Read by Cary's brother Hal at Cary's Celebration of Life:

Cary was born on February 28, 1934 at Mount Sinai Hospital in Chicago, Illinois. Our mother named him after Cary Grant, who was popular at the time.

It's hard for me to find words to convey how I feel, how we are all feeling. When I think about my brother Cary, I have so many things I want to say.

I love my brother and will never forget him. In our younger years on the west side of Chicago, Cary was full of mischief. Though Cary always stayed out of serious trouble, he was always trying to get out of doing chores. On one occasion, our parents found Cary and me playing cowboys and Indians in the living room and lighting a fire on the carpet. Did we get in trouble!

We made rubberband guns and had neighborhood gang fights. We made our own scooters out of wooden grocery boxes with skate wheels. We traded comic books and World War II cards. He was always following me and my friends around wanting to be with the older kids when we went treasure hunting in the alleys of our neighborhood.

Cary was always a happy child. He never took things seriously. He loved it when we went fishing in Chicago at Dam #3, visited the museums downtown, and when we vacationed with our aunts and cousins in St. Joe and South Haven on Lake Michigan and much later when the whole family would come out and visit us on our farm in South Haven, Michigan, during the summer.

At 13 he had a Bar Mitzvah at the only synagogue in South Haven, which served a small Jewish community of resort owners and farmers, and it was attended by all the Jewish families in town.

 Cary joined the track and football teams at South Haven High School. He also was in the school plays, usually playing the lead role. Cary was also the class clown. He enjoyed making people laugh. He also enjoyed singing. On our farm in the evening our mom would play the piano and we would sing with her. The farm was 20 acres and we took care of the chickens and ducks, milking our cow Bessie, and cutting asparagus that we sold in town.

During the summer we worked at Rosenson's Resort as waiters, where we first learned to dance. One of the girls staying there would let us take turns dancing with her. While waiting for a turn, the rest of us used chairs to practice our steps.

After graduation from high school, Cary went to Chicago. He stayed at the YMCA and worked at menial jobs. Eventually he went to Florida, where he got a job selling magazine subscriptions throughout the South.

The draft finally caught up with him and put him in the Army. He had basic training at Fort Benning, Georgia. Cary served in the 9th Tank Company in Korea during the Korean War. When discharged, he followed our parents to San Gabriel, California.

Cary had many jobs and it wasn't until he met and married Elaine Seidner and they moved to Palm Springs that he worked for the city and eventually got a Building Contractor's license. He came into his own building a home shaped like a flying saucer, which made him a name in Palm Springs.

Eventually Cary and Elaine moved to Tarzana, where he continued to build and remodel homes and start other businesses, even while he was frequently hospitalized. Elaine kept him well by making sure everything the doctors prescribed and the nurses administered were the right medications.

Cary also was psychic, and he could help people find objects they had lost and help cure them of their ailments. He did this by giving them a card good for "one miracle" and told them to put it under a glass of water and drink the water in the morning. Cary would joke that he could help other people but not himself.

Cary loved his wife, his daughters Robyne and Kim, and his grandchildren Kaiti, Emerson, and Spencer, his son-in-law Harry, and Kim's partner Patrick, and they loved him. Cary had a lot of friends and a loving family. He had a big heart and a lot of compassion for those around him. He was more sensitive than most people knew.

Cary was very close to our mother after our father died. We would see her every week and take her to Weiler's Deli every Saturday. He always had a story to tell to make me laugh about when we were growing up. Cary was  outgoing and wanted to pick up the tab anytime he went out with friends. He was always well groomed. He had a curious mind, always coming up with ideas for inventions and solutions to business problems.

I will miss our Saturday mornings at the deli, where we talked and joked about our lives, past and present, and met occasionally with his friends Les, Arnie, Mel and my son Jeff.

Cary was in a lot of pain this past year, having one infection after another until it finally became too much for him. He passed on August 27, 2005, at Encino Tarzana Hospital to a better place free of pain and earthly body.

So, as we all gather close, we will remember my brother Cary together. He will have a place in all our hearts, for the rest of our lives. We will remember Cary for what he was, and we will love him for who he will always be.

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