So, I'm back - the long awaited and sometimes dreaded visit to Berlin happened and is gone in a flash.
Let me say right off the bat - it was amazing.
First of all, we were all survivors or first generation of survivors and just being in the same room with people who KNOW how that feels, who've had all those feelings that are so unique - I felt I "knew" them all. Those who spoke up and shared got immediate responses of identification and commiseration.
I think of all the stories I heard, and I wish I could get them written down - compiled to share and to hold.
Carol was the best at making contact and learning people's stories. She's always been a people person and as I have so often said telling her not to speak to strangers was useless when she was little because she never met a stranger. She's not that much different now.
The Berlin government went to great and expensive lenths to make us feel welcome.
First of all - money. They paid for my husband and myself to fly there business class which may have spoiled me for life. They paid for our room for one week - not only that they paid for my son and daughter-in-law and their baby's room. They paid for Carol's room - not everyone brought an entourage with them but they were generous
to me.
Breakfast was included and it was vast, German and delicious. We all looked forward to breakfast and have missed it since leaving. We touched base with each other and we enjoyed the hospitality that food always conveys.
There were welcoming speeches and good bye speechs by the Mayor of Berlin and by the Vice President of the Senate - accompanied by buffets or a reception with appetizers generously served.
There were tours of the city, of the Jewish sites (good and bad), of the river Spree,
and the Jewish Museum. We had access to things that many people don't know exist let alone visit.
But the emotions were the centerpiece for me. I was so moved to be in the city of my birth - beautiful, green, with this lovely river running through it and with a park at it's center like a green heart beat. This city I felt I knew - my Mother had told me often of the great Kuferstendam street - a shopping street but also a street of cafes, restaurants, flower shops and gift stores. A street where people come to meet, greet and share. It throbs with life and energy.
I knew the street names as though I had lived there. I "recognized" some of the historic buildings as though they didn't just live in pictures but in my life. Some, of course, are so associated with Germany of the '30's that everyone knows them as they know the Eiffel Tower without going to Paris. The Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag, Potsdamer Platz, the Wall, Checkpoint Charlie. But something more resonated in me - could I remember them? I was only two when we left but I don't doubt that my Mother and I, in my pram, strolled some of those places. Certainly,
the Tiergarten, the zoo, Ku'dam (as they call it) and Unter den Linden. I KNOW I was there before.
But there was pain too. We visited the street where my Father's business had been and where we lived. All reconstructed since WWII - I gather the bombing finished off a lot of Berlin and not all has been reconstructed as it was. But the street is there - quiet, green and close to all those things above that were part of my life.
We visited the Jewish cemetary - Weisensee (White Sea). I had heard my parents talk about that too - but never imagined the real thing as a thing of great beauty. It is huge - acres and acres of graves in a forest of greenery dense, quiet and eternal (or so it feels). It has been there 200 years and they are still burying Jews there. It goes on for miles, it seems, of rambling paths leading to clusters of upright granite markers - some ornate, some plain. The authorities had found my Grandmother's grave and we all were teary eyed as we cleaned up the ivy that was swallowing it and removed the debris that had collected.
The plain white stone said her name, her maiden name, the date of birth, the date of death. Plain, simple and so cherished. I know her three sons put in money to buy the plot and the stone - an act of love in the middle of the destruction of their lives. I'm told she loved me - I still have receiving blankets she made for me with the simple blanket stitch along the edges - I've saved them because they were something she touched with love for me. We left flowers and a stone I had picked up for the purpose.
I'm told there were other Baendels in that place but we had no time to search them out. It's strange to see a place that holds some of my family history - for so long it seemed that we were rootless, stateless and had no history.
We also went to a place called Grunewald (Green Forest). It is a neighborhood of beautiful homes, villas, and manors all set in beautiful trees and woods. Many with spacious grounds. Here lived the elite, the movie stars, the politicians. In the middle is a charming little, very Bavarian looking, train station. It looks like a cuckoo clock and you think a bird (a big one) might come cuckooing out - BUT, this is the train station where Berlin's Jews were herded into cattle cars and taken off to their fate which was a quick and painful death in some cases, and in some cases a long slow torture of starvation, torture and disease.
There are places where signs have been preserved - a historical reminder - one sign from 1933 states that Jews may no longer join singing clubs. It seems a foolish sign - until you realize, they really meant it - Jews were not good enough to sing with gentiles....they could not belong to any associations and the Germans love their associations and clubs. They have singing, dancing, hiking, picnicing, swimming, social clubs. Men's clubs, women's clubs, singles' clubs. And in the beginning of the Nazi regime, it was deemed unacceptable to have Jews in any of them.
There was the "new" Jewish synagogue (150 years old) - just a remnant of it's old glory with gilded roof, carved beams - still functioning for the remnant of Jews who still live in Berlin. And there are quite a few - nothing like the prewar numbers - but some who will live here because it's their home and their right and to leave means "that Hitler wins". On the wall of the synagogue there is a plaque - I don't know what any of it says except it ends with three words which translate to "Never forget".
We visited the site of the infamous wall, which is by the side of a pile of rubble left intact - once it was the home of the Gestapo. A place soaked in fear, suffering and degradation. Nothing is to be built in that space. It is too saturated with - dare I say - evil.
But the sun shone - it was downright hot and sticky. The sky was blue with puffy white clouds and all was right with the world.
Thousands of Germans collected in the Tiergarten to watch soccer and they beat England. There was ecstasy in the streets. The roar of the crowd could be heard for miles. In our hotel room, we knew when there was a score. The police were very present - quietly ready for any civil unrest that might arise. But the people were peacefully delirious. Waving flags, wearing flags, hanging them from rooftops, and balconies, hanging out of car windows waving the flag. I wanted England to win.
