I called her “Nana Banana”.   She called me “Puzzy Wuzzy”.  She came to live with us when I was five – shortly after my granddad had died – enabling my mother to go back to work.  I can close my eyes right now and conjure up her bright blue eyes and wispy white hair. 
 
My brother and sister were seven and ten years old, respectively, when I was born. Because of this big age difference, I was in many ways an only child.  And with this came loneliness.  But Nana was always there to befriend me, to make me feel special rather than left out.  On the occasions when my parents would go somewhere with my older siblings, Nana would turn my feelings of abandonment into ones of delight by making what she called her “tea parties”.  We didn’t have tea – instead her special drink was Bronx Coffee (in honor of the area of New York City where she’d lived).  It consisted of a small amount of coffee with a large amount of sugar and milk.  I felt so grown up!  Nana would bake gingerbread men, using raisins for their eyes.  The kitchen would be perfumed for hours with that gorgeous spicy smell.   Sometimes we’d have animal crackers. Nana would make up stories about the exotic animals - especially, for some reason, the monkey and the camel - before we’d ceremoniously dunk them in our coffee. Afterwards we’d often play Canasta.  Was it purely coincidental that I’d usually win?    
 
Because my mother was working, the bond that developed between Nana and me was special. She often told me that I was her favorite grandchild.  Her other five were teenagers and as a consequence were generally impatient with her, or as she put it ‘fresh’.  We were, as she repeatedly told me, “pals”. 
 
Although she was crippled with arthritis, Nana would still take me out for short walks, moving very slowly, using her cane for support.   She loved violets and we’d frequently stop en route so that I could pick some to put in a vase in her bedroom.  Another favourite flower was lily of the valley, which bloomed in May – the month in which we were both born, my birthday being two days after hers – so we’d always celebrate together. “You were supposed to be my birthday present,” she’d say, teasingly, “but you were a little lazy, my Puzzy Wuzzy.”
 
Nana’s bedroom was next to the one I shared with my sister. Outside her window was a flat bit of roof, just the kind on which Santa could easily land with his sleigh and reindeer.  Every Christmas Eve, Nana would let me sleep in her bed so I could listen for Santa’s arrival.  Although I tried very hard to stay awake, I never succeeded – and would wake up in my own bed in the morning – no doubt having been carried there by my father.
 
Nana was diabetic.  I can see her sitting at the kitchen table with her little pot of insulin, a needle, and an orange which she’d cut in half.  She’d inject the insulin into her thigh then eat the orange.  Thanks to watching this daily routine, which was as normal as getting out of bed in the morning, I’ve never had a fear of needles – unlike my own daughter who practically froths at the mouth at the thought of an injection!
 
Another kitchen-table task I remember watching her do was darning socks.  She’d stick a drinking glass into the sock and patiently repair any hole.  She’d often ask me to thread the needle for her because I had “young eyes”, as she put it.  Nowadays, if a sock has a hole, it goes straight into the garbage. No doubt she’d be appalled by my behaviour.
 
Nana’s family came originally from Germany.  Not surprisingly, she favored foods such as pickled herring and rye bread.  And here I am, more than 50 years after her death, still eating the foods that were staples in our household.  She had a great philosophy concerning leftovers.  She’d put them into the refrigerator, saying, “You can always throw them out tomorrow.”  Unlike my attitude with holey socks, I know she’d be proud of the inventive ways in which I recycle leftovers.   
 
Her taste in music also reflected her origins.  Nana loved Viennese waltzes and would wave her hand in time to the music, as if conducting the orchestra.  She told me that in her youth, she loved to dance – and it was when she was taking lessons at an Arthur Murray Dance Studio that she met my grandfather – who was also a keen dancer.  She was addicted to watching the Lawrence Welk show, as well as Arthur Godfrey and even Liberace.  On New Year’s Eve, when my parents and older siblings would go out, I was again left with Nana.  She would always let me stay up until midnight – watching Guy Lombardo and his band on TV – until the ball dropped down from the Allied Chemical Building in Times Square. 
 
She loved Chinese food which was definitely not available in our small town of Pleasantville, New York, back in the 1950s.  Undaunted, she’d treat me to an exciting bus journey to the larger town of White Plains where we’d go to the movies  (I vividly remember seeing “The Student Prince”, which she loved as it’s set in Heidelberg, Germany) -- and have lunch at her favorite restaurant, the China Garden.  The best part for me was the fortune cookies.  She’d let me open hers as well as my own, and then she’d interpret the philosophical messages that I was too young to understand.
 
Then one day, almost out of the blue, she fell ill.  My mother moved her into the downstairs bedroom.  I don’t remember a great deal, except a feeling of bewilderment.  The doctor was called, and at this point my mother wouldn’t let me in to see her.  A few hours later, she died in my parents’ bed.  I was eleven years old; she was 74.
 
In actual years, my time with Nana was relatively short but I do not envy others who’ve had their grandparents for many, many years.  The quality of our time together far outweighs the quantity.  My memories of “Nana Banana” are indelible.  A short time after we’d lost her, I had a nightmare and woke up sobbing.  Between sobs, I related my dream to my mother who’d come to comfort me.  In my dream I saw Nana skipping and dancing – something I’d never seen her do because of her arthritis.  When I tried to go up to her, she kept pushing me away, laughing, her eyes shining with merriment.  Her rejection of me, her favorite grandchild, her “Puzzy Wuzzy”, was devastating.  My mother soothed me with a dream analysis worthy of the best psychologist.  “She wants you to know that she’s completely free from pain now.   That’s why she can dance about.  She’s telling you that she’s happy where she is and she doesn’t want you to join her.”  I was reassured by my mother’s words, and accepted this as gospel truth. 
 
Many years have come and gone.  I have experienced the joy of being a mother myself and now, at long last, I shall experience that of being a grandmother.  My own daughter is expecting her first child, a girl, in a few months from now. Of course, I am already planning tea parties and Canasta games. 
 
I don’t know what my baby granddaughter will eventually call me…but I’m hoping it will be ‘Nana Banana”.   

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