to the Children's Garden in the nearby Brooklyn Botanical Garden. On Saturday mornings he walked me over there and I learned to pot plants and grow vegetables.

During the war, we had “Victory Gardens” which produced vegetables and flowers for the family and neighbors. And Robert also raised rabbits. How did he do that in an apartment house? He got permission to use part of a storeroom to construct two double cages. He brought in straw (I have no idea where he obtained it), rabbit food, and four bunnies named Flopsy, Mopsy, Cottontail, and Peter. Soon many baby bunnies began to appear. So cute. All the kids in 201 loved the bunnies. The cages were locked and after school Robert would open them and allow us kids to hold and pet the rabbits while he changed the straw and cleaned the cages. This was fascinating to little kids and we begged to feed and hold the bunnies until ‒ one day Robert found the cages broken into and the rabbits gone. That was the end of that project.

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201 was mostly a Jewish building. In those days, women stayed home, cooked, cleaned, and raised the children while the husbands took the subway to work in Manhattan. Aunt Rose was an exception since she was a schoolteacher. That's why she needed Ella Mae. Divorce was practically unknown. You had to go to Nevada to be divorced. And intermarriage was unheard of. So when the scion of a Jewish family, noted for owning a burlesque circuit, moved in with a shikse who looked a lot like Betty Grable, it caused eyebrows to be raised. The wife was a platinum blonde, wore high heels, and did not wear the customary foundation garment to stabilize jiggling ‒ not the type to fit in with anyone's mah-jong group in 201 by a long shot. She walked a large friendly chow, and they were soon dubbed by us boys “Beauty and the Beast,” an eponym which caught on among the adults. Too shy to say anything to her, we boys would blushingly befriend the Beast. In retrospect, she was probably lonely, feeling socially isolated and, having nothing in common with anyone else in 201, befriended the boys, which was not going to ingratiate her among their mothers. After about a year, they moved away.

Talkies were fairly new when I was a little boy. And children had no chance to get used to seeing violence on the TV screen. My first movie was Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. I remember my mother cautioning me that there would be a witch and if I were scared, I didn't have to look. I was scared by the witch plotting with her red apple and I hid my eyes. In 1940 my parents took me to see The Great Dictator with Charlie Chaplin portraying Adenoid Hynkel.

Daddy explained that Hynkel was really supposed to represent Hitler, who was our worst enemy, but he didn't know then what to think about Tojo, the Japanese general. We found out at the end of the next year.

Martin Smolin

My Old Farmhouse — 250 Years on Hardscrabble Road Driving north from the lower end of Hardscrabble Road in Mount Pleasant you find curves and hills and woods. In two miles a big white house looms up on your left, set sideways to the road behind a picket fence. The house is close to the street, and separated by bushes. Stone steps lead up and around to the old maple trees and lawn in back. There’s a root cellar with a dirt top. Three roofs face different ways ‒ porches to the south; patio and decks to the west; garage to the north.

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Inside, the house is a miscellany, both spacious and snug. There are fourteen rooms, five baths, front and back stairs, three fireplaces, seven doors to outside, built-in cupboards. Each of the three floors contains three levels joined by a few steps, so nine levels need cleaning. It is a house of many corridors, angles, and surprises. But in the late 1700s, it was a two-room cottage with a storage space above.

Two centuries later, in the old farmhouse, I fed three boys and a husband for five years. Then for nine years I also taught writing courses to college freshmen. Leaving that job, I took to research and writing about my house: no one had looked into its past.

How, in the 18th and 19th centuries, did it get the way it is? And who are the ghosts?

The house stands about four miles east of the Hudson River and two miles north of the Pleasantville-Briarcliff Road. In 1800 Hardscrabble Road was an ox trail.

Mohegans, a subdivision of the Algonquins, lived here.

But Dutch settlers came out from Manhattan to build near the Hudson, in this land of enormous trees. In 1672 Frederick Philipse, a New York merchant rich from shipping, purchased 2,900 acres in Yonkers from Dutch owners. Married to a rich widow, Philipse had resources from the slave trade and probably also from piracy. A 1673 government appraisal listed him as the richest man in the county. Over twenty years he bought seven Westchester tracts, most from the Indian Sachem Goharius, who was paid in pounds or items like guns, spools, stockings, powder, and beer.