One of the speakers struck a nerve with me. They all had said how sorry they were,
how unforgiveable the past was; how they were working that such a thing could never again occur; that they hoped for good relations with the Jewish people and with Israel. But, this one speaker spoke of how the German people carried with them guilt and shame and grief - that no conversation with a Jew was completely free of this weight of the past - the recent past. I wonder if that's true - maybe for some people.
One of the wonderful people who volunteer to do this work of organizing, meeting, attending to the needs, helping the returnees said to me in response to my stating that I didn't know if I would have been brave enought to speak out as some did, risking their lives. She looked at me - deep into my eyes and said "But not enough did speak out." In that moment, I felt the weight she carried of the past.
So as I tried to deal with my feelings I realized that the ripples of those terrible times do not disappear in one or two generations. We are all branded on some level
with the marks of a past too painful to contemplate, let alone forgive.
I'll probably write moe on this subject as time goes on but these are my first impressions and the impressions made on me.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Sunday, June 20, 2010
The Past Lives On
Maybe it's a sign of aging, but I find myself thinking of the past and reviewing how I got from there to here. Sometimes good - sometimes bad.
One of the things I was thinking of this morning was my adolescence. I always said I'd never want to relive those years - given a choice. But I've not delved very much into why.
So recently I've been thinking a lot about my past - my birth in Berlin, my toddler years in an English household, and my growing up years on the farm in England.
But now, I come to those other years and I feel a painful reluctance to go there.
The truth is my adolesence was made much more difficult by the fact that my Dad died - a long lingering painful death - when I was 14.
Shortly after he died, my uncle (the patriarch of the family) decided that Mom need a husband and saw a matchmaker and set her up with this German guy with the intention of them getting married. Hans Winter was a jerk. He had nothing to commend him other than a paying job. And my Mother accepted it. She married him.
I was aghast. I begged and pleaded with her to think this over - Dad had been gone about a year and she was still mourning him. She seemed almost zombie like and accepted my Uncle's decree that she marry.
It lasted about a year. Mr. Winter wanted a housekeeper. He wanted his meals on time, his laundry clean and ironed, his house (actually our house since he moved in with us) neat. My Mom worked all day in the garment industry in a sweat shop and came home exhausted. I "started" dinner - meaning I peeled and boiled potatoes and anything she had pre-cooked I put in the oven. But he sat and waited to be waited on. Me too. I was supposed to wait on him. Once he asked my Mom to make him a "prune whip". Something she had never made before. So after a long day's work and preparing him dinner and doing the dishes (well, I did the dishes), she looked through her cook books, found that recipe and made a long tedious evening's work of preparing him his prune whip. I thought - Never, Never, Never.
I didn't take kindly to it. One day I threw a knife at hime and that probably precipitated the end. After that, he told Mom I had to move out when I was 16 - I was an adult by his standards. He should have known better. Mom woke from her trance and told him if there was a choice, he'd be the one to leave. I was her witness in court. I was terrified, but they were nice to me and it was all over quickly.
After that, Mom was more independant. She started dating a guy that my Uncle and Aunt disapproved of. Dave Rotner was loud, aggressive, energetic and dynamic. I hated him. Mom didn't seem to mind being bossed around, but I took to it like a match to dynamite. As a teen I was pushing to be independant and not at all liking being told what to do by someone who wasn't even my Father.
Mom and Dave were an "item" for about a year. They went off for weekend trips together; he ate most dinners at our house and seemed to take up a lot of space there. My Aunt and Uncle detested him and manipulated me into arguments with my Mom and with Dave. Looking back I can see how they whipped me up, and picked my brain for information about the relationship. But then, I didn't realize what was happening.
My Mom finally broke up with Dave, but I think she was always sad about it. My Aunt and Uncle, and I had prevailed.
It was hard on me because my Mom was pretty and attracted a lot of male attention - at a time in my life when I wanted to be the one who attracted the male attention.
She liked domineering men - I didn't. The secret was that although she liked men like that, she fought back tooth and nail against being dominated. I always said she was the velvet glove with the iron fist. But they didn't know that - they loved the velvet glove.
Mom also could not be alone. When there was no man in her life, I shared her bed.
I was her best girl friend. We went to the movies together, we went to dinner. We traveled as a pair. Much, I guess as she and her sister, Toni, had done. But I got pretty tired of being dumped - back to my own bedroom and with no social life - when she had a boy friend.
Then she met Moish. A nice guy who had been single all his life, but loved the ladies and they loved him back. Mom, however, got him to marry her. Moish loved her - he was proud of her, took her places to show her off, bought her jewelry (on time, that she paid off) but she loved the idea of his loving her - who wouldn't?
Wherever they went, she told me, women approached her and told her they had slept with Moish and she was lucky to have "caught" him. She told me he was good in bed, and I believe it. He couldn't turn off the flirting - with anyone, including me.
He loved Mom, but he flirted with everyone and tried it on with everyone.
Years later, my sisters-in-law told me that when they had him work for them (he was a housepainter) he tried it on with them.
When I married Morey, we had a big family party with all Morey's cousins etc. and one of his cousins had slept with my stepfather - she told us so. So, it was all in the family.
Moish was concerned for me - genuinely, I think. He thought I should get out and meet Jewish guys which wasn't going to happen with me living way out in a Christian, blue color neighborhood. He joined me up at the Jewish Center - miles away - and drove me back and forth for meetings and parties. He taught me how to drive and saw to it that I got a car - a tank, as he wanted me to be safe.
I met Morey because of him - Moish - and Moish gave us a lovely Jewish wedding on short notice because he knew how to do these things. My Mom was sort of naive - some part of her had never left the schetl in Poland and she knew it. But Moish, he may have been born in Estonia, but he had come to New York as a teenager and had reveled in all things American.
