Life’s Odyssey of Questions

While back in Montana for a few months I taught a course called Imagination in which fifteen college freshman embark on a mind-bending odyssey (along with Homer) that coaxes them to refocus their viewing lens and approach life from a more creative perspective. Our imaginative journey through the arts and sciences was invigorating and reminded me of why I love being in the classroom. I was also reminded that the older I get, the more important it is to keep my own imagination in play as a driving  force in my life.

I relish my minor role in guiding young adults through their college education, but I have nowhere near the same level of  self-confidence as a rookie writer. Still, I persist in taking small steps in my freelance writing career. My next step is into the German media as part of a Jewish Women’s Histories in Berlin project with AVIVA-Berlin.de. I’m the odd American in a small group of Israeli women and women from the former Soviet Union who want to pursue journalistic endeavors in Germany. I’m diving into a more Jewish topic than anything I’ve previously written about and I’m feeling queasy about it already. I guess queasiness can be a good thing though since it preceded the birth of two of my three children.

Come to think of it, there are some close parallels between birthing a child and birthing a creative work. Rilke commented in Letters to a Young Poet that “the woman, within whom life dwells in a more direct, fruitful  and trusting way, must, after all, have become basically more mature, more human than the man.” He implies that a woman’s creative potential and ability to love might be more readily achieved than that of a man who is more “easily pulled down by the weight of the lack of physical fruitfulness.” Strong feminist words from one of Germany’s greatest poets, but words that will perhaps bear on the gestation of my next writing project.

I’ve derived a lot of inspiration from Rilke who so poignantly reminds us to embrace solitude and to live and love the questions in our hearts. Perhaps that’s the best angle for me to approach a Jewish writing project, for what I appreciate most about Judaism is its love of questions over certainty of answers.

Mapping the Future

Since I’m on hiatus from my Berlin adventures (for just a little longer!), I’ve been engaged in a frenzied effort to synthesize my Full Circle experiences into some new communication endeavors that will target a broader audience. What does that mean? Applications for Speakers Bureaus, proposals for book chapters, the beginning of a first draft of a memoir, making connections with the German media (more on that later), and the preparation of my first talk on the relationship of American Jews to the Holocaust that I will give at Congregation Beth Shalom in Bozeman for Holocaust Memorial Day.

In the midst of my self-induced state of combustion, I’ve heard from quite a few blog readers lately with questions about our experiences in Germany and the hidden mysteries of the German citizenship application process. These electronic missives from afar remind me that I would like to set up a web site to offer some advice and guidelines for diaspora Jews about moving to Germany and obtaining restored citizenship. Instead of paging through my blog, people might then have easier access to information. Article 116 applications from American Jews are on the up-swing and the trend is likely to continue.

The coming end of our second year in Germany has also brought significant questions about the future for our family. Are we ready to give up our life in Bozeman to live permanently in Berlin? What about our family and friends in the U.S.? We are starting to plan a move for my mother from Bozeman to California, the kids want a break from living in our cramped Berlin apartment, and my husband and I are facing some big career questions and choices. We are working on a road map for the future. Change is afoot, but one thing is certain: Germany will remain an integral part of our plans.

Reverberations

My sister has often looked aghast or simply stood back in disbelief as I unveiled my latest dream adventure or far-fetched vision for a better life. She’s given up trying to talk me out of my plans and is usually content to stand on the sidelines and cluck her tongue at me.  We are a study in contrasts. She’s watched me turn my life upside down more than a few times while I am constantly encouraging her to shake things up a little. Our move to Germany was yet another upheaval she had to endure, made more difficult by our mother’s anger and distress over our decision.

But something changed for my sister as she saw me sift through the layers of our family history and lay claim to our German Jewish past. The discovery of a Holocaust victim within our own family suddenly made my journey become hers as well. She is now as determined as I am to set the family record straight (see Rewriting Family History) and create a memorial for our great-aunt Meta. She has embarked on a frenzy of genealogical research of her own and is currently embroiled in a battle with her corporate employer to obtain permission to attend Meta’s memorial ceremony in June.  She’s even decided to apply for her German citizenship!

