When I think of Elizabeth, I think of her head on her cat's head, kissing his nose, her voice coming from the other room, laughing on the phone, her walking miles through the city, in her fringed suede boots, in her sneakers with the holes in them.
She was raised reading Harry Potter, listening to Harry Potter on tape, going to Harry Potter movies. She was part of the Harry Potter nation, the Harry Potter generation who are now graduating from college. She thought of her cafeteria at school as part of Hogwarts, and it did share a certain grandeur, with its open atrium high ceilinged space, with Hogwarts.
Elizabeth wrote notes in a tiny precise hand writing. She put her long straight hair up in a bun.
Today I went swimming in the Delaware, and did the back stroke so that I could look at the swallows darting for bugs. I thought of her.
Meditation on a piece of string
A funny thing happened when I went to use the leather strip I had bought years ago to repair my raccoon fur hat. That hat was six inches high, lined with red felt, and had ear flaps with a leather thong that tied under your chin. It was really warm. But its last use by Elizabeth was in the Christmas pageant when she was asked to dress as one of the animals in the manger. She didn’t want to be a sheep or a cow. She wanted to wear the hat.
The fur itself piled high on her eight year old head said to the crowd I am a beast, not human, not vegetable or mineral, but animal, present at his birth.
She walked with the other children, four feet high most of them, down the aisles of church to the altar where the manger was set up.
Years after I wore the hat on sub zero days until the thongs broke. I bought some leather string to fix it but could not successfully anchor the piece in the mounded fur. Now the hat and Elizabeth are gone, and I only have the string.
The fur itself piled high on her eight year old head said to the crowd I am a beast, not human, not vegetable or mineral, but animal, present at his birth.
She walked with the other children, four feet high most of them, down the aisles of church to the altar where the manger was set up.
Sorry for the absence, faithful readers
Elizabeth would have loved Iron Man 2.
Robert Downey Jr she referred to as "genius."
We loved to watch movies together.
Robert Downey Jr she referred to as "genius."
We loved to watch movies together.
She would have graduated this month from college
Every Sunday I get a report on who visits the blog. I see there are people with Smith College addresses looking ... we are all probably wondering why Elizabeth didn't get to graduate with you all.
All around NYU parties were taking place last week, and young women walking around with graduation gowns. I try to feel happy for them without feeling sorry that Elizabeth isn't among them. It is just plain impossible.
I saw my next door neighbor, six months older than Lizzy, and she is a grown woman. She is ready to start out in the world now, like so many of her friends. Good luck, you all!
A mother of a Smith graduate sent me this picture from the program.
All around NYU parties were taking place last week, and young women walking around with graduation gowns. I try to feel happy for them without feeling sorry that Elizabeth isn't among them. It is just plain impossible.
I saw my next door neighbor, six months older than Lizzy, and she is a grown woman. She is ready to start out in the world now, like so many of her friends. Good luck, you all!
A mother of a Smith graduate sent me this picture from the program.
Memory
When she was four or five, and it had rained very hard, we put on our boots and jackets and went to Harrison St. where the deepest puddles were. We splashed around until we felt we had tested the rain gear sufficiently and found it satisfactory. Or not. For a few minutes, we were roughly the same age.
photo by Enzo D.
photo by Enzo D.
Book Fund at Packer Collegiate
Today there was a reception to view photography books purchased in Elizabeth's name for the library at Packer.
Books by Lisette Model, for instance.
And Meatyard
Kertesz
Erwin Olaf
And pictures of New York by
Ruth Orkin
And one by Klein of Tribeca, after snow
I felt very elegiac, and overwhelmed by the emotion of returning to the school, the first time since the memorial service over three years ago. So many of her teachers were there, people who mattered deeply to Elizabeth's education, people who taught her what she should be. People like Eric Baylin, who read this poem:
Elizabeth's Books
Through her eyes a photograph unfolded
Through her gaze surface grays and blacks began to breathe,
gave way to stories.
Faces came alive
Through her careful looking.
And so these books - Elizabeth's - are filled with surfaces to be
plumbed through quiet gazing.
For years beyond our own a string of curious minds will find in these
new ways of looking, new ways of thinking
And through their eyes and in that trail of small epiphanies, lighted
moments stretching past our view,
She will be gazing still.