He was also a really good grandfather - coming to visit with bags of food, toys and goodies. He cared about my kids as though he really was their blood grandfather. Meanwhile my Aunt and Uncle were really pissed that Mom had married without their stamp of approval (although they came to Las Vegas with us and witnessed the marriage). Moish didn't get into a power struggle with my Uncle, he just ignored him.
My Aunt and Uncle gradually became more and more alienated from the family. They disapproved of Mom's multiple marriages (and she wasn't through yet). And they wanted to be the old fashioned kind of family where the oldest brother runs the show.
My Dad had kind of accepted that - rebelling in his own way. Hans Winter had been beholden to them but Dave Rotner was totally out of their control and so was Moish, but in a much kinder way.
People said he had a heart of gold and it was true. But his life was cut short by an accident on the job - he was thrown from the back of a truck and had a head injury. He wasn't the same after that and then he had a stroke and died. This would have been about 1969.
By then, I was married, and had three little kids. Mom - always a social butterfly - had lunch most days in Farmer's Market in Los Angeles, Fairfax district (the Jewish neighbohood). She and MOish had bought a duplex in the area and fixed it up so that she was in a much better neighborhood for her when he died. She had social networks at the senior center and in the Jewish community and the Farmer's Market was the nexus.
She told me that one very nice looking older man was prowling around her group and he finally found a mutual friend to introduce him. They dated for a while and then married about 1972. Charles Nelson was a widower, he had money, he had a good income from Germany (reparations) and he had a house in a nice area of Hollywood which he sold to move in with Mom.
He was also very jealous of her past husbands and destroyed all the pictures he could of them. He wanted me to do the same, but I refused. They - especially Moish - were a part of my life too and I had no intention of indulging his jealousy.
Every summer he and Mom went to Germany. They went to the various "baden" - resorts where there were hot springs or healthy bathing in sulfur springs etc. She had a good life with him and he with her. He did try to seperate her from me and the grandchildren - but he was smarter than Hans Winter and soon realized that if it came to a choice he'd lose. So he graciously accepted the inevitable - and Mom did try to back off somewhat from her weekly visits so that he wouldn't be so threatened.
Then in 1979 - I was still working nights - I got a call at work that Charles had died. I got off work and ran over and Mom was just sitting there with his dead body and not knowing what to do next. We got her mobilized and made the arrangements with her. But it was a shock and a great loss to her.
After Charles died, Mom often got propositioned by men. She still had this charm and magnetism which drew them in - but she had been burned and did not want to get close to anyone again. From that time on, she spent her time with her lady friends
and visiting us. She told me she missed being married but found she liked being her own person too. She ate when she wanted, what she wanted and could come and go as she pleased. She made a good adjustment to widowhood. She made a pretty good life for herself - and of coure, having Charles money helped. He had no children or family except a brother or pre-deceased him. So it all came to her. And it took care of her in later years..a gift she deserved.
So looking back at what I've written, I discover that it's about Mom, not much about me. But trust me, it was an emotional yo you in those early years and I needed all the therapy we could afford when we first got married. I was very close with my Mom maybe too close. I also resented by shoved this way and that whenever a new man came into her life - but I can sort of understand it - at least intellectually.
My Uncle had promised to send me to college, but when I graduated High School and approached him, it was like the married son in Sense and Sensibility - he kept hedging and negotiating for cheaper ways for me to get educated. He decided I should become a Real Estate woman - I wanted to be a doctor. I probably would have done well in real estate, but I was angry so I took my savings and went to secretarial school and ended up working at the Edison company. I started night school at the Junior college but I was also dating Morey at this point so love triumphed over education.
Much later, I did go to the Junior college and slowly accumulated the classes I needed - but that's another story.
One of the things I was thinking of this morning was my adolescence. I always said I'd never want to relive those years - given a choice. But I've not delved very much into why.
So recently I've been thinking a lot about my past - my birth in Berlin, my toddler years in an English household, and my growing up years on the farm in England.
But now, I come to those other years and I feel a painful reluctance to go there.
The truth is my adolesence was made much more difficult by the fact that my Dad died - a long lingering painful death - when I was 14.
Shortly after he died, my uncle (the patriarch of the family) decided that Mom need a husband and saw a matchmaker and set her up with this German guy with the intention of them getting married. Hans Winter was a jerk. He had nothing to commend him other than a paying job. And my Mother accepted it. She married him.
I was aghast. I begged and pleaded with her to think this over - Dad had been gone about a year and she was still mourning him. She seemed almost zombie like and accepted my Uncle's decree that she marry.
It lasted about a year. Mr. Winter wanted a housekeeper. He wanted his meals on time, his laundry clean and ironed, his house (actually our house since he moved in with us) neat. My Mom worked all day in the garment industry in a sweat shop and came home exhausted. I "started" dinner - meaning I peeled and boiled potatoes and anything she had pre-cooked I put in the oven. But he sat and waited to be waited on. Me too. I was supposed to wait on him. Once he asked my Mom to make him a "prune whip". Something she had never made before. So after a long day's work and preparing him dinner and doing the dishes (well, I did the dishes), she looked through her cook books, found that recipe and made a long tedious evening's work of preparing him his prune whip. I thought - Never, Never, Never.
I didn't take kindly to it. One day I threw a knife at hime and that probably precipitated the end. After that, he told Mom I had to move out when I was 16 - I was an adult by his standards. He should have known better. Mom woke from her trance and told him if there was a choice, he'd be the one to leave. I was her witness in court. I was terrified, but they were nice to me and it was all over quickly.
After that, Mom was more independant. She started dating a guy that my Uncle and Aunt disapproved of. Dave Rotner was loud, aggressive, energetic and dynamic. I hated him. Mom didn't seem to mind being bossed around, but I took to it like a match to dynamite. As a teen I was pushing to be independant and not at all liking being told what to do by someone who wasn't even my Father.
