Seven Days of SHIVA by Marc Gellman
What's It About?
After losing his wife of 40 years, the author uses the seven days of Shiva to tell family and friends their love story.“We didn’t grow old together. We stayed young together.”
Who’s to say — was Marc Gellman’s fairytale love affair with Barbara really that extraordinary? They were married for 40 years. She died of cancer just short of her 60th birthday. He was from Brooklyn, she from the Bronx. They met at a young age. Had three children. Good careers. Good friends, fun times, amusing tales. If you could measure love on a scale, theirs would tip it.
But it is the very ordinary about their life and their relationship that makes Seven Days of SHIVA such a poignant and powerful story. This is not a swashbuckling adventure, not a rags-to-riches, no stunning whodunnit, but a sweet and simple love sonnet (albeit a lot longer) to the other pea in Marc’s pod, a deep love readers can feel and embrace in every word.
A Love Story Told in Seven Days of Mourning
If you see something in yourselves in the characters and the story, don’t be surprised. Marc and Barbara go through life’s routine experiences and defining moments, and as they do, you’ll relate to their dilemmas and decisions, or imagine from within your own world how you’d feel and act in such situations.
Remember that feeling of falling in love? Marc does: “It was like everything Barbara and I did was right. There were no regrets, no looking back. It was like everything around us was coming together so easily. We were in unison and knew what the other was thinking and didn’t have to speak. It was like all we could think about was each other.”
The author, with candor, love, devotion, warmth, humor, joy and pain, uses the seven days of Shiva — the formal mourning period for the dead immediately after the funeral — to tell family and friends his story, retracing his life from meeting Barbara to summers in the Rockaways to their first apartment in Jackson Heights, Queens, to a home in New Jersey, condo in Florida, starting careers and a family, the celebrations, conversations, dealing with her diagnosis of cancer, her funeral, and her glowing courage and spirit every step of the way.
It’s encouraging to read about Marc’s support group — family, friends, neighbors, and, of course, Barbara herself. But given the circumstances and challenges surrounding him, he also writes about the demons within, and feeling so alone in this all-out life-or-death battle.
An Emotional Story with Invaluable Life Lessons
It’s one thing to follow the narrative of Marc’s life, it’s quite another to get caught up in all his emotions, which most certainly will run the gambit. I’m not ashamed to say I cried.
Maybe Marc Gellman will capture the hearts of readers by describing his life as an ordinary guy with a special love. But “ordinary” is in the eye of the beholder: “So often I hear people say their lives are boring [locked into the same routine]. If those people opened their eyes and ears and took a moment to look and listen to the sights and sounds around them … they would start to see their lives much differently … to not miss out on all the silly, fun, strange and interesting things happening around them.”
“Open your eyes like Barbara and I did and perhaps you will be lucky enough to see some guy slip on a banana peel or, even better, step in dog shit.”
No doubt, Seven Days of SHIVA was a therapeutic exercise for the author and his family. What better way to get a grasp of your feelings and celebrate true love than through the written word? Yet if Marc Gellman can inspire readers to take his advice and appreciate what they have and how they have it, using the lens of his love affair and life with Barbara as the example, then that is his raison d’etre.
About Marc Gellman:
After a lifetime of working for others, Marc Gellman now works for himself. After more than forty years focused on architectural design and real estate development projects, Marc has launched several new careers: writing, performing stand-up comedy, and creating and starring in “Benjamin’s Grandpa” videos.
Marc grew up in the East New York section of Brooklyn in the 1950s and ’60s. During the summers, his family — mom, dad and older brother — vacationed in the Rockaways of Queens, NY, a summertime beach community.
While attending college, Marc became a licensed real estate salesperson. He married one week after his 22nd birthday, two weeks before Barbara’s twentieth birthday. After graduation, the couple moved to rural New Jersey, where they raised three children. At first, Marc worked for a home builder and later grew his career at a management and design consulting firm. Now he’s a proud author and grandpa to three grandkids.
