Sarah Pollack

SARAH POLLACK
ITHACA - On Thursday, August 30, 2007, the world lost Sarah Pollack, a thinker, music lover, Democrat, Jew, and grums. She was born on November 2, 1921 and adopted by Rosa and Pincus Karl. She spent the first two thirds of her life living in CA. As a child in Ocean Park, she had read all of the books in the local library by the age of six, so they gave her a special pass to the larger, Santa Monica library. She moved to Ithaca, NY, to be near her daughter, Joan Bokaer and Joan's two daughters, Jen Bokaer-Smith and Abigail Bokaer.
Sarah loved Ithaca. She first lived on Cascadilla Creek and later at EcoVillage. She had the gift of making friends wherever she went. This was rather ironic, as those who knew Sarah knew she spent limited amounts of time with people, sometimes even family. She followed the 5-minute rule. She would stay for 5 minutes and then hightail it out. Hightailing became more difficult in later years when macular degeneration forced her to stop driving. But she trained a number of us to be ready to leave at the exact moment she wanted. Of course, the exception to the 5-minute rule was her time at Wegmans. She had a core of friends/people who worked there who joked, told her their problems, and dubbed her alternatively "Sunshine," "Battle-Axe" and words not suited to print here.
She was the heartbeat and message center for her extended family in Ithaca. If you wanted to know where people were and their expected time of arrival, you called Sarah. If you wanted something at Wegmans or Greenstar, you called Sarah. If you wanted to discuss the latest Paul Krugman or Maureen Dowd piece, you called Sarah. If any child at EcoVillage wanted a popsicle or just a friend, they went to Sarah's house.
Sarah rarely talked about some of the things she did with her life. She was deeply troubled by the fate of Jews in Nazi Germany. In 1949 she went to help those stranded in camps because they couldn't gain entry into a western country. Among those survivors she found still living in Bergen-Belsen was her father's sister, Hannah, whom she helped relocate to California.
Music was one of Sarah's passions. When Bennie Goodman asked her to audition as a singer in his band, her parents nixed the idea. Sarah had many quirks. She loved gadgets, whether a wind-up toy, something scientific, or flashlights. She loved to shop, though not for clothes. She took great delight in wearing scrubs and shorts. Her children remember going to eat at Hillcrest Country Club with her, where she always wore scrubs and moccasins.
Sarah had a big heart and her definition of family wasn't limited to biology or marriage. Sarah was loved by son, David; daughters, Joan, Carol (Gill), Lynn; and her honorary daughters, Sloan and Ceci. She was loved by grandchildren and their partners, Jen and John, Abigail (Hilby), Maika (Florian), Dorigen (John), Emily (Rene), and Eva; and of course great-grandchildren, Aviv, Nathaniel, and Tivona. And there is much more family: Tsvi, Sarah Jane along with their four children, Jonah, Emil, Devon, and Ben; Heather; and cousin, Jean. Lucas, the family dog, gives a howl. A celebration of Sarah's life with song and good food will be held at the EcoVillage First Neighborhood Common House on Wednesday, September 5, at 6:00 p.m. Grumsie, Sunshine, Battle-Axe, and Old Fart is laughing. What's in a name? A whole world of stories and love. In lieu of flowers or gifts, you can donate to one of her favorite charities: Doctors Without Borders or the Sierra Club.