Some things can't be fixed. Some things are perfect. Some things are simply beyond our reach. Mom, is now both perfect - and beyond our reach. But for 93 + years she was eminently reachable - touchable, the most accessible person, especially if you wanted a hug - or a chocolate - or comfort. I want to take a bit of time and blog-space to share some photos and thoughts and invite you to add your comments.
The photo above was taken by Tony about three years ago. The next few pictures were taken by Maren at the memorial service.
For you will go out with joy
And be led forth with peace;
The mountains and the hills will break forth into shouts of joy before you,
And all the trees of the field will clap their hands. (Is. 55: 12)
“Zina’s here! Zina’s here!
This is my mom’s day. Her memorial service. Her friends and family have gathered to “remember” her. I would like to share some things about my mom that I will always remember and appreciate.
My mom probably never expected to live as long as she did. She had some heart problems as a child, then a bad concussion from a bicycle accident that gave her headaches for the next 80+ years. After gymnasium, or high school, when she went to Germany for nursing school, she got TB, and had to put off school to regain her health. From my childhood, I remember her suffering through a tough miscarriage and later pneumonia. We always worried about her health.
Her life was pretty tough. Growing up with religious persecution. Losing everything in the war, starting over in a new country that wasn’t really sure it wanted more “displaced persons”. Never really having much financially. Working nights, then up all day helping others with translating. Having two kids…a husband….
And her internal life was often hard as well. Mom was sensitive. I remember her sad times and her times of disappointment, fear and loss. She worried. Imagine having a son in Viet Nam and a daughter in college in the late 60’s early 70’s. Things to worry about!
But what was special about mom was that she used all of these hard events to grow a big heart. I think the fancy word for that is empathy. More than sympathy, where we feel sorry for someone, empathy enters into the other’s situation and feels with them. Mom was able to reach into other people’s lives and minister to them – to us – because she “knew how it feels”. I think it was mom’s experience of prejudice that made her aware of its destructive force. It was her pains and losses that didn’t allow her to minimize our hurts. She saw good people suffer for the sins of others. She understood loneliness. She understood why people made bad choices. She knew what it was to have NOTHING.
So, mom was probably the first person in U.S. history to make a black “Raggedy Ann” doll for the daughter of a co-worker. (That was at least 10 years before Barbie came out in ethnic flavors!) She taught her children to eat with chopsticks. Every Sunday she filled the house with guests, especially those with nowhere else to go. She took in our friends, even allowing them to live in our home. She gave away her food, clothing and money. She gave her time and energy. And she gave cookies to the neighbor kids. Mom would do everything in her power to help as many people as she could. And of course she prayed.
biography
Zina was born in 1915 in Poland to Paul and Olga Rucki. Paul was a railroad engineer, who took the opportunities of travel to preach the Gospel of Jesus everywhere he went, starting and encouraging small churches. Olga was his faithful support, a gifted homemaker who stretched his small income to care for many. Zina absorbed both her parents passions growing up in their home in Kovel, Poland. She was also very adept at learning languages. In her later years she used this talent to help other European immigrants, translate documents for the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, tutor individuals in the Polish, Russian and German languages, and translate for visiting farmers from Russia and the Ukraine.
After her schooling in Poland she worked in Germany at a Christian mission. After World War II broke out, because of her Red Cross Nurses training in Poland, she served as a Red Cross nurse at a Lutheran Hospital in Germany. When it became evident that Russia would take power over Poland, she aided her parents and younger sister to flee Poland and brought them to safety in the British sector after the war. She met her husband Francisczek (Frank) in a displaced persons camp. After three years in a series of displaced person’s camps, they and their 18 month old son, Aleksander, emigrated to the United States in 1949. They were sponsored by Edward and Francis Nelson of Clover Township, near Hinckley, Minnesota, with whom they lived for a period of time. Amber joined the family in 1950.
Zina was known for her singing voice, and was asked to move to Chicago to take part in a radio ministry to Slavic people in South America over HCJB Radio in Quito, Ecuador. She and her family lived there for several years, eventually returning to Minnesota and settling in Minneapolis. There, Zina used her nursing skills as a nursing assistant at Swedish Hospital/ Metropolitan Medical Center, retiring at 62, to care for her husband.
Frank died in March of 1984, and she moved to Eagle Grove in 1990 after Amber, Dave and Valerie moved to the area. She enjoyed church and community life in Eagle Grove until her eyesight began to limit her activities, then decided in 2000 to join the Joplin family in Storm Lake. In 2007, Zina moved back to the Eagle Grove area to be near Alex and Diane. She was residing at the Rotary Ann home and died there peacefully at the age of 93 on December 9, 2008. Diane had been reading to her from the 23rd Psalm when she took her last breaths.
