Linda read this message at the 50th Wedding Anniversary Celebration of Vera and Hy Burstyn, sent to them by Nagypapa and Nagymama.
Surrounded by your loving family, how wonderful that you have reached this day to celebrate, to appreciate your many blessings, and to be able to look forward to many more good things to come.
We would like to share with you this happy occasion, this time from far away, but not with diminished enthusiasm about your great life's journey so far. We did not make it to your wedding. All of us were deeply engrossed in building a new life in America. We did make it to your 25th Anniversary. We were on our way to success and to California. As we contemplate the fifty years just passed, we look with immense appreciation to what has been accomplished.
Our children are married, our grandchildren are growing, and we enjoy a retirement we hardly dreamt would be possible, when we started out fifty years ago. Life has been good to us. It is time to say shechecheyonu.
When Vera arrived in America and came to visit us in Cambridge, the Boston Daily Globe reported her visit on December 21st, 1956, in an article, titled: “Happy for First Time in Years — Free from Terror at Last.” We still have a copy of this article. It speaks of our hopes for the future.
The American Dream, the “Impossible Dream” in many ways is now a reality for us. Not even in our wildest dreams seemed all this Naches possible. Yet the mantra, ‘anything is possible” has become part of our daily lives.
We had hoped to come and visit to be part of the festivities. It did not quite work out that way. But we are with you in spirit, in our thoughts, and thinking of all of you, celebrating with you and counting our blessings every day.
May our blessings continue for many more years to come.
With much love,
Iby and George
Menlo Park, California