11/09/2024
This is one of the most difficult, somber farewells I’ve ever had to write, one that tells you:
This is why I’m leaving the country at the end of the year.
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I am asking for words of love and support. If you want to support me in other ways, I speak to that at the end of this message.
I respectfully ask you not to comment if you support Trump, or if you feel I’m ‘over-reacting.’
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First of all, I did not make this decision. This decision was made for me.
It has been clear to me that if Trump won the election, I would have to leave. Those of you who do not understand why, I’m too tired to explain or educate you.
Some of you know that I, and my immediate family, are products of WW2. After the war ended, my father ended up in Paris where he met my mother and married. He didn’t have any documents, including the work papers that were required for him to make a living. He falsified his birthdate after being refused visas to the U.S. and other countries, qualifying him for a visa for Australia, where my siblings were born. I was later born in England.
My parents were Jewish. In 1944 my father, at the age of 14 was taken from his town, Uzhgorod, to Auschwitz. The population of his town (which is now part of Ukraine) was 9,576 before the war in 1941. In less than two months, nearly 440,000 Jews were deported from Hungary in more than 145 trains. Most were deported to Auschwitz. *Photo below is my father, note the tattoo from Auschwitz on his arm.
My mother, (*photo below, note the Star of David on her top identifying her as a Jew), was in hiding in Paris. I always thought she looked a little like Anne Frank. The 3rd photo is my uncle, my mother’s brother. Note the tattoo from Auschwitz on his arm.
My parents didn’t / couldn’t escape in time and my father lost all his siblings, his parents, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, grand-parents, friends, teachers, everyone.
As a child I bore my parents pain with anxiety, nightmares of the nazi’s knocking on our doors and created escape plans and fantasies.
I ignored my parents warnings about humanity. I preferred to believe that the world had changed, that they were no longer capable of such horrific acts. I just couldn’t accept their distrust and their bleak view of humanity. That was not the kind of world I could live in.
With all this, I messed up a lot before finding my healing path. I’ve done a lot of that over the years and I’m big time into self-awareness and growth.
As an adult it’s been difficult to reconcile a world that had understood so little from that depraved event. How could the world not have completely reconfigured itself after that?!
The “Never Again” was always in the back of my mind but there was a part of me that considered that paranoia, and I wanted and needed to feel good about life, so it stayed on the back burner.
I never dreamed that what’s happening in the world at large, and what people are choosing to vote for in America, is actually happening. Every day (although it’s only been four days, it feels like an eternity), I feel like I’ll wake up from this nightmare, and I cry my heart out because I won’t wake up from this, and the world will be forever changed.
Of course it is happening in other parts of the world too, ignorance is more than accepted, and fascism seems to be the renewed political party.
And then there’s the incident in Holland just a day or so ago, 2 planes had to fly in to Amsterdam to rescue the Jews who were being beaten and attacked after a football match. The news called it a pogrom.
What’s going on is sickening. The world is in tough shape right now, and it’s going to get a whole lot tougher.
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Einstein moved to the United States in 1933, after fleeing N**i Germany. At the time he commented, "As long as I have any choice in the matter, I will live only in a country where civil liberty, tolerance, and equality of all citizens before the law are the rule." He became an American citizen seven years later.
How sad it is, that if he were alive, after only 91 years after his arrival in the U.S., together we would have had to flee the country that has stood for so much, for so many.
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Do I think they’re coming for me specifically, as a Jew? History tells us that ultimately it does always seem to go that way, and current trends are certainly pointing is that direction.
In my tribal history, those who left were more likely to survive.
For those who stay, the women, the minorities, all those who will be targeted, my heart is with you. I cannot bear to be witness, to be so close, to the persecution of others.
I’ve had enough trauma in my lifetime.
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Many of you know that my husband, Blane and I, closed our business in 2016 and traveled the world for 3 years, returning right before Covid. This time I close my business and leave with a sense that this time I will never return. And this time I am totally unprepared in every other way possible, including financially.
Initially I will be staying with my gong mentors and friends in Wales. After that, it’s anyone’s guess.
If you’d like to help me, I could sure use the help! Please consider booking a session before the end of the year. If you’re already coming in, please consider coming in more often.
I thank you all from the bottom of my heart for your love and support.
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Please note, I will be away from November 19th - 28th. Hand in Hand Massage and The Gong Lab will be open until the end of December.
For those of you wondering, Blane has not decided if he’s going with me. He’s in his second semester of his second year at Lesley University. As I am the sole source of income, he’s exploring how he can possibly stay here and continue his studies without an income. The free safe haven for him to live fell through at the last moment.