L.A. is a great big freeway
Johnny Carson used to joke that the 405 freeway is a parking lot going 70 miles an hour. To the uninitiated, it is all that and worse: when driving 70 miles an hour bumper to bumper on an unfamiliar road, one can barely if ever read the exit signs even if they are posted at a somewhat reasonable distance from the exit. If they ARE posted at a somewhat reasonable distance from the exit and if you CAN actually read the signs as you speed by, you then have the issue of getting from whichever lane you’re in, which is inevitably the far left lane, and making your way across 8 lanes of speeding traffic to the exit ramp. This can rarely, if ever, be accomplished. The reason commutes in LA are so long may well be because if you miss your exit, you have to travel an additional x-number of miles beyond the exit while trying to utz your way to the far right lane only to exit miles past your intended exit, u-turn around on the overpass (if there is one) and head back in the other direction – now, wisely staying in the right lane the whole time. With everyone honking, tailgating you, and gesturing rudely.
OR, you’re not moving at all.
That last option was the scenario the last time I was on the 405, in 2014.
On just another perfect day in LA I was on the not-moving 405. Because I was stopped, I was able to read a sign up ahead that indicated that the next exit was Wilshire Blvd. That was not my destination, so I didn’t pay much heed. My mind wandered. I then thought – “Wait a second! As long as I am so close, I’m going to get off on Wilshire and try to find Minka’s house!”
My mother’s late sister, Minka, had lived on Oakhurst, on the flats in Beverly Hills, since WWII. The house was a classic Spanish style 2-bedroom stucco with a cathedral ceiling in the living room, a little tiled nook with a table and bench seating in the kitchen, and a detached garage that had been converted to guest quarters/office. Totally adorable.
I inched my way along, got to the Wilshire exit, turned off the 405, and was then stopped dead in new traffic on Wilshire Blvd heading for Beverly Hills. One thing about LA traffic: it teaches you patience. If you don’t learn that lesson, you’re sunk. SO, I once again sat, more or less patiently.
As I sat, I glanced out the driver’s side window and saw that the traffic in which I was now stopped was alongside a cemetery. I noted how lovely it was: a pretty tile-roofed building nestled among trees in a manicured lawn. Neat rows of gravestones. “H’mm”, I mused. “I wonder if this is Forest Lawn.” Another look. “Nah. Forest Lawn has all sorts of odd monuments, statues and headstones. People say it is weird. THIS cemetery is so tidy, it might as well be a military cemetery.” My next thought came as an epiphany: “Military?! Grandpa was buried in a military cemetery in LA! I wonder if this is IT!”
Backstory: my maternal grandparents were both from Lithuania; Grandma Beatrice from Vilnius, and Grandpa Izzy from Kovna. They met after they had separately immigrated to the Bronx. Grandpa lied about his age, saying he was 18 when he was actually 16, and enrolled in the US Army to fight the enemy that had tortured his family. Also, at that time, if you enrolled in the Army you were automatically granted US citizenship. He later said that being in the US Army was his proudest accomplishment. When he returned from the service, having fought "the war to end all wars,”, he met and married Grandma.
My mother, Freda, was the oldest of Beatrice and Izzy’s 4 children. After she married my father in NYC at age 19, the rest of the Berlowitz family moved from NY to California. Grandpa was a house painter, and the CA weather allowed year-round opportunity to paint. So my Aunt Minka and Uncles Larry and Arthur all grew up in CA and were able to take advantage of the then-fantastic CA education system. All three earned multiple degrees. Minka married Gene, their son Ethan was born in 1960 and their golden life seemed complete.
Lots happened to the family living in the pretty little stucco house. By the time I was sitting in traffic trying to get to their street to see if their house was still there, all of them were dead, long-gone from that house. But still –
I wanted to see it again in tribute to them and to my memories.
As the only child in proximity, Minka became caregiver to her parents in their old age, and had arranged Grandpa’s funeral. Although I hadn’t attended and had no knowledge of where in CA he was buried, it would make sense that Minka would bury him close to where he and Grandma had lived in downtown LA. AND, it was possible that Grandpa had a military burial, having done his service to his chosen country.
I was now sitting in traffic alongside what might possibly be my grandfather’s burial place. I inched my way up to a traffic light where there was a left turn into the cemetery parking lot. There was only one other car parked there. I got out and walked to the stucco building. It was locked. Closed for lunch. Disappointed, I walked back to my car just as another car pulled into the lot. A man got out, saw me heading to my car, and said “May I help you?” I said “Oh, do you work here?” “Yes, I’m the director.” “OH! Well, I was just driving by and it occurred to me that my grandfather might be buried here. I have no idea.” “Well! Let’s find out!”
I followed him into the little stucco building with a sign telling me that I was in the Los Angeles National Cemetery. He turned on a computer and said “Just type in his name.” I typed in “Israel Berlowitz” and BAM!!! A window instantly popped up: “Israel Berlowitz. Lithuania” with his rank and the years of his birth and death!
“Oh my god! What does this mean?” I asked.
“It means that he is buried here!”
I gasped. I couldn’t believe it. I had stumbled upon my grandfather’s burial place. Blind stupidity, curiosity and choking traffic had led me to a place I had not known existed: to the burial place of a man I had met three times in my life who was my grandfather!
The director gave me a map on which he noted the location of Izzy’s grave, and headed me in the right direction.
I slowly drove the winding lane and parked where the director had indicated. I got out of the car on that beautiful California morning and started looking at numbers on plots, and at names.
Most of the headstones in the cemetery were identical verticals. But as is the Jewish tradition, in this area the headstones were flat on the ground. I inched my way along the indicated row peering at the ground. No, no, no, no, no Izzy. And then, just like that, the next to last headstone in that row was marked “Israel Berlowitz” with all the above-mentioned information chiseled into it.
“Grandpa! Grandpa!” I sobbed. I could not believe it. As I cried, I found a stone nearby and placed it on his grave. I whipped out my cell phone and took pictures. I texted the pictures to my two uncles, the only surviving children of Izzy and Beatrice, and to my siblings and cousins – their other grandchildren. I was shaking, but I managed to send them the message and photo. I am HERE! Look what I found!
So what did I learn? L.A IS a great big freeway, and while it might not be obvious, that freeway can lead to all sorts of wondrous discoveries, if one is only patient while sitting in traffic. And if one allows one’s mind to follow the wanderlust, and if one is very very very blessed with blind dumb luck…. wondrous discoveries may well await.
PS: When I left the cemetery, I DID find Oakhurst Drive. I was on the correct block, but Minka and Gene’s house wasn’t there, not even their house number. I drove up and back, up and back. Where was the pretty little stucco house? What I saw was a large, ugly McMansion sitting in that formerly charming spot. There were other similar McMansions on that street. Though a couple of the original houses were there, none of them were Minka and Gene’s. I was late going wherever I was going, so I left with that unsolved mystery.
Uncle Larry later told me that the house had been torn down some years earlier, that many properties on the block had been bought by “foreign investors”, and all these un-lovely residences were built in place of the original sweet homes. The REALLY awful part is that many of the new houses were unlived in. The street had an eerie, abandoned – though manicured – feeling. Much like a cemetery.
The new home owners no doubt had their own dreams when they chose this street on which to build. Their California dreams may have been about making money on their investment. I prefer to think that they also sensed that their time on the 405 had not been wasted and that new, other, wondrous discoveries might await them just around the corner, on Oakhurst, on the flats in Beverly Hills. And elsewhere.