Mom and Dave were an "item" for about a year. They went off for weekend trips together; he ate most dinners at our house and seemed to take up a lot of space there. My Aunt and Uncle detested him and manipulated me into arguments with my Mom and with Dave. Looking back I can see how they whipped me up, and picked my brain for information about the relationship. But then, I didn't realize what was happening.
My Mom finally broke up with Dave, but I think she was always sad about it. My Aunt and Uncle, and I had prevailed.
It was hard on me because my Mom was pretty and attracted a lot of male attention - at a time in my life when I wanted to be the one who attracted the male attention.
She liked domineering men - I didn't. The secret was that although she liked men like that, she fought back tooth and nail against being dominated. I always said she was the velvet glove with the iron fist. But they didn't know that - they loved the velvet glove.
Mom also could not be alone. When there was no man in her life, I shared her bed.
I was her best girl friend. We went to the movies together, we went to dinner. We traveled as a pair. Much, I guess as she and her sister, Toni, had done. But I got pretty tired of being dumped - back to my own bedroom and with no social life - when she had a boy friend.
Then she met Moish. A nice guy who had been single all his life, but loved the ladies and they loved him back. Mom, however, got him to marry her. Moish loved her - he was proud of her, took her places to show her off, bought her jewelry (on time, that she paid off) but she loved the idea of his loving her - who wouldn't?
Wherever they went, she told me, women approached her and told her they had slept with Moish and she was lucky to have "caught" him. She told me he was good in bed, and I believe it. He couldn't turn off the flirting - with anyone, including me.
He loved Mom, but he flirted with everyone and tried it on with everyone.
Years later, my sisters-in-law told me that when they had him work for them (he was a housepainter) he tried it on with them.
When I married Morey, we had a big family party with all Morey's cousins etc. and one of his cousins had slept with my stepfather - she told us so. So, it was all in the family.
Moish was concerned for me - genuinely, I think. He thought I should get out and meet Jewish guys which wasn't going to happen with me living way out in a Christian, blue color neighborhood. He joined me up at the Jewish Center - miles away - and drove me back and forth for meetings and parties. He taught me how to drive and saw to it that I got a car - a tank, as he wanted me to be safe.
I met Morey because of him - Moish - and Moish gave us a lovely Jewish wedding on short notice because he knew how to do these things. My Mom was sort of naive - some part of her had never left the schetl in Poland and she knew it. But Moish, he may have been born in Estonia, but he had come to New York as a teenager and had reveled in all things American.
He was also a really good grandfather - coming to visit with bags of food, toys and goodies. He cared about my kids as though he really was their blood grandfather. Meanwhile my Aunt and Uncle were really pissed that Mom had married without their stamp of approval (although they came to Las Vegas with us and witnessed the marriage). Moish didn't get into a power struggle with my Uncle, he just ignored him.
My Aunt and Uncle gradually became more and more alienated from the family. They disapproved of Mom's multiple marriages (and she wasn't through yet). And they wanted to be the old fashioned kind of family where the oldest brother runs the show.
My Dad had kind of accepted that - rebelling in his own way. Hans Winter had been beholden to them but Dave Rotner was totally out of their control and so was Moish, but in a much kinder way.
People said he had a heart of gold and it was true. But his life was cut short by an accident on the job - he was thrown from the back of a truck and had a head injury. He wasn't the same after that and then he had a stroke and died. This would have been about 1969.
By then, I was married, and had three little kids. Mom - always a social butterfly - had lunch most days in Farmer's Market in Los Angeles, Fairfax district (the Jewish neighbohood). She and MOish had bought a duplex in the area and fixed it up so that she was in a much better neighborhood for her when he died. She had social networks at the senior center and in the Jewish community and the Farmer's Market was the nexus.
She told me that one very nice looking older man was prowling around her group and he finally found a mutual friend to introduce him. They dated for a while and then married about 1972. Charles Nelson was a widower, he had money, he had a good income from Germany (reparations) and he had a house in a nice area of Hollywood which he sold to move in with Mom.
He was also very jealous of her past husbands and destroyed all the pictures he could of them. He wanted me to do the same, but I refused. They - especially Moish - were a part of my life too and I had no intention of indulging his jealousy.
Every summer he and Mom went to Germany. They went to the various "baden" - resorts where there were hot springs or healthy bathing in sulfur springs etc. She had a good life with him and he with her. He did try to seperate her from me and the grandchildren - but he was smarter than Hans Winter and soon realized that if it came to a choice he'd lose. So he graciously accepted the inevitable - and Mom did try to back off somewhat from her weekly visits so that he wouldn't be so threatened.
Then in 1979 - I was still working nights - I got a call at work that Charles had died. I got off work and ran over and Mom was just sitting there with his dead body and not knowing what to do next. We got her mobilized and made the arrangements with her. But it was a shock and a great loss to her.
After Charles died, Mom often got propositioned by men. She still had this charm and magnetism which drew them in - but she had been burned and did not want to get close to anyone again. From that time on, she spent her time with her lady friends
and visiting us. She told me she missed being married but found she liked being her own person too. She ate when she wanted, what she wanted and could come and go as she pleased. She made a good adjustment to widowhood. She made a pretty good life for herself - and of coure, having Charles money helped. He had no children or family except a brother or pre-deceased him. So it all came to her. And it took care of her in later years..a gift she deserved.
So looking back at what I've written, I discover that it's about Mom, not much about me. But trust me, it was an emotional yo you in those early years and I needed all the therapy we could afford when we first got married. I was very close with my Mom maybe too close. I also resented by shoved this way and that whenever a new man came into her life - but I can sort of understand it - at least intellectually.