In 1693 Philipse received royal letters patent from England naming him Lord of the Manor of Philipsburgh, by then 92,000 acres from the Hudson to the Bronx River, including what’s now Mount Pleasant and Yonkers. By 1776, 272 tenants were farming on Philipse’s land. Houses, farms, mills appeared along the river and inland. In New York, then, manor tenants owned their buildings and improvements, but not the land. This was a thriving area. Frederick Philipse boasted, before the Revolution, “Many of the Tenants were rich, all had good Houses and Barns, in a prosperous condition.” Farmers raised dairy and meat products and were required to plant fruit trees. They paid rent to the landlord, but owned crops they grew and structures they built. A 1760 rent roll for the Manor lists one Benjamin Underhill among the tenants.

We know Underhill’s land on the Manor surrounded the present property on Hardscrabble Road: his name appears at that spot on survey maps in 1778 and 1785 ‒ just below the northern border of the Manor (which still is the Chappaqua town line). His annual rent was less than four pounds. His 231-acre land was not among the most or least valuable properties on the Manor. In 1760 Benjamin was thirty-eight and married to Amy Weeks. This was a hopeful period, before war years ravaged Westchester farms. Underhills first came to the colonies around 1630, when Captain John Underhill arrived in Boston. He fought with success and glory in the Indian wars after a Dutch trader in 1643 killed an Indian for furs. Both Indians and Europeans responded with brutal raids. In 1644 Captain John, with Dutch troops, attacked a village in Bedford, killing at least 500 Indians; many victims had gone to die in their burning lodges, set on fire by Underhill’s men. He was called a hero.

Captain John was Benjamin’s grandfather. Benjamin was born 1722. No Underhills were on the Philipse rent roll in 1749, but by the 1785 survey there were a lot. There was probably a structure built on Benjamin’s land by 1770, since his name is on the 1760 rent roll. We know his farm included a house because a 1785 survey map contains a rectangle close to the west side of the road, just where the house is today.

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We don’t know what happened to the farm during the war and after, when ownership was transferred in 1787. The Philipses were well-known Tories, and most of the Manor tenants shared their politics. We do know that Benjamin publicly supported the Loyalists. A document, from April 1776, reports a scuffle at the White Plains Court House after citizens with grievances against the Crown, meeting to plan a Congress, were interrupted by protesting Loyalists. “We are determined to support the Constitution and King,” they declared. A list of 312 names (headed by Frederick Philipse) was affixed to this Declaration. The 271st name was “Benjamin Underhill.” (I counted!)

One account said that this Loyalist group broke into the meeting and announced allegiance to their gracious Sovereign, “…then gave three huzzahs and returned to Captain Hatfield’s tavern, singing as they went.”

After the Battle of White Plains in October 1776, the British held New York City, and Washington’s patriots were based slightly north of Westchester. The county became a chaotic noman’s-land. Records from 1778 show Benjamin Underhill living in Phillipsboro at the time of his second wedding (Amy had died), so he had not deserted his farm, although many farmers had fled.

Wandering bands ‒ from both sides ‒ were raiding and burning farms, often murdering residents.

A doctor wrote of the local farmers, “They feared everybody and loved nobody. Their houses were scenes of desolation.” But by 1779 Underhill and his new wife Elizabeth were not totally wiped out; a Philipsburg Manor tax list reports him as having real estate valued at 300 pounds, and a personal estate of 780 pounds.

And the farmhouse? Maybe built between 1760 and 1770; probably a small cottage built into the hill, less than half the width of the current long porch. Early houses faced south to protect against the cold, and were next to a road. That first cottage would have been the section that is to the left of today’s central porch door, the southwest section of the house. The basement-storage room underneath still contains a long ceiling beam from that era. Above the main living room would have been a low garret, now part of the third floor. The hall and eastern half of the house were probably not built until about 1800. (An architectural historian examined and explained the house for me in 1995.)

Residents did survive those terrible war years, restoring farms and resuming normal lives. Many Loyalists moved to Canada or England, but the Underhill clan remained. The third Frederick Philipse, Lord of the Manor, had been accused of treason and imprisoned for six months in 1776.

After the war he and his family moved to England. Philipse’s land was confiscated under an act of attainder and sold. The state gave current tenants first chance to buy their leased land, but Benjamin Underhill, aged sixty-five, declined, and moved across the town line.

The house was bought in 1787 by a speculator, Ward Hunt, who owned numerous other farms in the area and did not live on this one. Expansion and renovation were probably done around 1800, waiting for Samuel Washburn ‒ who bought the place from Ward Hunt in that year and prospered there, with his wife and his twelve children. Samuel Washburn ran his farm for fifty-three years.

