About one year ago, my Great Aunt Bev called my grandmother, Blanche Fersh, to pay her final respects. At 91, Blanche’s health had sharply declined and she had trouble staying attentive for an entire conversation. During one moment of silence, Aunt Bev became particularly concerned.

‘Blanche?’ she asked. ‘Are you there?’

Grandma re-engaged in the conversation just in time to fire one last joke at her sister-in-law: ‘Well, where else would I be?’ she replied, earning chuckles from the other end of the line.

 

During the final years of her life, Grandma’s mind and body had begun to betray her. She relied heavily on a walker to move her brittle bones and needed regular attention for her diabetes and other ailments. Yet even on her deathbed in 2010, one thing about her was just as healthy as it was throughout her lifetime: her sense of humor.

 

Life was sometimes difficult for Blanche, but laughter always seemed to come easy to her. As she watched her eleven grandchildren grow into adolescence and beyond, she was always a ready audience for shenanigans that may have rubbed our parents the wrong way.

 

Every time she came over for dinner, we would mess with her. I’ll never forget the first time she arrived at our house wearing hearing aids. After pointing out the short battery lifespan of such devices, my brother Ben and I started silently mouthing our words to Grandma instead of saying them out loud.

 

Confused, she turned to our father and gestured to her hearing aids.

 

‘Robbie, I can’t hear them.’

 

When my father told Blanche why she heard no sound, she burst out laughing.

The same Blanche who had sharp wit into her early 90s had been the clown amongst her friends as a teenager. She carried that spirit into her career as a dental hygienist, often dressing up as the tooth fairy as she taught public schoolchildren the virtues of brushing their teeth.

Such workplace hijinks never took away from raising her three children, including my father, in a loving Jewish household. Her devotion to her family never faltered, including the time she crocheted a jock strap for my great uncle Manny to wear at a costume party.

 

To this day, I have never met such a willing accomplice to so many tall tales. If you believed everything her grandchildren ever said about her, you would be amazed at Blanche’s athletic accomplishments after the age of 85.

 

Generously listed at 4-feet-10-inches, Grandma could bench press 350 pounds and push her walker up to 30 mph. She once wrestled a grizzly bear into submission, stopped a bank heist using only her pinky finger and made a game-saving tackle while playing defensive line for the Washington Redskins, according to us, that is.

 

Many people would wallow in self-pity at the loss of basic physical capacities. With our help, Grandma laughed about it. Though, to be fair, this came as no surprise to anyone who had known her for a long time.

 

I suppose this week’s column has very little to do with life at Syracuse University. However, I believe you, my devoted readers, have the right to know where my humor comes from.

 

Blanche Fersh was the matriarch of a large, proud family when she died at the age of 91, almost exactly a year ago today. She left with us a lifetime’s worth of love, memories and hilarious jokes. Thatís why when I think of her today, my tears are more from hearty laughter than profound sadness.

 

That’s how Grandma would have wanted it.

 

Danny Fersh is a senior broadcast journalism major and his columns appear every Wednesday. He would like to dedicate this week’s article to Dad, Aunt Judy and Aunt Lainy. Email him at dafersh@syr.edu, and follow him on Twitter via @fershprince #FershDays.