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SIX
MILLION DROPS OF BLOOD Moshe-Shmuel
Szklaniewicz Some 200 of my
ancestors -- murdered by the Nazis. Two hundred drops of my blood spilled, one for
each relative slaughtered because he or she was Jewish. Six
million drops of blood, one for each
innocent murdered in the Holocaust. Six million. Adolf Hitler. Nazi
Germany. We can’t forget. When I think of the
millions killed, the six million drops become a river of blood
that will flow
through my life. In a sense, I am living the lives my
murdered relatives never got to enjoy. They were deprived of
their lives, but their blood is my blood. I went to Hebrew
School to learn the traditions of our people, to keep alive the beliefs
that cost six million their lives. We must never forget.
The Holocaust is fading from memory, and we must not allow this to
happen. Six million drops of blood. From the
murdered, to my grandparents, my parents, to me. And from me to
my children, and their generations. Though we can never
fully feel the horrors of the Holocaust itself -- the concentration
camps, the gas chambers, the day to day life of death -- we can learn
from those who were there, murdered and survivors. A Jewish proverb
states there’s a piece of every Jew’s soul inside of each of us.
That’s how I remember. I can’t begin to imagine what they lived
through. Yet they are all a part of me. I am each of them,
just as each of them was a part of me waiting to be born. That
part of them could never die. My children will be their children. Sometimes I’m not
grateful for all I have. I get upset over little things.
Then I realize that I’m really lucky. I have a loving family, a
roof over my head, friends, food to eat, and most precious of all, life
itself. In public school,
we discussed the horrors and tragedies of World War II. We talked
about the irony that there were white houses just down the road from
the blackness of the concentration camps. And the local citizens
in their white houses actually smelled the burning flesh, and
they did nothing to stop the Nazis. Nothing.
Then I asked a question I knew could not be answered. I asked,
“Why?” I asked why would somebody do that? I looked at my
teacher, and she, a devout Catholic, answered, “Nobody
knows.” Maybe God
knows. Or, maybe even God is at a loss to answer my
question. Maybe there is no answer -- even from the
Almighty. During my next
class, as I was walking alone, I started to cry. I wondered,
would there ever be another Holocaust? My answer was the
long, empty sounds of the lonely corridor echoing around me as I slowly
headed back to class. Me, 200 murdered
relatives and six million drops of blood. I will remember.
©2001 Amanda Centor |