PAVLOV'S DOGS

In school we learned about Pavlov’s Dog experiments. Ivan Pavlov could train dogs to respond to certain stimuli. If he fed a dog soon after ringing a bell he determined that the dog would associate the bell with being fed. The recess monitors at the Bigelow School where I attended in the 1940’s used the same principle. At recess we boys could yell and scream and carry on as only young boys can, but what we could not do was run…. for some unknown reason that was forbidden in the school yard.

So with all the bedlam occurring during recess it would all come to a screeching halt with the ringing of the school monitors bell. All of us froze in our place without movement and sound. Who knew the power of a ringing bell.

The monitor would then admonish the running boys with a stern “There will be no running during recess” There was a moment of silence while we all gathered our thoughts. Then as if nothing happened, the bell would be rung again and we resumed the bedlam until we had to return to the classrooms.

Sometimes, when I hear a bell ringing now I automatically stop for a moment. I, like Pavlov’s dogs have been totally conditioned.

PARENTS

Why is it that we don’t fully appreciate our parents until they are long gone. Only now can I get the full measure of their devotion to their children. My parents, like a lot of others, migrated from a foreign land. My father left Albania at sixteen to avoid conscription in the Turkish Army. He arrived in America with very little except what he could carry with him. He loved the United States and was quick to adopt its ways. He felt patriotic so he enlisted in the Army during the First World War. Once established he returned to Albania to find himself a soul mate. My mother married my father and followed him back to America as a young bride. Imagine how scared she must have been to leave her family and homeland to travel far away not knowing if she would ever see them again.

My parents had 4 children, I being the youngest. There was 10 years between myself and my sister…. in between two twin boys. I have the deepest respect and love for my father but in my opinion it was my mother who was the heroic member of the two. Early in his life my brother Anthony developed Muscular Dystrophy. It is a terrible debilitating disease for which even today there is no known cure. Most of our child growing years were during the depression of the 1930’s. Like all families there was a struggle to keep our heads above water.

My parents brought Anthony to the Long Island Hospital for incurable diseases. Given their financial situation it would have been the prudent thing to leave him there. But once they assessed the deplorable hospital conditions, they could not bring themselves to do that…. they brought him back home. This meant my mother, in addition to attending to the needs of the family would now be on duty 24/7 tending to the needs of a child incapable of taking care of himself. Most children die young from the disease. Because of the love and attention my mother gave Anthony he lived well into his early twenties.

If it was a burden to my mother and I know it was, she never showed it. Not once did I ever hear her complain. As I said at the beginning, it is only these many years later that I fully appreciate my parent’s devotion to their children and the heroic efforts of my father and particularly of my mother.