Growing up with lots of moms and dads in Glen Head

Looking through my late parents' photo album recently brought back warm memories of growing up in Glen Head. All of our neighbors are gone now so the trip down memory lane was bittersweet. What better time to recall those moments than on Mother's Day?

I had half a dozen "mothers" and "fathers" on Glen Cove Drive. And we called most of them by their first names or nicknames. There was Buddy and Gus, and their wives, Ann O. and Ann L. (Osman and Leslie to differentiate between the two Anns). There was Mrs. Levy, a widow in her 70s, who hired me to mow her grass with her electric lawn mower. She followed me around holding the cord ("I don't want you to get electrocuted," she explained, but I have a feeling she was watching I didn't cut her cord or miss a strand of grass).

And rituals from the pages of the barbecues — with all the men wearing their finest undershirts — "casual" was indeed the word! There was Anita Dilworth, the prettiest mother, dressed up as a witch stirring her huge cauldron of cider on Halloween.

And, finally, there was a photo of the ladies' weekly coffee klatch. To signal that the meeting would commence in the Schachter driveway in five minutes, Mom would phone her friends but hang up after one ring — she didn't want to drive up our phone bill!

After college, I became a teacher at my alma mater, North Shore Schools, where I rode my bike as I had done as a student. As a sidelight, I also penned freelance essays for Newsday. When I was 27, I moved to Sea Cliff — two miles away — where I bought a house on Altamont Avenue. I wondered: Would I feel the same love and compassion from my neighbors as I did when a youngster on Glen Cove Drive?

To introduce myself to them, I held a spring brunch at my house: eggs, bagels, coffee, tea, orange juice. Almost everyone showed up except the older Rannou couple who lived across the street.

When I would bike past their house in the morning on my way to school and on my way home, I would give the wife a hearty wave and a cheerful greeting, "Hi, Mrs. Rannou. Lovely day!" and she'd grunt. No smiles. This went on for years. After her husband passed away, Mrs. Rannou's disposition never changed. Oh, well. I tried.

When Mrs. Rannou died, I attended the wake. I offered my condolences to her daughter, Yvette. "Can I speak to you privately?" she asked. We walked out into the hall. "This is for you from my mother," she said, pressing a package into my hand. Held together with string were about 20 of my Newsday freelance essays. "She was a big fan of yours," Yvette said.

I guess I had a "mother" on Altamont Avenue, too.

Reader Saul Schachter lives in Sea Cliff.