If you've been paying any attention at all to the news, you know that there's a lot of angry talk in our country about immigrants. I'm not going to go into the details because it's just too tragic to consider what compels people to leave their home of origins and what compels people to want to deny the bereft, brokenhearted, or simply dreamers seeking a new home. These are difficult times.
But I'm thinking about immigrants because today is my grandmother's 126th birthday. My wonderful, smart, immigrant grandma who was born Zara Zlata Dienstfrei in Brody, Galicia, Poland on March 17, 1890 came to this country with her husband Abraham Pikarevich who was born in Kiev on May 10, 1888. He left his homeland with his brother and literally walked across Europe to Egypt, where they both learned to be barbers. They then went to Italy, France, and finally to Germany during World War I. That's where he met Zara. They got married and had a son, Jozef in 1917.

On June 2, 1921 they boarded a ship bound for America. They arrived via Ellis Island where they changed their names. My grandfather chose Adolph. My grandmother became Sophie. Jozef became Josef, although my grandmother always called him "Yussie." They settled in Newark, New Jersey, where my grandfather and his brother opened a barber shop. My grandmother was a dressmaker. My mother's older sister was born in 1923; my mother in 1925, and two more children followed in 1927 and 1930.
I hardly got to know my grandfather. He died in 1954. I do have a very distinct memory of him though. He loved to take my twin brother and me out for a walk in our twin stroller. He loved to sing a little song to us in Russian. I still remember the words, but I'm not sure how to even type them or what they mean.
I did get to know my grandmother. She was a remarkable woman. So smart, so political, so engaged. She loved to sew, cook, and bake. She was utterly serious about the world and always kept up with current events. She subscribed to the
I F Stone Weekly. She taught us to be serious and to question authority.
It is truly amazing to think she lived to be 86 years old, but she did. It was a good life here in her adopted country. It hasn't even been 100 years since my immigrant grandparents and Uncle Joe arrived. In those intervening years, though, my grandmother's mother and two brothers died in the Holocaust. Sometimes, it really is the most important thing to do, to let people move about the planet as if we are all one species. 'Cause you know that's just what we are.
I am the granddaughter of immigrants.
Happy birthday, Grandma.