My Uncle had promised to send me to college, but when I graduated High School and approached him, it was like the married son in Sense and Sensibility - he kept hedging and negotiating for cheaper ways for me to get educated. He decided I should become a Real Estate woman - I wanted to be a doctor. I probably would have done well in real estate, but I was angry so I took my savings and went to secretarial school and ended up working at the Edison company. I started night school at the Junior college but I was also dating Morey at this point so love triumphed over education.
Much later, I did go to the Junior college and slowly accumulated the classes I needed - but that's another story.
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Worry Warts Inc.
I don't know if it has something to do with my history but I can always find something to worry about and I can get downright creative about it.
Toni has found a place to move to here in Santa Rosa and we had all been getting kind of worried that it wouldn't work out.
I had no idea of the scarcity of rentals, and the competition there was for those few rentals. We looked at, at least, 8-10 potential rentals. Some close by which would have been very nice. Some which were rural slums. Others which were incomprehensible - like no heat - really no heating system. Oh yes, there's a fire place. Or, 3 bedroom and two baths in 1040 square feet - you can't imagine how tight that is.
It's a really nice townhome they found. In a complex with a pools and tennis courts.
It's not huge - but compared to some we looked at it's downright spacious at 1500 square feet.
It's on the other side of town from us - but it's no more that a 20 min. drive so it's not like Texas. Still, fantasies about walking over for coffee are down the drain - they probably wouldn't have worked out anyway.
It's relief, although we were ready to do it, not to have them move in with us for several weeks or months. Our house is big enough, but we are used to doing things our way and in our own time and being on our own schedule and that would have been hard to do with four extra people in the house.
So what am I worried about - you name it. I'm worried that we'll be too close; that we'll have expectations of Sunday or Friday night dinners; that Toni will bike ride on some of those crazy country roads where cars go way to fast and there's no shoulder for cyclists to stay out of their way. That the kids won't want to go places with us - after all they are older now and will have their own activities and friends. That they will want to go places with us and we will lose some of our independance.
As I write the above, I can see how crazy I am - but all things are possible and I've never felt immune or safe from bad things happening. That's probably at the crux of my anxieties. I've know people who have had problems with their families and are alienated from them and even gone through periods with my own kids where I've felt like we don't exist for them.
I read the papers and hear about accidents
that make me think "there but for the grace of G-d........" I guess it all comes from a basic insecurity and that cloud of nameless dread that I grew up with.
After all, my Dad did die of cancer at 46. My Mom did marry some jerk that a matchmaker set her up with (because her big brother told her to - really!) She did re-marry a nice man who liked to paw little girls. Yup, safety was not the name of the game where I come from.
When I met Morey I knew instinctively that here was a decent man who would take care of me and I was right. He is solid and doesn't have flights of imagination that take him to scary places so he keeps me centered and sane (even when HE drive me nuts). And I was right! The things that upset and frighten me in the papers, he is rational about. And the things that I worry about and are unlikely to happen, he gives me the statistics on. It's what we worry warts need, or at least this one.
Thank G-d for rational, unimaginative men who want to take care of their families and keep them safe.
Toni has found a place to move to here in Santa Rosa and we had all been getting kind of worried that it wouldn't work out.
I had no idea of the scarcity of rentals, and the competition there was for those few rentals. We looked at, at least, 8-10 potential rentals. Some close by which would have been very nice. Some which were rural slums. Others which were incomprehensible - like no heat - really no heating system. Oh yes, there's a fire place. Or, 3 bedroom and two baths in 1040 square feet - you can't imagine how tight that is.
It's a really nice townhome they found. In a complex with a pools and tennis courts.
It's not huge - but compared to some we looked at it's downright spacious at 1500 square feet.
It's on the other side of town from us - but it's no more that a 20 min. drive so it's not like Texas. Still, fantasies about walking over for coffee are down the drain - they probably wouldn't have worked out anyway.
It's relief, although we were ready to do it, not to have them move in with us for several weeks or months. Our house is big enough, but we are used to doing things our way and in our own time and being on our own schedule and that would have been hard to do with four extra people in the house.
So what am I worried about - you name it. I'm worried that we'll be too close; that we'll have expectations of Sunday or Friday night dinners; that Toni will bike ride on some of those crazy country roads where cars go way to fast and there's no shoulder for cyclists to stay out of their way. That the kids won't want to go places with us - after all they are older now and will have their own activities and friends. That they will want to go places with us and we will lose some of our independance.
As I write the above, I can see how crazy I am - but all things are possible and I've never felt immune or safe from bad things happening. That's probably at the crux of my anxieties. I've know people who have had problems with their families and are alienated from them and even gone through periods with my own kids where I've felt like we don't exist for them.
I read the papers and hear about accidents
that make me think "there but for the grace of G-d........" I guess it all comes from a basic insecurity and that cloud of nameless dread that I grew up with.
After all, my Dad did die of cancer at 46. My Mom did marry some jerk that a matchmaker set her up with (because her big brother told her to - really!) She did re-marry a nice man who liked to paw little girls. Yup, safety was not the name of the game where I come from.
When I met Morey I knew instinctively that here was a decent man who would take care of me and I was right. He is solid and doesn't have flights of imagination that take him to scary places so he keeps me centered and sane (even when HE drive me nuts). And I was right! The things that upset and frighten me in the papers, he is rational about. And the things that I worry about and are unlikely to happen, he gives me the statistics on. It's what we worry warts need, or at least this one.
Thank G-d for rational, unimaginative men who want to take care of their families and keep them safe.
Friday, June 11, 2010
Self definition
Years ago, I was asked, along with the rest of a class, to write the titles that define me. It was thought provoking - what was I? Daughter, wife, mother, housewive, student etc. etc.
Now it seems that every few years this subject comes up again - and I've noticed a strange thing. New things get added on - nothing much gets dropped off - oh, maybe housewive - I do as little of that as possible. But, I've added Jew which I never would have back then even though it's a core part of me.
