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Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak Joan Pollak
Memorial Candle Tribute From
Am Israel Mortuary
"We are honored to provide this Book of Memories to the family."
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Memorial Candle Tribute From
Miriam Tendler and Eric, Michela, & Noah Grunebaum
"In memory of "Joanie", a beautiful person inside and out. "
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Memorial Candle Tribute From
Sherry Kaye
"Dear Joanie, I love you and I will see you in heaven my dear friend. Now you are"
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Memorial Candle Tribute From
Lisa Seth Samm Max and Jack
"We will miss you Aunt Joan.We will always love you"
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Eulogy to Joan Sally Pollak

Joan Sally Pollak - we all miss you Bubbie… And hope that if you’re not currently in their presence, that you will soon sit in the warm embrace of Papa, Lily 1 and 2, Arnold, and Freddie… 

 

Due to the heinous illness that befell you, over the last couple of years It may have been difficult for you to understand everything that has been going will the little Polly-Maios, so I want to tell you a few things Joan so that you can be comforted during your transition between here and there. 

 

I will start from the leafs, and work my way in towards the tree.

 

You have three beautiful great grandchildren, Jordan Lily Mishal, Ethan Oliver Mishal, and the latest addition to the Pod Rachel Nachema Maio - all in good health and with smiles on their faces. They will be ok, BH, as your off spring raised strong parents that will guide them with logic and connection to the immaterial. 

 

Your grand kids - 4, have grown in your image - loving, open, and curious individuals, Samantha Nicole Pollak is about to graduate from CU Boulder this spring with a double major in experimental film and anthropology, she recently spent a semester in New Zealand where she met Jade Hartford Wilson - he makes her very happy and of course if it’s meant to be we wish them love as long as the world sees fit. Shmoolie, always know that Bubbie wishes you the best as well. 

 

Bubbie, I too have found love and companionship with Kathleen Mackin Kenny, a beautiful and regal lady - with whom I’ve had the fortune of seeing the past 2 and a half years - she has no idea how well you two would have gotten along, and I am saddened by the lack of conversations you two would have had. 

 

Earlier you may have heard me say that you have a great grandchild with the last name Maio - and you heard right. That’s because your lovely Justin, now a patent attorney in Los Angeles, got married to the smart and radiant, Jenna Marin Maio - they were married in New York two years ago and while working through their new lives as parents. Justin and Jenna live right down the way from me in LA, and what beautiful shabbat dinners do they host, warm, meaningful, and important - you would love these as well.  

 

Natanya Michelle Mishal and Jason Mishal defected to Florida which annoyed all us west coasters off a little bit, but hey - your daughter Laura is just crazy enough to now live the bi-coastal life so at least the grandkids can regularly see their Nana. While the beauty of what we call FaceTime does exist today and is an option to any and all who seek long distance communication this does not suffice for Laura who makes the Haaj nonetheless, because her heart is in the right place, as it ALWAYS is - we all know for certain that this trait was bestowed upon her by you - Joan. 

 

There are some people Bubbie that come and go on this earth and leave it the same or worse as they found it, but we all know without a doubt Joan that you were not one of these people. The four of us standing up here today in addition to all your friends and family are the proof in the pudding kid.

 

And as you know, Joan, or perhaps have recently discovered.. In our Jewish Tradition - the soul lingers about the body for sometime after passing, some here today may not know that… In light of that, please excuse me as I speak of you in the third person so that those here can be reminded of your grace and majesty. 

 

From Buh Buh Bubbidy Bubbie at the Jazz Kitchen in Disney’s Downtown Disney, to How ‘Bout It - Joan Sally Pollak was one heck of a person. She believed in love at first site, and doing the right thing, in Gin Rummy, and Cheese Omelettes cut into triangles, she believed in vacationing on cruise ships, walking on her treadmill, family dinners, an American flag on her Mercedes, and splurging - She believed in singing, It’s a world of laughter a world of tears, zippity doo daw, zippity aye, my oh my what a wonderful day, they’ll be blue birds over, the white cliffs of dover, somewhere over the rainbow, once I built a railroad, made it run, made it race against time… 

 

She believed in buying legos when there was no reason, in taking the little baby girl shopping for shoes even though she’d grow out of em “I don’t care if she’ll grow out of em or if she never even wears ‘em, she wants the d-mn shoes so I’ll buy them for her”, Joan believed in Beanie Babies, going to the gym but getting caught up in a conversation over coffee, in little shtickles of this, that, coffee, and seven layer cake. 

 

She believed in many many things, and lived her life sharing her gifts with her children, grandchildren, and husband of 64 years.

 

So, on this day of days, when Joan returns from whence she came, bravely leading the charge into the night for all of us mortals left bound to our mortal coil - let us express gratitude for a nondescript day in the year 1952. On a Detroit Day when a young man by the name of Edward Roland Pollak was doted on in Book Keeping Class by an older Joan Sally Belinksy for having a thick neck and for being so handsome you could just die… A day, forever frozen in time - that without which none of us - and for some of us, I mean literally, wouldn’t be here today to celebrate a life that was well worth living. 

 

If this was a war movie, we’d all bang our shield and spears, raise our hearts to the sky and yell out with cheers and adulation Joan! Joan! Joan! A’las today, in the context of the here and now, our customs are different, so as I bring my words to a close we will find ourselves in silence - a practice unfit for a woman so full of life, but welcome none the less as we reflect on how deeply this angel touched all of our lives. 

 

Posted by Isido Pollak
Monday January 15, 2018 at 2:22 am
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