Eric Baylin
April 22, 2010
Books by Lisette Model, for instance.
And Meatyard
Kertesz
Erwin Olaf
And pictures of New York by
Ruth Orkin
And one by Klein of Tribeca, after snow
I felt very elegiac, and overwhelmed by the emotion of returning to the school, the first time since the memorial service over three years ago. So many of her teachers were there, people who mattered deeply to Elizabeth's education, people who taught her what she should be. People like Eric Baylin, who read this poem:
Elizabeth's Books
Through her eyes a photograph unfolded
Through her gaze surface grays and blacks began to breathe,
gave way to stories.
Faces came alive
Through her careful looking.
And so these books - Elizabeth's - are filled with surfaces to be
plumbed through quiet gazing.
For years beyond our own a string of curious minds will find in these
new ways of looking, new ways of thinking
And through their eyes and in that trail of small epiphanies, lighted
moments stretching past our view,
She will be gazing still.
Eric Baylin
April 22, 2010
How she wore clothes
Easter
Easter.
Once when she was six or seven I asked Elizabeth what her favorite place was in the whole world she replied
Easterland!
Once when she was six or seven I asked Elizabeth what her favorite place was in the whole world she replied
Easterland!
One More Thing to Think About
The Census form came today in the mail.
How many people live in your house, they ask.
Do not include children at college
people in jail, in a nursing home.
This is much easier to correct than the voting registration form.
Where there were once three, now there are two.
We answer just like those who have children in college,
or cousins in jail, or parents in nursing homes.
How many people live in your house, they ask.
Do not include children at college
people in jail, in a nursing home.
This is much easier to correct than the voting registration form.
Where there were once three, now there are two.
We answer just like those who have children in college,
or cousins in jail, or parents in nursing homes.
Weather Report with Shopping Memory
Dear Elizabeth,
Weather report.
It just hailed. The sound of little ticking on the windows grew louder, and then the wind kicked in, and the sheets of rain went diagonal. Yesterday the wind blew so hard, I passed a blown down awning on Christopher St. and at the corner of Varick and Franklin was a tipped over tree in its gigantic concrete planter.
They say the gusts were up to 40 miles per hour. Went shopping anyway. Impossible to think of shopping without thinking of you. Harry’s Shoes now has a whole store just for children. You were patient trying on different styles and sizes of shoes while the many older people competed for the attention of Harry’s sales men waiting on you.
When we shopped in the old Burlington Coat Factory on Park Place—you would hide under the clothes racks, slip between the hanging coats and dresses, play hide and seek there.
Now the Burlington Coat Factory is a mosque. And small children wear Uggs.
Dear Visitors
Dear Visitors to Elizabeth's Blog,
Thank you for coming to this site. It is wonderful that you are still thinking of her. Please feel free to say something. I really cherish every little message left here.
Thank you again.
Patricia Aakre
Thank you for coming to this site. It is wonderful that you are still thinking of her. Please feel free to say something. I really cherish every little message left here.
Thank you again.
Patricia Aakre
Re-post of one of my favorite pictures
What I love about this picture is the way she is laughing. Elizabeth loved to laugh, and loved her friends, and this picture shows both things at once. Emma especially made E. laugh. Thanks, Emma.
Pictures of Elizabeth with her dad
Eiffel Tower 2004
Narrowsburg, 1996
Elizabeth and Whiskers, Minnesota, 1993
When she was two we would take walks in the stroller just before she didn’t need it any more and could fly where ever she chose to dash off to. She loved to use her legs pumping at the swings, springing from the floorboards in her Johnny jump up, wheeling around in her walker at six months. Propulsion was her middle name.
Memory of Akumal
Oh Christmas Tree!
Season full of Hope and Peace!
We hope you had a peaceful time in PR.
Here is a picture of our tribute to Lizzy on our
Christmas Tree. See you soon.
Love, Mary, Steve, Cook and Nick
from Nicholas Alciati
I carried a blue plastic dinosaur in my pocket today.
That dinosaur traveled with me to Poughkeepsie to student teach.
That dinosaur ate my awful fast food lunch with me.
That dinosaur was in my pocket when I did a presentation on Robert Rauschenberg today.
That dinosaur was with me when I had the usual hummus and pretzel dinner.