See, where and when I grew up, you kept a low profile. You mixed in as much as possible. You made no waves. Among ourselves, we were proud when a Jew was successful and filled with shame when one of ours was a villain. And you certainly never brought that part of your identity up in a situation where you were not sure of how that would be met.
I've added a new adjective which I don't share with everybody. That is "compulsive overeater". I'm not proud of it. But it is a part of me and has been a difficult part to deal with. Not everyone understand the strange compulsion to eat until you are bursting and then want more. Definitely not normal. Or in my case, the eating of leftovers (while the dog whose dinner they should have been looked on sadly), or
hiding things that I know everyone else will want if they know it's in the house.
But, the good news is I've added a modifier "recovering". Isn't that nice. I'm not in the throes of my addictive behaviour. I'm recovering - trust me this is not something I've done or am doing alone. It takes a lot of effort to go to meetings, call my sponsor, read supportive books, write journals etc. etc. But SOOOO worthwhile.
Even the Jewish part of me, not only is it overt but it's practicing. I actually go to services and enjoy them - look forward to them. I look forward to taking more Hebrew classes so I can follow along in the prayers - I'm not sure I want to understand the prayers because my "rational" brain clicks in and starts arguing then.
"Some shepherd and protector YOU turned out to be." "Worship and obey" oh puleeze.
But given the ancient and evocative unknowable words, I can open myself to a spirituality as though I were linked with some universal force. It's hard to explain but I think of it as "plugging into electricity - it doesn't work unless you plug into it" and one way of doing that is prayer - or meditation.
I find myself surprised at those changes - I guess I thought that at some point I was set into concrete - "grown up". But change goes on all the time - sometimes unexpected ones - like having to deal with chronic pain - or becoming more religious. I guess this goes on until I die. ... I hope so. I like the idea of growing as a person very muh.
Now it seems that every few years this subject comes up again - and I've noticed a strange thing. New things get added on - nothing much gets dropped off - oh, maybe housewive - I do as little of that as possible. But, I've added Jew which I never would have back then even though it's a core part of me.
See, where and when I grew up, you kept a low profile. You mixed in as much as possible. You made no waves. Among ourselves, we were proud when a Jew was successful and filled with shame when one of ours was a villain. And you certainly never brought that part of your identity up in a situation where you were not sure of how that would be met.
I've added a new adjective which I don't share with everybody. That is "compulsive overeater". I'm not proud of it. But it is a part of me and has been a difficult part to deal with. Not everyone understand the strange compulsion to eat until you are bursting and then want more. Definitely not normal. Or in my case, the eating of leftovers (while the dog whose dinner they should have been looked on sadly), or
hiding things that I know everyone else will want if they know it's in the house.
But, the good news is I've added a modifier "recovering". Isn't that nice. I'm not in the throes of my addictive behaviour. I'm recovering - trust me this is not something I've done or am doing alone. It takes a lot of effort to go to meetings, call my sponsor, read supportive books, write journals etc. etc. But SOOOO worthwhile.
Even the Jewish part of me, not only is it overt but it's practicing. I actually go to services and enjoy them - look forward to them. I look forward to taking more Hebrew classes so I can follow along in the prayers - I'm not sure I want to understand the prayers because my "rational" brain clicks in and starts arguing then.
"Some shepherd and protector YOU turned out to be." "Worship and obey" oh puleeze.
But given the ancient and evocative unknowable words, I can open myself to a spirituality as though I were linked with some universal force. It's hard to explain but I think of it as "plugging into electricity - it doesn't work unless you plug into it" and one way of doing that is prayer - or meditation.
I find myself surprised at those changes - I guess I thought that at some point I was set into concrete - "grown up". But change goes on all the time - sometimes unexpected ones - like having to deal with chronic pain - or becoming more religious. I guess this goes on until I die. ... I hope so. I like the idea of growing as a person very muh.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Grandchildren
I am blessed with four grandchildren and three adult children. I never knew that I would love my children so much and my grandchildren as much.....I never played with dolls when I was little. Was totally uninterested in domestic arts - except cooking and baking (because I loved to eat). I had very little contact with other children generally - except at school. Having no sisters and brothers, I didn't know much about parenting other than being parented. I had seen few babies, handled none, disliked the one toddler I did know - so who knew?
When I got married, I assumed we'd have children but I was in no hurry and wasn't pining to become a Mom.
I worked at the Edison company in Los Angeles as a secretary and had several friends there that I ate lunch with and met on breaks to gossip and chit chat in general. One day one of those friends, married only a little longer than I, announced she was pregnant. I was surprised as I thought they planned to wait a while. I congratulated her and asked if I could make a baby shower for her blah blah blah. When I went back to the office, I stopped in the restroom and to my complete shock and surprise, I burst into tears. Where that grief came from I don't know, but I realized that I, too, wanted to be pregnant and have a baby.
In time, we did get pregnant and I left my job to be a stay-at-home mom. Something that was "natural" in my generation. I adored being pregnant, and I adored my baby when she was born but then the nightmares began. I was always running in a forest, someone was chasing me - maybe more than one someone. I was carrying the baby and running as fast as I could but I knew I couldn't escape - that's when I woke up.
It was a recurring nightmare.
I had a second child, and a third and the nightmares didn't stop - they became fiercer. I remember screaming (in my dream) "Damn why did I have three kids, I can't carry them all."
When each of my kids reached the age of two - I would look at them and wonder how my Mother could give me up. I'd heard that story all my life - the exchange on the platform of the train station - giving me to a strange man who spoke no German as my Mother spoke no English. She handed him my little suitcase - which my youngest daughter still has - and let me go.
