Seventh Grade (2)
Robert Zuraw was our seventh grade teacher. A Greek man, he lived
on Franklin Street in a house with a big Greek family. Relatives
and relatives. In our small factory town Greeks and Jews were a little alike though
we rarely entered one another's houses and even now
that hasn't changed so much. My mother loved
Greek food and she asked Callie Vartelas to give her a cooking
lesson. Callie's daughter Chickie was in my class they
both came over and we all made moussaka. We were in seventh grade.
When my mother died forty years later we put our childhood house
on the market 43 Holbrook Street and Chickie Vartelas came over
said she'd wanted to live there since
she'd come to cook. Her family bought the house the first day
it was on the market and although I've never been inside since then,
a neighbor said they're still there now.