Many facts are known about the birth and growth of the property now called 725 Hardscrabble Road, Chappaqua. There are still mysteries, though. Somewhere along the way, the 231 acres listed for Benjamin Underhill on the 1785 survey map were reduced to 131 in the 1787 sale of the property from Underhill to Ward Hunt. What did New York State’s Commissioners of Forfeiture do with the other hundred acres? There are theories, but nobody is sure.

Deborah O'Keefe

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“I Vant to be Alone” Greta Garbo, in the 1932 movie Grand Hotel, makes one of the most iconic statements in film history when she demands, “I vant to be alone.” Those Swedish-accented words were spoken as a lament during the throes of a love affair. She did not live in a CCRC. In 2018 the Westchester Health authorities thought that it would be best if we here at Kendal imposed that demand on ourselves during the winter GI virus “suspension,” or “lockdown.” It was not a love affair. They wanted us to be individually in total isolation. They didn’t force us into that but what we got was almost as bad. Somehow, we survived.

A post-lockdown evaluation found that almost everybody, pretty much, returned to good physical health when it was over. But what about the psychological state of the residents during and even after everything had returned to normal? My guess (as a nonmedical person or psychiatrist) is that the most constant malady during the two-and-a-half-week period of limited activity and social contact was something called – loneliness. Its memory lingers.

Wikipedia defines this feeling as follows: “Loneliness is a complex and usually unpleasant emotional response to isolation. Loneliness typically includes anxious feelings about a lack of connection or communication with other beings, both in the present and extending into the future.

As such, loneliness can be felt even when surrounded by other people. The causes of loneliness are varied and include social, mental, emotional and physical factors.”

It is not only a “lockdown” happening. There is no doubt that people of advanced age, especially those living alone, and doubly those who at one time had a mate or lived with a relative or a friend and are now solitary, suffer to some degree from this corrosive feeling.

Many made the decision to move to a place where, at least, they could be surrounded by other human beings. Taking the giant step in giving up a residence is surely difficult. However, in the long run it may well turn out to be almost a necessity in continuing one’s life but it is often a cause of loneliness as well.

Even being at Kendal, surrounded by fine people, still provides almost all residents with a great deal of “alone time.” Most residents sleep seven or eight hours a night or so. That leaves sixteen wakeful hours. Given an hour and a half at dinner in the company of others, plus some exercise, committee meetings, and extra activities, that probably leaves a dozen or so hours that have to be filled up. Reading, listening to music, and, especially, TV fill in some of the time. It still leaves six to eight hours. Now, those hours are not necessarily “dead.” Telephoning relatives and friends, paying bills, and other activities such as going to the doctor or shopping takes up some of the hours – but not for everyone. If anyone seriously evaluates how his or her days are spent, an honest answer would be that there are plenty of empty hours. Loneliness is just around the corner.

Not all days are the same. It seems to me that weekends are especially filled with empty hours.

There are few if any meetings. There are occasional concerts on Sunday afternoons preceded by brunch, and that brings about a little of what we used to call in the Civil Rights days, “the mixing of the bodies.” Saturday is usually the worst day, frequently with no activities at all and no van driver to shuttle people around. Those without cars are stuck. Alone time in apartments reigns supreme.

There are movies and they do help.

To be sure, being alone is not the same as being lonely. In fact, it is helpful to have some “alone” time. Being alone and suffering loneliness are two different animals.

Absent a survey of my fellow residents, I think all of us experience loneliness at one time or another. In many instances it is probably not even recognized. The “empty hours” feeling at times 9

results in a feeling of being “blue.” I believe it is pretty common. With most of us it is a passing phenomenon. However, with some it might lead to a real depression.

Even people who consider themselves “busy” may not totally escape. Shopping, walking outside, or just talking to a neighbor or friend are some of the strategies that are employed to get out from under the black cloud. Sometimes they work. Sometimes, not so much.

At Kendal we’re fortunate to have a Health Services Department and a trained social worker who can help if the unsettled feeling becomes more intense. The biggest problem is for individuals to come to terms with the need for help themselves.

For most of us the great antidote to any degree of loneliness is something called “Kendal on Hudson.” Author and novelist Suzanne Collins wrote in The Hunger Games, “ I realize, for the first time, how lonely I’ve been in the arena. How comforting the presence of another human being can be.”

KoH offers a constituency of more than 200 people who, in many ways are individuals just like ourselves. They can be reached and touched. Yes! They are not family members or old and trusted friends. They’re what I call “Acquaintances Plus.” They’re a pretty good substitute.

