When my parents went out to dinner or attended a wedding where children were not welcome, my mother took me to my grandmother’s house to spend the night. I can still feel the magic of those overnights with my bubbie and zadie, the flutter of excitement at the sounds and the smells of that white frame house on Baker Street.

My bubbie was four feet seven inches tall and never without her apron. She smelled of baked bread, roasted brisket and castile soap. She wore her dark hair in a tidy bun at the nape of her neck and I never remember her without a smile on her face. My bubbie could not speak English and I could not speak Yiddish but we understood each other perfectly. She knew when I was hungry or cold, tired or content. She never had to amuse me because she was my entertainment.

My bubbie spent her day shining and polishing the wonderful things my zadie had bought for her to put in a house she never dreamed she would ever have. My bubbie came from an impoverished family in Rumania and her daddy gave her to my Zadie because he had too many daughters to feed. My zadie was a plasterer and an artist at heart. He decided to find a job in the new world where people didn’t give away daughters and men could earn enough money to feed their families. He worked until he had enough money to build a house for his bride in Toledo, Ohio. Oh the wonder of that house! Indoor plumbing! A victrola! And a player piano with piano rolls to play all day long

My grandmother loved music and she sang all day long. When I was with her, we fluffed pillows and beat comforters, swept floors and polished the chandelier while we sang wordless melodies I still remember: Deedle-deedle-dee, dydle-dydle-dum while the dust rag swept the dirt away and made the radio shine. Diddle-dee-dee and dum-de-dum, while my bubbie‘s arms disappeared into a rainbow of soapsuds in the kitchen sink. When our chores were done, my bubbie would wipe her hands on her apron and make me a snack. She would smear schmaltz on rye bread and top it with a thick slice of onion….one slice for me and one for her. We would take our treats to the front porch and eat them, smacking our lips and swinging on the glider together. Oh the fun of it all: helping my bubbie do her day!

At five o’clock, my zadie would come home and my bubbie would put the finishing touches on the dinner she had been cooking for him in between the cleaning and polishing and all the kisses she gave me for reasons I could never understand. I played a part in dinner preparations too. I handed her the potatoes to peel and I sat across from her at the table while she peeled the shell from hard boiled eggs and chopped the liver until it tasted like heaven on the challah she had baked early in the morning.

I was too little to set the table because I couldn’t reach into the silverware drawer or lift the plates so I sat on my zadie’s lap and combed what was left of his hair while my bubbie put the finishing touches on a banquet too good for kings and queens: Dilled tomatoes! Roasted chicken smothered in onions and garlic! Chocolate drops from Goodman’s bakery! Oh, my God! Was there ever any meal anywhere better than that?

After dinner, my bubbie stood on a stool to reach the sink. I handed her the dirty dishes and watched her tidy her kitchen. Then it was my turn to get clean. My bubbie put me into the old-fashioned tub with four tiny legs and a plug you pulled up with a chain. When I was in my Dr. Denton’s, my hair combed and tied back with a ribbon, we two went into the living room to kiss my zadie goodnight. And then my bubbie would tuck me into the very bed my mama had slept in when she lived in that magic house on Baker Street.

When my mama came to collect me the next morning she didn’t have to ask if I had a good time because she had to drag me to the car. “What did you do all day,” she would ask and I would say, “I watched my bubbie.”

“That’s all?” asked my mother and I nodded.

“That’s all,” I said.

These days, we hire baby sitters to amuse our children. They play games with them or put them in front of a television set while they do their nails and call their boyfriends. Indeed, we spend thousands of dollars to entertain our youngsters and I often wonder as I watch children surrounded by elaborate toys if we have robbed these youngsters of the joy of simple pleasures. When I hear of children so hyped up they need medication to sit still in school or read about teen-agers fighting depression or trying drugs, I wish with all my heart I could give them a bubbie like mine to watch. I know it could not fail to make their world a beautiful place, just like it did mine.