Beverly Williams was just making a quick trip from her home to Crestline Village when she found herself waiting at the red light on Montclair by the Levite Jewish Community Center. While she waited she was just looking around absent-mindedly. She was probably thinking about her recently deceased husband. The couple had previously let their joint membership at The J lapse.
The light turned green. Then before she realized what she was doing, she pulled into The J’s parking lot, parked her car, and walked into the lobby.
Only days before, she had toured a retirement facility with her son and his wife. As a researcher at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and the Birmingham VA Medical Center who holds a PhD in medical sociology and a certificate in gerontology, Bev had a pretty keen understanding of the grief she was experiencing. While the retirement facility had seemed nice enough, she knew she needed more.
“I want to join,” she announced at the Welcome Desk. “I’m a gerontologist, and I’m very interested in programs for senior adults… and for widows.” She was able to reactivate her LJCC membership as a single adult.
‘The most welcoming place’
“I know a lot about aging, so I understand these social processes and dynamics,” Bev says. For example, that it’s really not a good idea to retire and then wonder “What am I going to do now?” She knew that she could make the social connections at The J that she would need when she retires, so she learned mahjong and joined the Roz Feigelson Circle of Life Knitting Group. She even connected with a personal trainer.
Bev is grateful for the social bonds she’s found in the friendships she’s made at The J, and for the social and physical nurturing. “When I get here for training I encounter at least six people between the front door and the gym who say, ‘Hey Bev!’ and talk to me.
“This has to be the most welcoming place I’ve ever been in my entire life,” she says. “It’s amazing” — and a direct reflection of one of the most prominent teachings in the Torah: Welcoming the stranger.
Bev also is a regular at The J’s Southern Jewish Voices and Questions With the Rabbi programs. The latter, featuring discussions with Rabbi Yossi Friedman, has helped strengthen her Catholic faith through a better understanding of the Hebrew Scriptures — or what Christians call the Old Testament. “Although the emotional component has been the most outwardly obvious change for me at The J, the spiritual component has enriched my spiritual life immensely,” she says.
Bev was playing mahjong recently when a friend turned to her and, recalling Bev’s first days after her spontaneous appearance in the lobby, said, “You’ve come a long way.”