Rakhel Fliman

Our Dear Mother passed away on December 25th. And at that moment, our world has changed.

No more phone calls, visits, spending time with mom. It wasn’t like that when we lost our father 7 years

ago because we still had our mother with whom we could share our feelings and thoughts. Now it’s

different, it’s just emptiness and sadness.

Mom was sick for a while and it was very hard to see her so ill. All three of us, Mina, Rima and

Mayya were determined not to let our mother go to hospital or nursing facility due to Covid-19 to die

alone. We were so ready to take care of mom as long as needed, but she took care of us, decided to free

us, and left us so suddenly. HaShem was watching over us and our dear mom died at her home in her

own bed with her daughters next to her. We’ll be forever grateful for that.

Our mother had a difficult life. She was born in 1931, oldest daughter of Hona and Mortko

Portnoy. She had many childhood memories about helping in family small store, spending time with her

grandmother Maya and her aunts. She was 10 years old when World War II began. Half of her extended

family including her grandparents, aunts and uncle were killed by Nazi’s and local anti-Semites. She

remembered her youngest aunt Polina who was 18, engaged to be married and didn’t want to leave

without her fiancée. She was tortured and killed by locals anti-semites. Mom was able to escape and

evacuate with her family to Siberia. She remembered riding train packed with people. Another train with

solders was coming the other way. The trains stopped and solders were given away food to hungry

civilians. My mom got a loaf of bread for her family. People were fighting for food. A growing man was

trying to take away her bread but this 10 year old girl was holding it so tight and didn’t let it go until her

dad came to her rescue. She witnessed trains with civilians being bombed, people running away from

bombs, some people didn’t return to their families. She and her family lived four years in Siberia moving

many times to different places because war was getting closer. During this time, she took care of her

dying father after he came back to his family gravely wounded in the war (our grandmother had to work

and couldn’t take care of her dying husband). Our mother experienced many terrible things, including

hunger, being bullied and beaten by local anti-Semites, she witnessed her little toddler brother dying

from starvation.

Life was hard after the war. The family was very poor. As a young lady, my mother had two

dresses: one that she wore every day and one that she was saving. Once, she heard a rumor that it’ll be

another war. That day she wore both dresses. She didn’t throw away food, especially bread since it was

a staple and helped family survival. It was a big NO. When she got married there were no money for

wedding or a nice wedding dress. But it was not that important. To have a family and to take care of

everyone was the way she wanted to live. It was the life purpose for her that continued for over 6

decades.

She was a faithful wife, devoted mother, and very selfless person. She was a hard worker and

always very energetic. She was a great cook and a highlight of many birthdays were homemade cakes

especially everybody’s favorite “Napoleon” cake. She baked chocolate cakes and biscuits for Rima’s

wedding for over hundred people. We always had homemade food in Soviet Union even though it was

so had at times to get groceries.

Her three daughters Mina and twins Mayya and Rima were the highlight of her life. And she was

extremely overprotective of her children. She worried about us constantly, even when we were all

growing up in our 50s - 60s. And no matter how hard we tried to convince her that we are safe she had

her own way of determining that. In her last days, she was sad that she couldn’t do anything for us any

longer. She was such a selfless person.

She was a smart woman learning how to use computer and smart phone in her 80s. She learned

how to text her children when she got up and how she feels. Given that sometimes texts went wrongly

to Anya or Lyudmila but they forwarded them to us right away. Sometimes she could figure out how to

fix a problem with her iphone. That was amazing and it was such a blessing that our mother had full

mental capacity until her last days.

She was proud of her children, loved her grandchildren, adored her great grandchildren. Mom

was helping to raise her grandchildren. She helped to take of her first granddaughter Lara, first love in

our family. She had special place for Anya who is named after her mother and Lyudmila who is named

after her stepfather. The girls were born 3 months apart and brought tremendous joy to our family.

Evelina was the first baby born in America, was the cutest kid ever. Our parents were taking care of

Evelina while we were trying to establish our lives as new immigrants. And youngest granddaughter

Michelle whom mom and dad helped to take care of for 4 years. Mom called Michelle her sunshine. Our

family is truly blessed with beautiful babies who made our mother so happy. First great grandson

Charlie, first boy in the family, a little cute baby. Our dad lived to see his first great grandson. Then was

Auggie, the funniest and smartest kid ever. Yakkov Menashe and Tony were born about 3 months apart.

We remember family gathering when Lyudmila and Anya came both with their precious babies. It was

such a happy time. Then Hadassah was born, first great granddaughter, beautiful Hadassah who is such

a spunky little kid now. Tziporah, mom’s love. Mom was convinced that Tziporah who named after her

aunt looked just like her aunt Tzipa. New addition to the family beautiful babies Izzy and Reizel brought

a lot of joy and made our mom smile.

Our mother’s legacy is her family, her pride and joy. She was proud and happy of every

accomplishment of her children and grandchildren, their birthdays, holidays together, college

graduations. Last gathering was this year on Rosh Hashanah. Thanks to Rima’s hospitality there was a lot

of delicious food. Mom was happy that day, enjoyed her meal and time with us. She was so glad that her

three daughters have such a close bond and are there for each other and she loved her sons in law.

There were difficult times when we immigrated to America in 1991. Mom was 59 years old. It

was so hard to wait a year until her 3rd daughter Rima could immigrate and join the family. It was very

hard to build new life in America. Mom learned some English and could communicate, worked for many

years in Savannah and was taking care of her growing family. There were sad and difficult times when

mom was taking care of our sick father for many years, she was determined to do the right thing. Sad

times for us when mom was sick and her health was deteriorating.

But in happy and sad times our family was always together. Somehow our parents living hard

lives in Soviet Union and then immigrating to America were able to teach us strong values, keeping us

together, cement our relationships and make us stronger.

Thank you, mom, for your love and devotion. We already feeling the pain and miss you

tremendously. You are always going to be part of our lives. You and dad will always be in our hearts,

thoughts and prayers.

Mina, Mayya, Rima

I am going to quote words from famous song “My Yiddishe Momme” because that’s who our mother

was.

My Yiddishe Momme, I miss her more than ever now.

My Yiddishe Momme, I’d longed to kiss that wrinkled brow.

I long to hold her hand once more as I did in the days gone by.

And beg her to forgive me for things I did that made her cry.

How few were her pleasures, she never cared for fashion’s styles.

Her jewels and her treasures, she found them in her baby’s smiles.

And I know that I owe everything that I am today

To that wonderful lady so old and gray

To that wonderful Yiddishe Momme of mine.

In lieu of flowers, please make a donation to https://mazon.org/