When there is “nothing left to be done” for someone, usually the greatest thing you can do is simply to be there with him

Uncle Abe was a small man with a large heart. He was naturally reserved, but his words carried such force that it felt like he was always talking. His Yiddishkeit was not sophisticated, but it was heartfelt, genuine, and throbbing with life. If you listened carefully and concentrated just the right way when he was speaking, you could smell the fish markets and hear the sounds of the shtiblach in the Lower East Side of his childhood.

Uncle Abe was ill for some time at the end of his life and spent several months in a nursing facility. We had been close to him for years before that, but, as we discovered, the time spent together at the end of life can yield unexpected treasures. The reality of the finitude of life has a way of sending people searching for and sharing memories that may have been long tucked away.

I was putting on tefillin with him for the first time in a few days after he had a procedure. We got to talking about the tefillin he had owned over the years, which got Uncle Abe recalling his time fighting with the American army during World War Two, a subject he had always been reluctant to discuss. Unprompted, Uncle Abe shared an incredible story of Divine intervention that happened to him during the Battle of the Bulge. When he finished, he was quiet for a moment. With a slight smile, he said, “I haven’t told that story for 50 years.” It is now forever a part of our family lore.

After some time in the nursing facility, Uncle Abe took a dramatic and final turn for the worse. After consulting with doctors and rabbanim, we moved Uncle Abe to a hospice facility. He wasn’t eating and hadn’t spoken at all for a few days. It seemed only a matter of time.

When there is “nothing left to be done” for someone, usually the greatest thing you can do is simply to be there with him. And so along with a stream of admirers, we were there with Uncle Abe as much as possible over the last days of his life.