Welcome to The Thread

I am working on a book about my history. It is about the stories of my family, the stories that I was never told as a child, or later as an adult. Everything that I am writing is towards healing. Through meditations and traditional research of primary texts, and consulting with organizations and experts in the history of my ancestors, I gained an understanding of my family as human begins and as Jews.

It all began with the election of 2016 where my body elicited a visceral response to what it perceived as an imminent threat of the US turning into a fascist state. There was a threat, but what was this reaction? Did it just relate to the election or was my body responding to an ancestral danger?

The question led me to study the rise of Nazism in Vienna and learn the story of my family’s great escape from Europe that defied all odds, my grandparents and father keeping one step ahead of the horrors of the Nazis and the Holocaust, eventually landing safely in New York. They survived but that survival exacted a price.

I then looked at the ancestors on my maternal line from Newark, NJ, which stretches back to the Russian Empire. Mom’s parents arrived during the Great Migration. They suffered terrible economic hardship along with the constant threat of violence from the pograms.

I made it my mission to learn their history. I feel it is my responsibility to remember what they could not say. Most of these their stories have not been told before, certainly not to me. Along the way I met family members previously unknown, the trauma too great to even speak their names.

This healing work is compounded with the healing of younger and future generations. I learn my place in a long history of people whose stories, many of which ended in tragedy, and I find are my stories too. I see the connections and I feel a sense of belonging. It is a lesson for all of us. There is so much healing to do from world wars, the Holocaust and continued aggression throughout the world, for ourselves as humans and the Earth. We must all look back now in order to collectively heal, otherwise lasting peace will remain elusive. The trauma remains locked away in all of us impacting our personal growth, our relationships and the community.

The work on the book continues, and the journey of discovery never ends. I ask you to join me now.

Judaism Does Not Equal The Holocaust

Credit: Museum Treblinka

Previously, I wrote on The Thread in anticipation of my Neshama (soul) journey to Poland. I had a naive idea of this experience as a journey into a sacred past, a connection to my heritage, and an opportunity for personal and ancestral healing. I took this trip with Nicole and a group of similarly minded modern Jewish women who were also looking to find themselves by reaching into the past; the dark memory that is World War II Poland, death camps, the cleaning of a cemetery, and the lost Jewish communities that once were populated by our ancestors. It was a noble crusade but ultimately, not remotely the journey I expected.

In short, Poland is a magnificent country with many remnants of its Jewish past still evident in some areas. Clearing the old Jewish cemetery Zawiercie was a rewarding experience.

We visited two death camps in Poland: Treblinka and Auschwitz.

Treblinka is a terrible and fascinating place. When the Nazis fled, they burned everything to the ground. There is nothing left of the original structure - the barracks, the gas chambers, ovens, all of it is gone. What you see, after stepping through the other side of a giant metal gate-like structure, is a field of green grass surrounded by a new-growth forest that appeared sometime in the 1960’s.

Beyond the grass is a huge field of constructed jagged granite stones growing up from the landscape like an anguished graveyard, which it is. At its center is a giant stone monolith. This is a place that demands silence and deep introspection. I found it haunting and beautiful. Nearly two million people were murdered here, mostly Jews, including my great-grandparents Ignaz and Sali Winkler.

Ignaz and Sali Winkler, my great-grandparents

At Auschwitz, the feeling was different. We arrived like many others did, in a giant tour bus. There were ticket booths and crowd control ropes. I stood in a long line of women all waiting to use the bathroom while the men all easily ducked in and out of theirs. This was my first up-close impression of the infamous death camp where dozens of cousins from my Grandma Ricki’s extended family were murdered, and our great-Aunt Hermina was liberated.

It all felt so wrong, like I was entering a rock concert or a festival. It made me wonder, why am I here? Is this pilgrimage necessary to understand the Holocaust? Are we learning anything, or are we simply voyeurs? Why do we consider a journey to the death camps so important? Surely there are better ways to honor our ancestors than being tourists at the sites where they were murdered.

Judaism does not equal the Holocaust: Many adults and young people are told that their education is not complete without a trip to the camps. It creates a perception that Holocaust is the main characteristic of Judaism and our past. Perhaps we need to reconsider our relationship to these places and ask ourselves, how we can move forward into the future when we are dragging the deaths of the past with us?

