A JEWISH DAUGHTER, CHAPTER 18, ROSH HASHONNAH, 2006
A CHILD OF SURVIORS FEELS A GREAT LOSS

It is the Jewish holidays again. Until 4 years ago it was a time I loved. The holdiays were always filled with mixed feelings: great joy and a little sadness. This year, unlike the past three years, it was filled only with sadness.
My father died four years ago and the Jewish New Year serves as a reminder of this loss. It was also the time of his bithday- September 25th. Every year before the holidays, I go to his grave.It is a place I want to go as I need to touch his gravestone.
This year a new dimension was added. Just before the holiday, my mother decided to move from the home they lived in for 30 years. As quickly as she decided to move is as quickly as she began to throw out everything accumulated for those same thirty years.
In a mere two weeks, closets were empty, everything seemed to be gone. I was and am in pain as I watch her unload the past. I , like my father, never throw anything out. I even keep notes he and my mother wrote to me.
I rushed to take things from her before they disapperaed. My mother is not sentimental and does not like clutter. If you forget to take something, she throws it out.
I could not take things fast enough. I didn't even know what she had I would want. I plucked a garbage bag from the trash and found stuffed animals from my childhood. I didn't remember them until I looked inside.
I lloked through the bag I found some 15 stuffed dogs from the fifties and sixties. Many were signed "autograph" puppies. Each one brought memories and tears. No wonder I live with several dogs today. Everything I had in my room as a child was a "dog". Had I not looked through this bag, I would have forgotten the memories the stuffed dogs brought back.
I am frightened to think about what my mother threw out I would have loved. Memories are so importnat to me. I live my life trying to create and capture them through writing, photography and film.
I found pictures in the garbage and could not help but wonder, does she know who I am... and does it matter? I am afraid she has thrown out memories of my family.
My mother was in labor camps then Auschwitz. My father survived 14 concentration camps. As I child I remember my mother telling me she didn't have a single picture of her mother. I never forgot.
Perhaps as a result or perhaps I took pictures because I love it. No matter, I have spent my life taking pictures, keeping them organized, giving albums to friends as gifts and trying to keep our history alive.
It's painful for me to be a collector of things old and watch my mother eliminate everything. I can't prevent her from doing it because she gets furious with me. I grabbed what she permitted and hope she has kept the pictures and maybe some other memroies. This move coupled with the Jewish New Year is painful. It is probably the most painful holdiay since my fathers death. For it is also , the dealth of the hone I knew, the memories I treasured and physical things that serve as reminders of times past. I doubt I will forget this holiday anytime soon.

evie litwok/ tippy/ the tippy story