I Am Holding Happiness for 6 Million
There has been an uncovering of antisemetic behavior in my little New England Coastal town in the past week. Not surprising to me, it was on our high school football field. Teenage athletes and a much loved high school football coach (who led our team to State Championships). The students had the remainder of their season taken away. The coach was fired from his coaching position. Quite the town scandal.
Let me take back the lede for a moment and you can read it from my seat. I am a 46 year old Jewish woman. I am the mother of an 11 year-old boy and a bonus 23 year-old young man. I am the proud granddaughter of an Auschwitz survivor and a Dachau survivor. My father was born in a refugee camp in Germany after the liberation of the concentration camps.
I live a Holocuast survivors life vicariously through my father. He lives the guilt a survivor carries with them, the shame that they survived. The sense of worthlessness born from the movement to rid my family and an entire population from existence. The feeling of loneliness, having no family, but always searching for someone who you may have known from your past life.
This is how my father grew up. When he married a nice American girl it was strangely different for him. He was celebrated by his community. He felt that he could move on and rise above the pain he inherited. He was--is--living the life that those 6 million souls had lived and wanted to live. In their own homes and in their own country. My father held the happiness of 6 million in his heart. He has to appreciate every second, live just a little harder, better for all the others.
As a Jewish woman, a granddaughter of a survivor, the daughter of a man born into freedom, I carry that torch. I went to college, got married, started a family and I am living my dream. I found the man of my dreams, I belong to a temple I love, I have the most amazing girlfriends and I am planning my son’s Bar Mitzvah. I do not think I could be any happier.
Then the football team thing happened. In my own town, the football team was using words like “Auschwitz” as an audible. Let me say that again: they called a play “Auschwitz” to signal players to block a lineman.
I have dealt with my fair share of antisemitism in my life. I actually believe most Jewsih people have.
“Don’t Jew me down.”
“Don’t buy anything from her, she’s not to be trusted, her last name is GOLDBERG.”
“I’ve never met a Jew before, I thought you guys had horns.” (Yes, I’ve had someone say this to me.)
Growing up and as a young woman, I would laugh uncomfortably. It didn’t really affect me. I don’t know why. If I caused a fuss every time I heard something antisemtic I don’t think I would be able to get through a day.
Here is how the timeline played out:
Find out there was antismetic talk on the high school football field
Ok, what else is new?
The football team called a play Auschwitz
Oh man! That really stinks. That one hits home....It was probably an innocent mistake.
This type of name calling has been going on for years.
What?
Jewish students begin to come out of the woodwork telling tales of pennies being thrown at them in the hallways, heil Hitler salutes as a Jewish student finishes a class presentation.
This is not an isolated incident. Where the fuck have I been in this town? Living under a rock? My anger sets in. Now I’m going to have to move, which is really disappointing because I like it here.
More anger sets in. More anger and more anger. And then the questions. Where is the help? What is the school doing about this?
School Administration fires the Football Coach but he still remains active as a special needs teacher within our school system.
Still more anger. Anger turns to utter confusion, paired with mounting aggression. Where is the school? Where are the assemblies? Where are the school psychologists? How could this have happened?
The town is in an uproar and social media ignites with opinions. “Coach is a good guy, he just made a mistake,” some said. “You can’t take down someone’s career for one careless mistake,” some argued. “Fire him and fire him now!” others countered in equal numbers. “Throw him in jail!”
The Football Team is suspended from partaking in any practices and any games. The reaction of some is anger that the season has been disrupted. They have a title to defend. The town continues its divisive argument on social media. Name calling, hatred, keyboard warriors lighting up the town page.
Still, radio silence from the school.
Who is talking to our children? It certainly cannot be left to adults. I argue that adults could be blamed for this systemic racism. We cannot trust the adults in the room to make change. Change originates from the young.
I become my own keyboard warrior targeting the schools and principals. Opinions are being formed in every household in town. This is a topic at every dinner table. Children are overhearing adult conversations.
Still, silence from the schools.
If I dismiss this, if I move towns, have I turned my back on my family’s history, dismissed our story? Would each night my grandmother spent on the top bunk of barrack 36C in Auschwitz be for naught?
I need to fight.
Confusion. but I don’t want to be on the forefront of the fight. I don’t want to be leading the protest through the center of town. I don’t want to be the person who shouts at the top of their lungs how wrong their neighbors are. I want to live peacefully, under the radar.
I am selfish. My grandmother wanted to live peacefully also and that was stolen from her.
Who am I? What kind of person am I? What example do I want to set for my children?
I think of the words that I have used to define myself throughout my life:
Jewish
Female
American
Free
These words, in this order. I have the strength and fire of a woman on a mission who is a proud Jewish granddaughter of an Auschwitz survivor. I have often been told I possess the determination and grit of my Grandma Betty. She was described as a quiet force. I have the privilege of being an American. I was born into my freedom but I know the past and know where I come from. Freedom does not come easily. And I am smart! Where do all of these qualities lead me?
To the fight. I will not stop my grandmother's fight. I will not sit idly by as any person is made to feel slighted. In almost all nationalities, religions, genders, sexual orientation, race, there has been adversity. And if we do not persist with strength we will never break the cycle. So I choose to fight. I choose to be the example my son needs to see to know that each and every individual can make a difference and each and every individual is important. If you are happy living in a tent in the woods, if you choose to not eat meat, you dye your hair purple, if you love tattoos, if you worship Jesus or if you worship Buddah, if you decide you are a woman and not a man, if you like the city and not the suburbs, I do not care! Are you a GOOD person?
If you aren’t hurting others or hurting yourself then go for it. BE HAPPY! We only get to live this life once and we should all have the freedom to do that as we please. Just don’t hurt anyone in the process. You stay in your lane and I’ll stay in mine. Respect the lanes of the road. I won’t insult your choices as long as you don’t insult mine. Be happy, be kind. You may learn something from someone, who knows. Please know from this Jewish, American woman, I will not stop fighting my Grandma Betty’s fight. She fought to live. She fought to be free and I will fight for myself, my son and all others that need their voice to be heard.