Remember how your ancestors lived: It is of course without a doubt that we need to remember. We need to learn our histories and tell the stories of our ancestors. We need to understand how they lived and what was important to them. For many of us, our lineages are lost to time and tragedy. We owe it to ourselves to find them. (I only learned the names Sali and Ignaz very recently). But when we do, we ultimately find ourselves and a way to step forward into a future not tethered by death and destruction.

Death camp tourism is reductionist at best: I am not saying that it wasn’t interesting visiting the camps, but there are aspects of the Holocaust we have unwittingly turned into an industry. Auschwitz has become the number one tourist attraction in Poland. The intentions were good - to educate, to warn, but is it succeeding? It is telling that Treblinka doesn’t fare as well as a tourist attraction. As one TripAdvisor reviewer named zippy808 from Arizona said, “Not much to see here. Don’t put it at the top of your list.”

Neshama: a Soul Journey

It is important to note, I wrote this post before we left for Poland. This is what we anticipated from the trip, a soul journey into the past of our ancestors. What we experienced was what we expected, and much more. To be explored in future posts….

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The Hebrew word neshama (נשמה) can mean "soul" or "spirit". It can also be used as a term of endearment or greeting to express that someone is a "good soul."

Beginning on July 30th (my birthday), Nicole and I plan to take part in a ten-day Neshama travel tour to explore Jewish heritage sites in Poland and help clean-up a long-neglected Jewish cemetery. We will have the amazing opportunity to learn from local rabbis, scholars, dignitaries, and community leaders who will offer first-hand insights regarding the imperative (and challenges) of cleaning-up cemeteries in accordance with Jewish law. We also explore how local Polish communities view Jewish cemeteries in their towns and the need to preserve Jewish memory.

I do not have Polish ancestry. My grandma Sarah was born in the Pale of Settlement which was in her era a part of the Russian Empire. The region changed hands many times over the years from Russian, to Polish and Ukrainian, and back (several times) but grandma’s first language was Russian. Investigating my own heritage I have often debated, am I Polish, Ukrainian, Russian? After much soul-searching and reflection, I have concluded that I am Jewish. Although I am not Polish, I feel that a visit to Poland is essential to understanding the atrocities that my ancestors endured. 

The trip formally begins with a tour of Jewish Warsaw, which includes a visit to the Okopowa Street Cemetery, the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews (recognized as one of the finest historical museums of the world), the Jewish Historical Institute of Warsaw, the Nozyk synagogue, and a visit to Treblinka, a place that lives deep within my history.

From there we journey to the Jewish communities of Lublin, Brzesko and Kraków. The darkest history of Polish Jewry is examined at Auschwitz-Birkenau where many of my extended family members were murdered, and my great-aunt Hermina was liberated.

For the final leg of the journey, we travel on to Zawiercie. Over the following three days we will work in what may be one of the most meaningful travel and soul-affecting times of my life. Under the leadership of The Matzevah Foundation, following the guidance of the Rabbinical Commission on Cemeteries in Poland, our group of about a dozen people will work on the restoration of a Jewish cemetery that has been largely neglected over the past 80 years.

The tasks in the Jewish cemetery often consist of clearing of brush, grass, small trees, and other vegetation. Heavy lifting may be involved so it’s a good thing Nicole is prepared. Fortunately, all levels of strength and expertise are needed. 

We plan to show up with the willingness to do the work and a flexible spirit to help accomplish whatever task we might be asked to do.

photo credit: wcielone.zlo

Is Vienna Home?

Last fall, Nicole and I traveled to Vienna, Austria, my father’s birthplace. There is a lot to say about that trip and I wasn’t doing a blog at that time, but I recently put a short video together with some of the highlights.

Growing up, Austria was not really a consideration, it was just some European country where grandma was born. When I went to live in Europe for a year after college, I went to Madrid. Vienna never even entered my mind. But now as I research their lives and our shared history, I wonder, is Vienna home?

I am especially grateful to Elizabeth Sechser, who took an interest in the building where she works, and my great-grandmother once lived, and helped us make profound connections.