That dinosaur was with me when I sat in my room listening to the Garden State soundtrack remembering the time we sang every song on the railroad tracks.
That dinosaur has gotten me through a lot in the past three years.
That dinosaur was in your dorm room and was given to me by my mom when she broke the news to me three years ago, tomorrow.
That dinosaur was with me at your wake and funeral.
That dinosaur was with me when I decided on which college to go to.
That dinosaur was with me whenever I was having a bad day.
That dinosaur was with me when got admitted into BFA photography program.
That dinosaur was there when I made a book, just for you.
That dinosaur sits next to my bed every night.
That dinosaur is one of the only physical things I have to remember you by.
That dinosaur can never make up for your absence, but the memories I have make things better.
I am so lucky to have known you and without you I may be going to school to just be a number in our society.
I may have denied my artistic passion, but you pushed me to embrace it, rather than hide it.
You influenced me in ways that I think you could never understand.
Although you are gone, you have given me more than most people have in this world.
Gone is such a permanent word, you're not really gone, you're here in other ways and that helps me get through my days as a busy photography student.
I love you Elizabeth, and with your blue dinosaur and the memories I have, I can get through anything.
That dinosaur traveled with me to Poughkeepsie to student teach.
That dinosaur ate my awful fast food lunch with me.
That dinosaur was in my pocket when I did a presentation on Robert Rauschenberg today.
That dinosaur was with me when I had the usual hummus and pretzel dinner.
That dinosaur was with me when I sat in my room listening to the Garden State soundtrack remembering the time we sang every song on the railroad tracks.
That dinosaur has gotten me through a lot in the past three years.
That dinosaur was in your dorm room and was given to me by my mom when she broke the news to me three years ago, tomorrow.
That dinosaur was with me at your wake and funeral.
That dinosaur was with me when I decided on which college to go to.
That dinosaur was with me whenever I was having a bad day.
That dinosaur was with me when got admitted into BFA photography program.
That dinosaur was there when I made a book, just for you.
That dinosaur sits next to my bed every night.
That dinosaur is one of the only physical things I have to remember you by.
That dinosaur can never make up for your absence, but the memories I have make things better.
I am so lucky to have known you and without you I may be going to school to just be a number in our society.
I may have denied my artistic passion, but you pushed me to embrace it, rather than hide it.
You influenced me in ways that I think you could never understand.
Although you are gone, you have given me more than most people have in this world.
Gone is such a permanent word, you're not really gone, you're here in other ways and that helps me get through my days as a busy photography student.
I love you Elizabeth, and with your blue dinosaur and the memories I have, I can get through anything.
Anniversary by Susan Markert
It comes
like fog
settling in and over
the day.
A date, a time, a moment
that changed everything.
They did not know
in the produce department at the grocery store
where a mother caught an avalanche of orange peppers
set off by her curious toddler
They did not know
at the stop light
where a car full of teens
smoking
waited for the light to change
Or on the boulevard
where a couple argued in a car
over something insignificant
and both felt unappreciated.
The mailman still came
the catalogs glossy
and promising a better life
My mothers red-rimmed eyes
The sound of a wail
as my purse fell
to the floor
Where did it come from?
It was me
I heard
As if watching
from another room
far from the truth telling
The sky looked different after knowing
as my heart shattered
into millions of little pieces
and fell to the ground
shiny and scattered
And I felt as if
I would never stop crying
Ever.
Does she remember my face
my eyes
before the news?
Did they change
like the sky?
The earth shifted that day
Only some felt it
Still feel it
When the fog moves in.
***************************************
Susan is my cousin, and lost her father, my uncle Edward Markert, suddenly one morning when he did not wake up. He was 52, Susan 17.
Howling
Every day after his dinner
the cat lets out a yowl that cannot be explained
Is he still hungry
Was the meal too wonderful
Who knows what he is missing or needing
to explain further
When she first died he would go to the bed
in search of her, and I would be there
and he would bury his head in my hand
and be comforted.
But sometimes
a yowl
is what
is needed
the cat lets out a yowl that cannot be explained
Is he still hungry
Was the meal too wonderful
Who knows what he is missing or needing
to explain further
When she first died he would go to the bed
in search of her, and I would be there
and he would bury his head in my hand
and be comforted.
But sometimes
a yowl
is what
is needed
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