In addition Kendal offers twenty-seven committees (I counted them) in which one can be active and involved not only with the committee function but with real-live fellow residents. You don’t have to love them all but just the rubbing of shoulders and talk are important blues-chasers.

The genius who first brought “Wine & Cheese Nights” to us deserves a medal. It has turned out to be one of the most important events on our social calendar. It’s gotten to the point that on many evenings there are just not enough chairs to accommodate all those who want to sit and “schmooze” with their compadres. The recent addition of “free” continental breakfasts gives residents another opportunity to socialize.

One thing we all should remember. Kendal is a community. It’s not a hotel. Relating to one another is a necessary and positive element in communal living. As a community member, there are pleasures and responsibilities. You should participate in both. It’s health positive.

If Greta Garbo was alive today, she’d probably love Wednesday and Friday evenings plus the Monday, Wednesday, and Friday breakfasts. She could discover the pleasures of not being alone.

Eugene DuBow

On the Go with the Trips Committee If it’s a Wednesday, you might notice twelve venturesome residents boarding the Kendal van to go on a field trip. The destination might be a New York museum or the nearby one in Katonah. Perhaps it’s to a mansion like Lyndhurst or Boscobel. Maybe to Poughkeepsie for a stroll on the Walkway over the Hudson or a cruise on the river itself to West Point. Or it could well be to the New York Botanical Garden or to the Storm King Art Center.

Day trips like these, usually available on several Wednesdays a month, are organized by the Trips Committee, which was started in 2006 by Jane Beers, one of the Founders of Kendal. Jan Myers took over as chair in late 2009, bringing the perfect background to the job: she was a partner in a 10

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small New York public relations agency that specialized in the travel industry. One aspect of her job was arranging trips for (and sometimes escorting) travel editors and writers to client destinations in Europe, the Caribbean, and Ecuador. Ever the traveler, she is currently on an Overseas Adventure Travel (OAT) tour of back roads in Spain and Portugal.

In addition to Jan, the current Trips Committee has nine members, four of whom joined this past year: Sheila Benedis, Lynn Brady, Jacky Cummings, Sheila Darnborough, Doris Eder, Muriel Hahn, Gloria Lewit, Pat Taylor, and Alice Weinstein. It meets once a month to plan outings and choose volunteers among committee members to lead upcoming trips. Being a tour leader involves myriad duties: making arrangements with the destination, confirming participation via e-mails and phone calls, collecting checks, answering questions, keeping an eye on the weather report, suggesting places for lunch, and making sure that everyone boards the van at return time. Early on, the tour leader submits sign-up sheets to the Resident Care Center, whose job it is to determine if each person on the list has the stamina for the trip or if a mobility assistive device (wheelchair or walker) is needed or an aide is necessary.

Savvy residents look for information on new trips in each week’s Spotlight and head for the Trips Book in the Activities Alcove to sign up (or get on the Wait List). The number of participants on any trip is limited by the Kendal van, which holds twelve residents. Wednesday trips are billed to residents at cost, with admission usually at a senior group rate. There is no charge for the van on weekday trips during the day.

Because the trips involving a Met opera in HD live take place on the weekend when van drivers are not on duty, there is a different financial arrangement: the cost for use of the van and driver overtime is prorated among participants. A trip to an opera has evolved into one of the most popular offerings on the Trips Committee list. The 2018-2019 season includes four operas: La Fanciulla del West, Dialogues of the Carmelites, Aida, and La Traviata. The latter two garnered so many names on their respective Wait Lists that Jan arranged for a second van for each. The operas are screened at the City Center Cinema in White Plains on Saturday afternoons.

Another popular trip, “New York Do Your Own Thing,” is offered multiple times a year on Wednesdays. Participants are dropped off and picked up at the Met Museum and are free to do whatever they want in between. This is the only trip not on a first-come, first-served basis: instead, priority is given to residents who have never taken this trip before or have not taken it recently.

The Trips Committee is committed to providing residents with a year-round menu of intriguing places to visit. With Kendal’s accessibility to New York City, the tristate Metro area, Westchester County and the Hudson River Valley, there is no shortage of history and culture to be tasted.

Pat Taylor

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Poem I have a hole in my heart, Peek-a-boo, I have a hole in my heart, I see you – and beyond to the rolling hills, valleys, plains; beyond to the land where birds are free, antelope roam, and crags and crannies usher in a new divide.

A cleavage in the beyond from which I return to the hole in my heart and, with two cats, curl up around a cozy cloud and fall asleep.

