Nazi Horrors | The Camp
The window of our tiny room was a little narrow opening, which provided me with a daily dose of dark, very dark entertainment. Here I was, a seven-year-old kid, standing on a box so I could look out onto the daily caravan of corpses passing beneath my window. The bodies—skeletons with dried-out skin—were piled on top the wagon with the trash. Sometimes there would be a hand or leg hanging out, or bodies here and there thrown into the wagon like refuse. Two ghostly looking inmates pulled the wagon through the alley. Every morning I stood on the box and peered out as the infestation of death rolled by. I recall thinking, "Will I be next? Maybe tomorrow it will my my body tossed upon the wagon." I do not remember being afraid. My thoughts were matter of fact. I was detached. I still am.
Liberation: One Degree of Freedom | Let My Father Go!
When my father crawled out from the dungeon of the jail, we were there to embrace him. He was unrecognizable. He could not walk. He could not talk. He was a broken shadow of a human being. His spirit was shattered. My mother succeeded in propping him up and supporting his frail body. We started walking away from the camp. A short distance later, Papa collapsed. He lay on the ground, sobbing like I have never seen an adult sob, especially my father! "You go without me. I cannot make it. Leave me here. Go, go. I can't," he pleaded.
My poor mother, thin and fragile, who rarely opened her mouth, who normally shrunk into the background, demanded, "Come on, Mendel, we have to go. Let's go!" She gripped me with one hand, my sister with the other, and commanded Papa to lean on her from the back. Her strength at that moment was incredible, miraculous in her weakened condition. Somehow we all dragged ourselves along the road toward home.
On the way back, there was no transportation in sight. The trains that brought us there were not running. We would walk all day and then stop at night. I have no idea what we ate, but I know that we knocked on the doors of farmers and asked for food along the way. At night we would sneak into the barns and sheds of the peasants and bed down with the chickens and various creepy-crawly creatures.
Everyone was smelly and dirty. I wanted to cry. I was hungry, my feet hurt, and my shoes were full of holes, but I did not cry. I had to be strong for Mama. For two weeks, somehow we stumbled along, knowing that each step took us farther and farther away from the horror of the death camp.
At long last, we arrived at our family compound in Tshernovitz. We made it back home. It was surreal. We had survived—all four of us. We were alive!
Israel: Our Homeland | Israeli Air Force
In 1949, there was a change in the Rumanian emigrations policy. We were allowed to leave and immigrate to Israel. We were going to our ancestral homeland, heaven for the haunted and unwanted Jews in the world!
I was an enthusiastic pioneer. I threw myself into my new existence. I thought the experience was absolutely terrific, including the smell of the horse manure! I listened carefully when Hebrew was spoken, read books, and spoke Hebrew whenever possible.
When the time came to enlist, I entered military service. My secret goal was to be in the Israeli Air Force, the most prestigious division of the armed forces. The Israeli Air Force was the best of the best.
My request was granted. They assigned me to the Air Force. I was in heaven. Here I was, this short little girl, who had glanced furtively around a Rumanian Catholic classroom, seeing she was the only child without a cross; who had wandered from town to town as a poor refugee; who now, finally, at home among Jews was realizing her dream of serving in the Israeli Air Force.
In those days, girls were not sent to the front line, and perhaps it is still true today. However, we were trained to use weapons and went through the rigors of boot camp for three months just like the boys did.
We were near the Lebanese border. We had to take shelter close to the ground, which reminded me of the bugs and creepy-crawlers I encountered during the nights of hiding from the Nazis. It was not for the faint of heart. Eventually, after a few weeks of boot camp, we were called upon to serve as border guards and keep the enemy at arm’s length. I was very scared. I could hear noises in the dark but could not see whether friend or foe was coming. I was terrified to say the least, but I never flinched from duty. “Here I am! Yes, sir!”
Excerpt has been edited.
The Lure of Los Angeles | Challenging Patients
I recall a patient (I will call him Pete), who was referred by the court for a battery charge. During his first visit, he took off his shirt and showed me knife cuts he had inflicted on himself. When he was little, that's what his drunken parents did to him. At age fourteen, Pete ran away from home, from his parental physical and emotional torture. When he missed them, when he needed to feel alive, he inflicted pain by cutting himself with a knife.
In our weekly sessions, he would use foul language and make comments designed to scare me so that I would reject him. Underneath all of that threatening behavior was a person crying out for help. Assisting Pete, the adult, to nurture and heal the child within would have been a long and painful process. Without a steadfast, long therapeutic relationship (three to five years), the chance of healing the wounds of long ago and experiencing caring relationships with self and others was nil, zero, nada.
Unfortunately for Pete, after seeing me twice a week for several months in which he tried all kinds of strategies to elicit rejection from me, he attacked someone and ended up in jail—in other words, arranged to get caught. The therapeutic relationship was too much for him. My steadfast, attentive listening and continuous affirmation of his plight were more than he could bear. He was not ready for the therapeutic journey.
Years later, I received a phone call from San Bernardino County. It was Pete. He said, "All that time I was in jail, your presence was with me. I could hear your voice and remember the effect our talks in your office had on me. I could not tolerate your kind presence in your office, but I welcomed it in the isolation of my cell. I'm out of jail now, and I would like to stop harming myself and others. I have a job with a plumbing company in the city of Orange, and it's too far for me to come to your office in Tarzana. Could you recommend a therapist where I live?" It was gratifying to hear that he was seeking help. I hope he turned his life around.