I spent the past week in Los Angeles with my sister where we finally had a chance to reflect on all the recent family discoveries and events. As we chatted over dinner on the night before my departure, we wondered about how our eight cousins from my father’s side of the family would react to Meta’s Untold Story which appeared last week on The Jewish Writing Project.  What version of our family history did they hear as children and how will they feel about the “woman in the shadows” who was left behind? Will they want to look back into such a painful past or keep the door shut? Three of the cousins grew up in South Africa, and although I have met them, we have not maintained contact with each other. Could Meta’s story and my journey back to our family roots create a new bond between us?

As the only grandchild from my family of Holocaust survivors who has returned to Germany to reclaim my heritage, will my experiences reverberate with other family members as they did with my sister? Perhaps it’s time to reach out into the diaspora and find out.

Rewriting Family History

It’s been almost a year since our family history tour took us to Altwiedermus. And it’s taken about that long to process most of what we learned on that important trip.  The stunning discovery that I had a great-aunt Meta who was left in Frankfurt when my father’s family emigrated to the U.S. reverberated for weeks after our return to Berlin. Our trip into the past shed new light on my German Jewish family history and raised many new questions about my family.

There were two outcomes from this trip. One was the decision to dig into my family’s past and learn why I had never been told about Meta. This was something I tended to only sporadically over the past year when I had time. I still don’t have a clear answer and only very slowly came to understand that there was an unspoken family rule to remain silent about Meta. I’ve learned not to take the previous generation’s account of the past for granted and will soon share a piece I’ve written about the experience of uncovering Meta’s story.

The other outcome was our decision to create a memorial for Meta. This has been slightly more straightforward than my efforts to dig into the past. Our family has been deeply impacted by the stolpersteins (brass stumbling stone memorials) scattered across Germany and other European countries. We felt Meta should have her own stolperstein.  I honed my German language skills during months of countless emails to discover the details of Meta’s fate and seek approval to place a cobblestone memorial in the ground for her. Our son Avery also learned Meta’s story and then raised the 120 euros for her stone as part of his preparation to become a bar mitzvah.

On June 30, 2012 Meta’s stolperstein will be laid in Altwiedermus. The Ronneburg community plans as many as five stones for Altwiedermus and Huettengesaess. These will be the first stolpersteins in this rural Hessen area and the artist Gunter Demnig will be present to mark the occasion. Our family will be there as well. I’m grateful to many people in Germany, including readers of this blog, for helping us learn what happened to Meta. Her stone will join the more than 32,000 stolpersteins dedicated to victims of the Holocaust.

Willkommen, добро пожаловать, ברוך הבא

So you’re going to Berlin and want to experience that vibrant Jewish life you’ve heard about? What should you know ahead of time? Since I’ve put out the call for American Jews to step inside the door of a  transformed Germany, I feel obliged to point out a few caveats.  Berlin’s Jewish community doesn’t focus much on American Jews. After all, the vast majority of the city’s Jewish population is from Russia and Eastern Europe and a substantial network of programs and services is geared towards this population.  That is as it should be.

But as an American it can be daunting to get a foothold, let alone find a niche, in the Jewish community. It’s heavily guarded, leans conservative to Orthodox, and is tightly structured compared to American Jewish communities.  A Jewish friend of mine ran into trouble at a Berlin synagogue’s security checkpoint when the guard asked for identification and saw that her husband’s first name was Christian. If she had not been able to speak Hebrew they might not have been allowed to attend services. When I sought assistance with my German citizenship application from the Jewish Community of Berlin, I discovered that there were people who could help me get on welfare but no one to help me have my citizenship restored. The beautiful monthly magazine Juedisches Berlin offers a gateway into the city’s Jewish life but only for those who speak German, Russian, or Hebrew. A multilingual Jewish publication of such significance could at least offer a few English entries!

As a European center for Jewish life, the Berlin Jewish community could do more outreach to show that it’s doors are open to the diaspora. The influx of Russian Jews to Germany has slowed; though integration challenges remain, the future will bring more diverse groups to experience Jewish life in Berlin. Nearly half of the global Jewish population resides in English-speaking countries. While I don’t mean to suggest that there are no resources for this population, the welcome mat could be a little more visible for them.