Ann Holloway

Hail and Farewell, Sue Anderson For the past seven years, the popular twice-yearly performances of the Kendal on Hudson Chorus and our summer sing-alongs have been greatly enhanced by the scintillating, virtuosic piano accompaniment of Sue Anderson. Since Sue and her family recently moved to South Carolina, I feel moved to offer a short tribute to her in appreciation for her unique contribution to the pleasures of our lives here.

Sue studied music as often as reading in her public school classes in the village of Frederic, Wisconsin, population about 500. She learned to play the organ with her father, who wasn’t a musician by any means – just interested. The family had a small organ in their home, on which they practiced, and later bought a Hammond with a full complement of foot pedals when Sue was in high school. When asked, much later, how she learned to transpose an accompaniment into any key, she said, “Oh, I just always could do that – having learned the chords on the organ.” Remember the times during a Kendal sing-along, when Sue stopped playing and said, “Oh, that’s too high!” and immediately and effortlessly moved the key down a step or so?

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In 1977 Sue graduated from the University of Wisconsin – Eau Claire. She started with a major in business, but switched to music halfway through. Then, wanting to see the Big City, she went east, intending to stay only a short time. Hah! Did she figure on a career in music? “Heavens, no! But sometimes careers just choose us, and sometimes New York just gets into one’s blood.”

While working days at Cornell University Hospital editing research papers for the Hematology Department, Sue picked up all sorts of music performance work. She worked at the Village Light Opera, played at the bar mitzvah of future academy award winner Ben Stiller, enrolled in an extension program at Jullliard, and soon found herself working as Rex Harrison’s rehearsal pianist.

There are some raunchy stories about those days, but we’ll skip them for one when she was hired to teach Peter O’Toole to play the piano for his role in Svengali. He was unable to learn enough to be convincing for close-up shots, so Sue played, literally tucking herself under the keys and playing unseen from there.

Sue met her husband, Cris Groenendaal, when he was performing in Sweeney Todd on Broadway and she was playing the pit piano and also conducting in another Broadway musical. They knew each other for years before “dating,” eventually moved together to Croton-on-Hudson, married in 1989, and had two children.

Why did this glittering gal from Broadway agree to accompany the Kendal chorus and lead the summer sing-alongs? Partly because her good friend, Catherine Nesbitt, the director of the Kendal chorus, asked her to, but I like to think she stayed on because she liked us! So, thank you, Sue – we all wish you all the best for all the years to come.

Doris Appleby

Kendal View Staff Editor Norman J. Sissman Managing Editor Pat Taylor Editor Emerita Joan Oltman Editorial Staff Gloria Cooper, Eugene DuBow, Doris L. Eder, Muriel Fox, Edith Litt, Deborah O’Keefe, Sue Phillips, Bill Smethurst Photography Editors Horst Berger, Arthur Brady, Caroline Persell Advertising and Billing Norman J. Sissman Kendal View is published by The Residents Association of Kendal on Hudson, a nonprofit organization in compliance with IRS regulations under 501 (c) (3).

It is printed by Accel Printing & Graphics, 128 Radio Circle, Mt. Kisco, NY 10549.

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BETTY AMICO 914-962-5475

Seniors Transition Services, LLC strans1@gmail.com Reduce the Stress of Downsizing SERVICES OFFERED • Assist You/Your Family in Vacating Apartments • Pack Charitable Donations • Obtain Estimates from Movers • Achieve Maximum Tax Benefit • Work Within Your Time Frame Insured Call for Free Estimate 914-962-5475

The Zegarelli dental office has been located in Tarrytown since 1982. We have been serving KoH residents since the Kendal opening day in 2005.

Ninety-One North Broadway Tarrytown, NY 10591 (914) 631-0983 www.coffeyfuneralhome.com NANCY COFFEY • MICHAEL COFFEY

A Family-Operated Business Serving Tarrytown and Sleepy Hollow Since 1911 Pre-Planning Available

BOSTICK, MURPHY & COMPANY CERTIFIED PUBLIC ACCOUNTANTS P.C. Individual, Business, Trust and Estate Tax consulting, planning and return preparation We will meet at your home, office or at our location in Mount Kisco

William G. Bostick, CPA, CVA Patricia A. Murphy, CPA, CVA, CFP, CHFC, PFS, CGMA 113 SMITH AVE. MT. KISCO, NY 10549 (914) 666-6336 (914) 666-0396 fax pmurphycpa@aol.com

We can assist you with your hearing loss, hearing aids, nasal and throat problems, and allergies.

