Tonight I will light a special candle in honor of my father's memory.

Tomorrow will mark the 50th anniversary of his passing. He was only 39 years old. He died of cancer in 1958.

I was 4 years old.

I am writing this for me, to give voice to the man I really never had the chance to know. But he deserves my love and hence, I feel the loss of what could have been if cancer had not taken him from family and friends.

I do not know how old I was but my first memory is of his pants. I was short...

The pants are tan in color and have a good crease. He was in partner with my grandfather and my uncle. They owned a clothing store so a good crease was probably very essential!

He smoked a pipe and a round mahogany red wooden holder held several pipes. It was not up high enough for small hands, mine. I got it down and hid behind his red recliner. Hiding is a good sign that I knew this was really not a good idea!

The pipe bowl was the head and the stem was the body. I was playing and having my pipe people walk when the corncob pipe stem broke off the bowl. Uh oh.

Many years later, I asked my mom about that memory. She laughed. She said Dad was not happy with me, it had been his favorite pipe.

He must have felt very sick now. He walked into the living room where I was playing. On the coffee table he set a fizzing glass of alka-seltzer. It looked like 7-up so I wanted a sip. He said no, I would not like the taste. He let me smell it, ewww.

The day he died, my mother gathered all 5 of us kids around her. She was very sad. She told us that he had passed away and we were to go to our rooms and to be quiet.

I do not really understand loss. I know he is dead and not coming back. But I think this is a good chance to get a coke. I ask and she says yes, my sister opens a bottle and I get a straw. I am happy.

Now I am standing at an open grave while prayers are being said. I am looking at two old women (probably in their 40's). They are crying and pointing at me. I understand that they expect me to cry. I had the ability to shed tears so I cry. I am not really sad, I am doing what is expected.

My final memory of the time is a bedtime ritual. There are many people in my house and I am not sure what to do. It is time to go to sleep. I always kiss my mom goodnight but I think it would be rude to just kiss her and no one else.

So, I go around the room kissing everyone. Everyone begins to cry.

Those are my few memories, the ones that belong only to me.

But there is much more to the man who was my father.

In honor of his memory, I need to say more. 50 years is a long time and he deserves my homage.

He was born in Russia. He lived in Odessa on the Black Sea. My father is 7 years old and the year is 1926. My grandfather realized he needed to get his family out of Russia so my grandmother sewed jewels in the hems of various clothes to use for bribes along the way. My uncle was a baby.

Unfortunately, a guard my grandfather was trying to give a watch to for safe passage took the timepiece and threw him in jail. My grandmother went to work for the warden's wife as a house cleaner.

Every day, she sent food to jail with my father. The guards made great sport in beating him up.

I do not know how long that continued but two days before my grandfather was to be shot before a firing squad, he was released.

He wanted to take his family to the USA but he needed a sponsor. He had a relative that was supposed to do that but something happened. There was always anger on my grandfather's part.

Through Cuba, they went to Mexico City. My father spoke only Russian and Yiddish. Now he had to learn Spanish to survive. He and family lived in Mexico for 7 years before getting into the USA. Passing Tucson, my grandfather settled his family in Phoenix.

My father was 14 and spoke no English at the time.

Did he have an accent? Oh yeah but I do not recall his voice.

He met my mother at a dance. Most girls were afraid of him, he had a "reputation." But my mom danced with him anyway.

My cousin's grandmother used to tell a story about their relationship. Other men had roving eyes for good looking women, my father only had eyes for my mother.

Although my grandfather was the patriarch, my dad was in charge. He had the head for business, expansion. He had an eye on the future.

He left behind a wife with 5 children ages 11, 10, 8, 7, and me 4.

I miss this man I never knew. 50 years ago on August 1st but the candle will be lit tonight.

I honor him with my small girl memories and a short story of his life. From ashes to ashes, from dust to dust.

I will muddle through the Mourner's Kaddish tonight. I may not pronounce it correctly but that does not really matter.

What matters is who he was.