I cry as I write this. My Mother loved me at least as much as I love my kids and grandkids and she gave me up. As an adult I figured out she saved my life - what I thought in my 2 year old brain, I don't know. I do know that I never, ever felt secure in anyone's love after that. I was convinced that "if anyone knew me well, they'd leave after two years." Why two years? Well, it wasn't obvious to me then, but, of course, it's obvious to me now. I just knew I wasn't lovable.
If my husband and I have an argument and he goes for a walk, I know he isn't coming back. We've been married for 53 years and I'm still not sure he'll come back.
I look at my little 2 year old granddaughter and think - how could anyone give her up? But I also think how could anyone kill her? And, you and I know, they did! Blonde hair, blue eyes, trusting smile and dimpled knees and they would kill her.
It's a terrible world we live in because this kind of thing still happens. Oh not the carefully planned, organized and coordinated killing of the Nazis. But it goes on.
On my Bat Mitzvah day I am "sharing" my Bat Mitzvah with my cousin. Sigfried Baendel. Four years old when he was killed at Auschwitz. How that can happen is unbearable to me. How I'm going to go to this country where they allowed it to happen is amazing to me. Will I be able to look them in the eye and not spew my anger and grief? I hope I can handle this.
Well meaning friends tell me to "let go" of my anger - would that I could. They tell me to pray or "turn it over to G-d". Hell, I just got over being mad at G-d for letting all this happen in the first place. But the truth is that nothing will change what happened - that old truism is that life goes on - life is for the living.
But the living can be really twisted by the process of life.
When I got married, I assumed we'd have children but I was in no hurry and wasn't pining to become a Mom.
I worked at the Edison company in Los Angeles as a secretary and had several friends there that I ate lunch with and met on breaks to gossip and chit chat in general. One day one of those friends, married only a little longer than I, announced she was pregnant. I was surprised as I thought they planned to wait a while. I congratulated her and asked if I could make a baby shower for her blah blah blah. When I went back to the office, I stopped in the restroom and to my complete shock and surprise, I burst into tears. Where that grief came from I don't know, but I realized that I, too, wanted to be pregnant and have a baby.
In time, we did get pregnant and I left my job to be a stay-at-home mom. Something that was "natural" in my generation. I adored being pregnant, and I adored my baby when she was born but then the nightmares began. I was always running in a forest, someone was chasing me - maybe more than one someone. I was carrying the baby and running as fast as I could but I knew I couldn't escape - that's when I woke up.
It was a recurring nightmare.
I had a second child, and a third and the nightmares didn't stop - they became fiercer. I remember screaming (in my dream) "Damn why did I have three kids, I can't carry them all."
When each of my kids reached the age of two - I would look at them and wonder how my Mother could give me up. I'd heard that story all my life - the exchange on the platform of the train station - giving me to a strange man who spoke no German as my Mother spoke no English. She handed him my little suitcase - which my youngest daughter still has - and let me go.
I cry as I write this. My Mother loved me at least as much as I love my kids and grandkids and she gave me up. As an adult I figured out she saved my life - what I thought in my 2 year old brain, I don't know. I do know that I never, ever felt secure in anyone's love after that. I was convinced that "if anyone knew me well, they'd leave after two years." Why two years? Well, it wasn't obvious to me then, but, of course, it's obvious to me now. I just knew I wasn't lovable.
If my husband and I have an argument and he goes for a walk, I know he isn't coming back. We've been married for 53 years and I'm still not sure he'll come back.
I look at my little 2 year old granddaughter and think - how could anyone give her up? But I also think how could anyone kill her? And, you and I know, they did! Blonde hair, blue eyes, trusting smile and dimpled knees and they would kill her.
It's a terrible world we live in because this kind of thing still happens. Oh not the carefully planned, organized and coordinated killing of the Nazis. But it goes on.
On my Bat Mitzvah day I am "sharing" my Bat Mitzvah with my cousin. Sigfried Baendel. Four years old when he was killed at Auschwitz. How that can happen is unbearable to me. How I'm going to go to this country where they allowed it to happen is amazing to me. Will I be able to look them in the eye and not spew my anger and grief? I hope I can handle this.
Well meaning friends tell me to "let go" of my anger - would that I could. They tell me to pray or "turn it over to G-d". Hell, I just got over being mad at G-d for letting all this happen in the first place. But the truth is that nothing will change what happened - that old truism is that life goes on - life is for the living.
But the living can be really twisted by the process of life.
Saturday, June 5, 2010
How many Jewish women does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Good thing my Bnai Mitzvah class doesn't have access to my blog! 10 Jewish women ALL want to be chiefs and no-one wants to be an Indian. Maybe the teacher is the only Indian in the class.
There are 10 of us women from about 44 to 72 studying to be Bat Mitzvah'd at my temple. I had seen an adult Bnai Mitzvah a few years ago - a couple of them in fact - and really appreciated these "older" women coming to Torah at this time in their lives - taking the time to study and learn. I wanted to be one of them which led me to signing up last year to do this.
I've been more and more involved in Jewish life and learning since we came to Santa Rosa. I found I needed a Jewish community and we checked out the local temples and felt the most comfortable in the Reform temple we eventually joined.
Modern Reform Judaism - at least as this temple teaches it is inclusive, warm, welcoming and has room for a lot of different points of view and questions. The rabbi who actually came to us a year or two after we joined, is young and open to questions, doubts - downright atheism at times. He has made it possible to me to be open to learn more and attend more services.
I seem to remember the music - it comes from the genes I think. I don't think my Mother - who always sang Jewish melodies around the house - knew these songs, or at least not all of them. The music just lifts me into a spiritual space where I feel happy and "connected" somehow. The prayers have become more familiar and certainly since I started this class and attend more services, I'm more comfortable with them.
So, here I am - expecting to be part of a group of older women on the same path I am and I find myself with a group of women old enough to be my daughters. I am clearly not in their world space, have nothing in common with them other than the desire to do this Bat Mitzvah thing.