Michael Bergstein, MD, FACS

Joseph DePietro, MD

Board Certified in Otolaryngology, Balloon Sinus surgery and Sleep apnea

Fellowship Trained Laryngologist, Voice and Swallowing Disorders

Jill Zeitlin, MD

John County, MD, FAAAAI

Board Certified in Otolaryngology, Specializes in Hearing Services

Board Certified in Allergy and Immunology

Jessica Comparetto, MA, CCC-A licensed audiologist

358 North Broadway, Suite 203 • Sleepy Hollow, NY 10591 Tel: 914-631-3053 • Fax: 914-631-2807 Ear, Nose, Throat and Allergy care in YOUR neighborhood!

Book Online, Anytime!

The

Phelps

Community

Pharmacy

One-Stop Pharmacy Shopping Prescriptions Medical Equipment Sundries professiomal staff take the time to get to know Our friendly, professional each customer. We do more than fill prescriptions. We provide the best in over-the-counter and post-surgical supplies.

So stop by, say hello, and let us know how we can help you.

Open Monday - Friday 9 am - 6 pm Located on the first floor of the 777 Building on the Phelps Campus

Parking is free!

P H E L P S Memorial Hospital Center P H A RM A C Y 777 N. Broadway on Route 9 at Route 117

Sleepy Hollow, NY

www.phelpshospital.org

(914) 366-1400 FYO Accounting & Tax Services

914-631-8868 Keeping the Kendal community mobile with one-stop auto repair services

Mickey Keegan, Owner mickey@mickeys-automotive.com

WE SERVICE ALL CARS FRONT END SPECIALISTS 路 TIRES WEEL ALIGNMENT & BALANCE EXHAUST REPAIR 路 HEAT/AC COOLANT 路 BRAKES 路 AND MORE!

Free Pick-Up and Delivery for All Kendal Residents www.mickeys-automotive.com

In-home service Tax Preparation & Planning Bookkeeping Filing & Organizing Bill Paying Owner: Jean Mayer, EA

Serving residents at Kendal on Hudson since its opening.

914-862-2305 jean@crotontax.com

25% discount to Kendal residents.

Pre-Season Tax Special: Provide your prior-year tax returns by February 1 and receive a free review and no-obligation fee quote.

Donald R. Reed Speech & Hearing Center

Comprehensive care close to home at Phelps Memorial Hospital Center

914-366-3010 Swallowing Disorders

914-366-3636 Suite 303

Van Tassel

Your Great Expectations...

Can Be Filled.

Cleaners “Better Cleaners For Those Who Care�

Family- Owned And Operated Since 1929 We serve over 70 Kendal customers, so you have probably seen our white- and red-lettered delivery truck making the rounds to all four residential buildings.

Dependable delivery and pickup of laundry, dry cleaning, clothing repairs and adjustments.

Turn Around Service 631-7787

A few doors from C Town.

Free parking in the back away from traffic.

Knowledgeable and friendly staff will answer questions and help you select from the largest and most unique display in the Rivertowns.

Competitive pricing and discounts.

I look forward to having you join our many Kendal customers.

John Sarofeen, Proprietor

Tel. 914-332-0294 92 N. Broadway, Tarrytown, NY

Harnik Bros.

J E W E L E RS

Enrico Hair Care, Inc. Tuesday Enrico does hair color/cut and styling Sandra does mani/pedi and waxing Wednesday Kim does hair color/cut and styling Thursday Toni does hair color/cut and styling Maria does manicures and waxing once a month, by appointment Friday Toni and Andi do hair color/cut and styling

Call for appointments 523-6382 or 922-1057

Community mausoleum, traditional in-ground burials, natural burial grounds, private family mausoleums.

540 North Broadway â—† Sleepy Hollow, NY 10591

Multiple manufacturers ― because one brand does not fit all 75-Day evaluation period 3-year extended warranty

'Congratulations to all our Angels for helping to attain our recent excellent DOH survey result.

Your hard work and dedication to the care of our clients here at Kendal is very much appreciated Pam Fitzpatrick, RN, CEO

Celebrating over 10 years with

Kendal on Hudson Main Building, Level C 845-628-2255 •• •• • •• •• • •• • • •

WWW. ANGELSONCALLINC.COM 667 STONELEIGH AVENUE, BLDG A, SUITE 302, CARMEL NY 10512 I 845-628-2255 LICENSED BY NYS DEPT. OF HEALTH

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