Honoring Barbara Hirshkowitz

By Friends of Barbara

Barbara Hirshkowitz: January 9, 1950—March 2, 2007Celebration
In celebrating the life of Barbara Hirshkowitz, I am continually reminded of her fierce commitment to living her life in keeping with her sensitivity to issues of justice and morality. She would ask things like “If we believe war is wrong, why do we keep paying taxes that support military activity?” and she engaged with the injustice of economic disparity, of racial and ethnic prejudice, and the immense gap between values held and values practiced. Barbara was never bound by intimidation, and found many ways of working toward goals she considered worthy of her values.

Her unbounded enthusiasm for life was always present in whatever she did: planting a garden, making marmalade, shipping books for prisoners, organizing an art exhibit, editing a book, going the distance in a read-a-thon, or eating potatoes. A task that needed doing wasn’t going to wait for a signal from someone else. It just needed doing and Barbara performed each with care and love. She was equally at home on a mountain trek, a canoe trip, or an ocean beach. She loved the creation of the cosmos and the creation of humankind. She worked tirelessly to make it all come together in the mosaic we call life.

Ellen Helmuth

Memories
I sit with Barbara in the oncology ward at the Penn Presbyterian Medical Center. We eat cheese curls and fold paper cranes. Barbara prefers the chair in the corner because it doesn’t face the televisions. I smile as she asks the nurse why it takes three and a half hours to retrieve blood from across the street. It’s a beautiful day outside, and although we planned to be enjoying it, we make the best of our time in the hospital. We tell each other stories and laugh about life. I read her a poem I wrote about her and we cry.

A week before my 25th birthday I lay in bed, unable to move because I have thrown out my back. I call Barbara and she comes over to read me a story. She sits on the end of the bed, and in the dim light reads about the elephant, the crocodile and the Limpopo river. I watch her turn the pages, listen as her voice and expressions change with the different characters, and wonder how many others she has read this story to.

Barbara is amazed that I have not been to Longwood Gardens, so we make a trip there in mid-November. It is a sunny, brisk day, and we have the Gardens to ourselves. We walk and talk for hours, taking time to sit to eat or take in the beauty of it all. Barbara shows me different trees and plants that she likes. I take her photograph. Later she will tell me with pride that the doctors did not believe she was able to walk that far and for that long.

The Saturday before her death, I come over after my soccer game. We eat lunch and chat until she can hardly keep her eyes open. Since we both need a rest, we go upstairs to nap for a few hours. I wake up to her warning me that I am about to fall off the bed. The pain has subsided for the moment, and she is in a much better mood. Her eyes are wide, almost shining, as we sit there transitioning back to the waking world. As I get up to leave she asks, “When will I see you again?”

Barbara sent me a card a few weeks prior to her death in which she quoted an Aztec blessing her old theater company would often use: “We have come only to sleep. We have come only to dream. It is not true, it is not true. We have come to live upon the Earth.”

Emily Stewart

Gratitude
Barbara was a good friend to me. I feel blessed to have been able to share a part of our lives together. She taught me many things. She gave me unconditional love and empowered me in many ways as a writer and photographer. We could talk about anything and often did. I will miss doing so many things with her. I am grateful for the memories of our times together. When my father died suddenly, Barbara was there for me. She came over to our home, spent time with my husband, brother and mother. Helped us write his obituary and put together a photographic display and program for his memorial service.

Barbara contributed a lot to this world through her work with Books Through Bars, Community Sponsored Agriculture, New Society Publishers, Vortex House and Friends General Conference. A couple months prior to her death I had the pleasure of spending Fridays when I was in town helping Barbara begin to sort through and organize her photographs. It was both a fun and hard way to go through her life. I felt special meeting some of her family through pictures, seeing baby Barbara, high school and college Barbara. It was fun hearing the stories surrounding many of the photos. It was a crash course into Barbara’s life as I met friends and family I did not know. I had an opportunity to share these moments with two other friends on different occasions when they came to visit Barbara on our photograph sorting Friday. It was on one of those Fridays that I learned from Barbara that the chemotherapy treatments were no longer working and she had decided not to have radiation therapy. That was a hard day for me. I was not ready to stop making memories with Barbara. However, I respected Barbara for her decision. It was also on one of our photo Friday’s that Barbara had her first visit from her hospice nurse. Time was running out for both of us and I didn’t know if we would be able to finish our project. I was scheduled for surgery the first week of February and would need several weeks to recover. Then in March my travel schedule would pick up. Well in fact, we finished the sorting (with help from others), but didn’t get the photographs organized in the books as we hoped. I will do what I can to finish this project for her. I feel it is one last gift I can give her.

Barbara had such a wonderful spirit that will be a part of my life forever. Thank you Barbara for being you and sharing your love with me.

Vanessa Julye