I spent most of 2009 going in and out of synagogues to say Kaddish, the Jewish prayer of mourning, for Madeline. Of course she wouldn’t have approved. She was a communist. Madeline lived in a different world, a world of transplanted Yiddish secular culture. I realized all of this only much later. There’s plenty of time to think about these things in synagogue because there are numerous prayers and who can concentrate on so many of them? Madeline loved music and she would take me to concerts when I was little. I would fall asleep but that didn’t deter her. She wanted me to love music as much as she did but she certainly did not want me to be a composer. Madeline, are you listening? I dedicate this piece to your memory.
