Honoring Ma | Violins in Flight

Honoring Ma in Her Own Words

My mother was born on February 24, 1918, near the end of World War I, then known as the Great War, the war to end all wars. Amazingly, that year became better known for something almost as deadly as the Great War—the flu pandemic of 1918.

This was the world my mom was born into. Oh, if only nothing else would go wrong for my mom and all the other children, but it was not to be.

Over the following decades, my mom grew up in the midst of Prohibition, Bread Lines, the Great Depression, Hitler, the Holocaust, marriage, her husband going off to fight World War II and the birth of a son. Other historical and momentous events would follow.

In 1933, when my mother was 15 years old and a student at Philadelphia's Simon Gratz School, she wrote an essay titled Honesty. I recently came across that essay while digitizing memorabilia.

Written almost a hundred years ago, mom's essay feels as if it could have been written much more recently. Like maybe as recently as yesterday.

Honesty

Author Maurice Maeterlinck wrote that "in a thousand diverse ways does the God from which we spring reveal Himself within us."

It is this invisible goodness which is our birthright. No man has anyone to blame but himself should he die morally disgraced....

There are obstacles that lie in the path of all virtues. There are temptations and lust for wealth and power. The more we have the more we want. How many of us ask ourselves if in achieving our aspirations, we are doing so honestly and with a clear conscience....

An honest man seeks after truth and advances with each rung of the ladder as he works his way toward success, reaping his rewards. He's worthy of the merit which is his.

Some honest men, you will say, labor long and hard day after day and year after year but never achieve social prominence and all that success means. But they are happy men because they have been true to themselves and true to their family....

In some people, success has the effect of a strong stimulant. It awakens them only to the importance of themselves and that is the beginning and the end of their success. They know only intolerance and greed and forget morality....

Whether we be rich or poor, let us not give way to temptations and visions of greed, but rather make ourselves a pillar of everything that stands for Honesty, Justice and Goodness.

Written by Estelle, age 15, in 1933.

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My mom died on the morning of January 22, 2001, a month before her 83rd birthday. Violins in Flight is written in her memory and honor.