There are a couple of older women who might have been my cohort, but they are joined at the hip and have no space to include anyone else. One of them has become my mortal enemy.
She, from the beginning, got on my nerves because she wanted to sing every song (as a solo), say every prayer (as a solo) and perform every function. It was funny at first but got old pretty fast. The teacher is a charming wishy wash who let her have her way - and still thinks we should all support her in whatever way we can in her spiritual journey.
Fine - then let her have her own Bat Mitzvah - and I told her that. Nicely - really, I did tell her nicely. But if you don't want to make space for anyone else, you should do it alone. But no, that wasn't her style.
That was about a year and some months ago and by now, everyone is tired of her. Several people have told her off in no uncertain terms and she has told me off, in no uncertain terms. Not that I care.
She decided that since she comes to a lot of services, she knows what to do so she isn't bothering to come to rehearsals. Great! I don't miss her, but I know I won't like her blithering around and not knowing what comes next on the beema either.
The next step is planning the luncheon which follows the service. EVERYONE has an opinion; and every opinion is different. This one wants bagels,lox and cream cheese, that one hates them. This one wants wine, the other don't feel it's necessary. This one spares no expense and that one is watching the budget. This one thinks we should all wear white (oy vey) that one doesn't think we should wear the same colors as previous classes so what's left - purple with pink polka dots?. This one wants to go to a mikvah the week before, that one wants to go to the ocean and drown, and the others don't want to do it at all.
The worst thing - and I understand this even as I want to cry - is that some of them are so busy they don't want to dialog on email to figure these details out - they want to use class time (now is that crazy or what?). They say they have too many email messages as it is - and I agree since I had 42 on the bagel issue, and 6 from my "friend" complaining about my emailing techniques (she got 2 emails from me on the same sending).
I don't know how these people think that a "party" for 300 people is going to come off without some pretty heavy planning.
I have decided to go with the flow. I'm sure it will all work out in the end. There will be food, there will be drink. Some of us will know what we are doing and some of us won't. I've seen the kids bar and bat mitzvahs now for quite a while and some are troupers and some are clowns but everybody is happy anyway. Tears and hugs
cover a lot of territory.
And aren't you proud of me for not letting my caustic sense of humor dominate this blog?
There are 10 of us women from about 44 to 72 studying to be Bat Mitzvah'd at my temple. I had seen an adult Bnai Mitzvah a few years ago - a couple of them in fact - and really appreciated these "older" women coming to Torah at this time in their lives - taking the time to study and learn. I wanted to be one of them which led me to signing up last year to do this.
I've been more and more involved in Jewish life and learning since we came to Santa Rosa. I found I needed a Jewish community and we checked out the local temples and felt the most comfortable in the Reform temple we eventually joined.
Modern Reform Judaism - at least as this temple teaches it is inclusive, warm, welcoming and has room for a lot of different points of view and questions. The rabbi who actually came to us a year or two after we joined, is young and open to questions, doubts - downright atheism at times. He has made it possible to me to be open to learn more and attend more services.
I seem to remember the music - it comes from the genes I think. I don't think my Mother - who always sang Jewish melodies around the house - knew these songs, or at least not all of them. The music just lifts me into a spiritual space where I feel happy and "connected" somehow. The prayers have become more familiar and certainly since I started this class and attend more services, I'm more comfortable with them.
So, here I am - expecting to be part of a group of older women on the same path I am and I find myself with a group of women old enough to be my daughters. I am clearly not in their world space, have nothing in common with them other than the desire to do this Bat Mitzvah thing.
There are a couple of older women who might have been my cohort, but they are joined at the hip and have no space to include anyone else. One of them has become my mortal enemy.
She, from the beginning, got on my nerves because she wanted to sing every song (as a solo), say every prayer (as a solo) and perform every function. It was funny at first but got old pretty fast. The teacher is a charming wishy wash who let her have her way - and still thinks we should all support her in whatever way we can in her spiritual journey.
Fine - then let her have her own Bat Mitzvah - and I told her that. Nicely - really, I did tell her nicely. But if you don't want to make space for anyone else, you should do it alone. But no, that wasn't her style.
That was about a year and some months ago and by now, everyone is tired of her. Several people have told her off in no uncertain terms and she has told me off, in no uncertain terms. Not that I care.
She decided that since she comes to a lot of services, she knows what to do so she isn't bothering to come to rehearsals. Great! I don't miss her, but I know I won't like her blithering around and not knowing what comes next on the beema either.
The next step is planning the luncheon which follows the service. EVERYONE has an opinion; and every opinion is different. This one wants bagels,lox and cream cheese, that one hates them. This one wants wine, the other don't feel it's necessary. This one spares no expense and that one is watching the budget. This one thinks we should all wear white (oy vey) that one doesn't think we should wear the same colors as previous classes so what's left - purple with pink polka dots?. This one wants to go to a mikvah the week before, that one wants to go to the ocean and drown, and the others don't want to do it at all.
The worst thing - and I understand this even as I want to cry - is that some of them are so busy they don't want to dialog on email to figure these details out - they want to use class time (now is that crazy or what?). They say they have too many email messages as it is - and I agree since I had 42 on the bagel issue, and 6 from my "friend" complaining about my emailing techniques (she got 2 emails from me on the same sending).
I don't know how these people think that a "party" for 300 people is going to come off without some pretty heavy planning.
I have decided to go with the flow. I'm sure it will all work out in the end. There will be food, there will be drink. Some of us will know what we are doing and some of us won't. I've seen the kids bar and bat mitzvahs now for quite a while and some are troupers and some are clowns but everybody is happy anyway. Tears and hugs
cover a lot of territory.
And aren't you proud of me for not letting my caustic sense of humor dominate this blog?
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