By Rosi Meier Benz , , Harstine Island
Today (Jan. 27) is Holocaust Remembrance Day, I heard the TV anchor voice say over the grinding of coffee beans. The thought and visual seeped into my head as I watched the hot water filter through the Melitta paper-lined cone into my mug. Six million Jews, 11 million in all exterminated by Hitler and his following. How many of my family are included in that number? I have never counted….”why not?” comes to mind? When the question is brought up by others I mention my mother’s mother, Dad’s sister, her husband, and their three young daughters. The visual of the only picture I have of the three girls bundled in winter coats smiling at the camera comes to mind. How many of the 6 million are a part of me? My oma’s three brothers and their families. Aunts, uncles, cousins I never met, know little about, have nothing tangible to relate to. Not even a photo to put on the family picture wall. I’m not sure how many were marched through the death camps on my father’s side of the family beyond his sister and her family. I have not opened my writing to this yet.
During the nine years my parents survived and brought my brother and me to life in Shanghai’s Hong Kew ghetto, the rest of the family fate was unknown. What burden Ludwig and Ruth carried those nine long years. Survival was difficult enough. How did they manage so much and keep going?
Tell the story, keep it alive, and pass it on, to Rachel, Sam and generations beyond. That is mine to make sure of. Word pictures on paper must give life to the past.