Time for an Identity Update

I’m currently in Montana spending some time with my mother. It’s funny how when I come back to the U.S. my mom has a better appreciation for why I am so drawn to Germany. She’s happy to have me home. Yet on our first dinner outing she bristled when I got a little too enthusiastic about being a new German and EU citizen. It still doesn’t sit well with her. I can understand….not only is she among the generation that fled the Shoah, but she was stunned when her own parents returned to Germany in the 1970s. Now her daughter and grandchildren are there as well.

I’m still disturbed by the hostile attitude of some American Jews toward my claim on the country of my heritage. “Go back home where you can be truly yourself,” said one reader of my recent Tablet article.  The Holocaust still has such a firm grip on American Jewish identity that some refuse to acknowledge the renewal of Jewish life and culture in Germany. How do the naysayers reconcile their blanket rejection of a nation with the choice that many have made to once again be Jewish on German soil? There must be a Judaic principle about having respect and compassion for finding our own path to a Jewish life. 

In a March 2005 publication for the American Jewish Committee (AJC), Rolf Schuette wrote that ”…Germany, in the eyes of the average American Jew, is the least popular European country—with the notable exception of France.” Schuette based this statement on AJC’s 2005 Annual Survey of American Jewish Opinion.  Haven’t American Jewish attitudes towards Germany improved in recent years, especially given the fact that Germany has the fastest growing Jewish population in Europe?  Do American Jews  recognize that Germany is a thriving democracy with deep and enduring ties to Israel?  I contacted the AJC and learned that they have not surveyed American Jewish attitudes towards Germany since 2005 and have no current plans for additional surveys. That’s too bad.

A pillar of American Jewish identity since WWII has been rejection of the land where the genocide occurred. But what about our own need for reconciliation and a more affirmative Jewish identity? Schuette and other observers have noted that the identity of Israelis is less deeply tied to the Holocaust than that of American Jews.  I wrote a previous post about the need for American Jews to update their image of Germany (see Time for an Image Update).  Perhaps it’s time for an identity update as well.

This is my journey…what’s yours?

My personal journey into German Jewish history and contemporary life became more public last week with my article in Tablet Magazine on neo-Nazi terror in Germany.  Here’s the link: http://www.tabletmag.com/life-and-religion/87460/descendants/  Many readers took issue with my commentary and dished up quite a few insults in their comments.  The magazine’s editors chose an ill-suited heading for the piece that made me appear like a country bumpkin from Montana who didn’t know there would be neo-Nazis in Germany.  Actually, I was born in New Jersey and spent most of my life in the Bay Area before moving to Montana in 1996.

Clearly, my German Jewish journey makes many people uncomfortable.  But doesn’t each of us have an odyssey that we must travel in life?  And on that journey don’t we have to step into dark places as well as those suffused with light?  This blog is a journal of the dark and the light places that we have encountered on our return to the land of our ancestors. Perhaps those who fear embarking on their own journeys are quicker to render judgment about the pursuits of others.  Steven, who posted one of the many comments on the article, said it best: “No Jew deserves shame for re-claiming something that was once theirs.”

American Jews still seem to struggle with the fact that German Jews are German as well as Jewish.  “Ha ha” said some commenters, “why don’t you go back home to Montana!”  But Germany is also a country that’s moved beyond stale debates over gay rights and “family values”, a country that offers equal access to health care and higher education.  My children are on their own personal odyssey, thriving on the chance to live in Europe, attend an international school, and learn German.  I actually do feel safe in Germany, but that does not lead me to dismiss the neo-Nazi terror that has taken place here.  Nor do I think the Zwickau terror cell, and the government’s failure to take timely action against it, can be compared to the white supremacy movements found in Montana and elsewhere.

I don’t see the U.S. or Germany in black and white terms; I try to see each country as it is, filled with promise and possibility as well as dangers that pose a threat to democracy.  As a citizen of both countries, I’m privileged to add my voice to those of others who call out when forces of hate lead us astray from a civil society.