My mother and her two sisters are, Baruch Hashem, collectively living 184 years longer than Hitler had hoped for, with children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, including several sets of twins, totaling thousands of years.
This is the greatest revenge on Hitler, yemach shemo.
How will we remember the Shoah? How do we ensure that our children and grandchildren will recall it 50 years from now? Kol adam tzarich lirot et atzmo k’ilu hu yatza min haShoah. Every person should view himself as if he survived the Shoah.
In my family, Rosh Chodesh Sivan is the yahrzeit for 52 family members just on my mother’s side. The 28th of Iyar, Yom Yerushalayim, is the yahrzeit for my wife’s mother’s family, the Friedmans of Munkatch.
My mother should live and be well to 120. Until then, I am a child of survivors. After my mother is gone, I will be a survivor. Survivors of all types have a special relationship, an invisible connection. And an obligation to reach out, to teach as a way of protecting others. An obligation to ensure that others understand.
To many, the term survivor has negative connotations – connotations of some traumatic event having occurred. This is certainly not an inaccurate or unfair understanding of the word. But survival can also bring people together in a good way – to share and support, and to protect themselves from future trauma.
The Shoah ended more than 60 years ago. Survivors are scattered throughout the world. We know that every year there are fewer and fewer survivors left. We, their children – the bnei haShoah – must now take upon ourselves the mantle of survivor. This is how we gain strength from our parents’ experiences. It is our obligation.
