I found Mrs. Rosenthal standing over her dining room table, her stomach resting on the mahogany as she arranged the flowers – gladiolas, daisies, red roses, and baby’s breath as the base. She’d put on her best off-the-shoulder sequined gown, had teased her blonde hair into a gorgeous doo, and put on her best make-up that I picked up before I even entered the room. Every one of her eighty-four years looked smashing.
“Pure nonsense, Charley Kramer, be still. And take your sweet pretty red head and wait for the other guests in the other room,” she said. Her voice scolded but her eyes smiled. “I’ll be along in a jiffy.”
I shook my head and laughed. What would I ever do with my favorite neighbor, what would anyone everdo? She was the grande dame of the Duquesne, and whenever she got something into her head, none of her neighbors – or anyone else in New York, for that matter – could get her to budge. But we all loved her.
I went into the living room. The walls were covered with photographs from her life – the gorgeous young dish who’d wowed vaudeville audiences with her luscious gams, the young mother of two who shocked society by becoming the first Jew to live at the Duquesne, the middle-aged political activitist who’d marched alongside Martin Luther King, Jr. – and the older woman who refused to slow down, no matter what. Every time I walked into this apartment, I felt the sheer force of her life, and I felt alive.
Mrs. Rosenthal came into the room. She had a devious sparkle in her eyes. Perhaps mischievous trouble to come? “So Charley,” she said, “we’ll have a little musicale after dinner tonight. You’ll play Gershwin on the piano and I’ll sing.”
Someone to Watch Over Me – I was sure she’d want to sing that one.
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