Sisters Reflect on the Sibling Relationship and Hot-Button Issues That Arise When Called on to Become Caregivers for Aging Parents
TIME magazine recently reported that nearly 43.5 million Americans are caring for elderly parents or relatives. Authors, and sisters, Barbara Pokras and Fran Pokras Yariv understand the ins-and-outs of caregiving, since they took care of their aging mother through three assisted living facilities in California. They have captured the essence of their experience in their new book, consisting of two novellas; the first is Feeding Mrs. Moskowitz, written by Barbara and the second, The Caregiver, written by Fran, who now is also a senior advocate.
In this pair of moving, gracefully poignant novellas, sisters Pokras and Yariv explore the world of the elderly with deft humor and heart-wrenching detail. Pokras’s Feeding Mrs. Moskowitz introduces us to the remarkable Golde Moskowitz, an elderly Russian widow living alone with her memories. In Golde’s world, “signs” are everywhere, the dead converse with the living, and dreams are real. Natalie Holtzman, a thirty-six-year-old graphic artist longing for connection, fills her world with work and with Artie, her commitment-wary boy¬friend. One sweltering summer morning, Golde decides to do some grocery shopping. Natalie, on her way to work, quite literally “runs into” her, and the lives of both women are forever changed.
Yariv’s The Caregiver unfolds in a series of stories, revealing the inner workings of Sunset Hills, a fictional upscale assisted-living facility in Hollywood. Narrated by Ofelia Hernandez, a young Latina caregiver, the stories capture both the mundane routines and the absurdi¬ties of the residents’ lives. With deep empathy and subtle humor, Yariv crafts intimate portraits of characters whose passion, intensity, and intelligence are only magnified with age.
This month they begin an extensive California book tour to discuss how they found the right assisted living facility for their mother, how they navigated the waters of the assisted living facility once she was there, how they divided up the responsibilities of caring for her, since one of them lived in California and the other on the east coast, and how they dealt with her aging and the impact it had on their own lives. Join them for a lively discussion at their bookstore events this month or on their blog at http://feedingmrsmoskowitz.blogspot.com/. They are ready to tell you all about their own experiences as caregivers, and how they’re embracing aging in their own lives.
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