All posts by Rebecca Michelle

Educator, traveler, reader, blogger. Loves learning, black coffee, and friendly people.
Germany

Eyes on Fall

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I feel a bit like a little kid; there’s a new season called fall and I’m playing in it all over again. (Some of you know this season as autumn rather than fall, and my favourite dictionary provides a lovely explanation as to why this might be.)

At the end of October, my Toronto family and I went for a beautiful walk an hour or so north. There was so much that reminded me of growing up and playing on the nature trails not too far from our neighbourhood. We used to climb all of the fallen logs and run through piles of leaves.

Regardless of the word you use to describe this time of year, this is the season of falling leaves and the crunch they make underfoot, of apples picked from trees and pumpkins from vines. The texture of the air changes, daylight grows shorter, shadows grow longer. Food gets warmer, coats thicker, and lush green gives way to all shades of red, orange, yellow, and finally brown before the leaves are gone entirely.

In Montreal at the beginning of November, further north and further into the season, the leaves were different yet again. Montreal is a city of bright skies and the colours made me smile at a time when smiling was difficult.

I took a walk through the park near my apartment in Weimar shortly after returning from Canada. The steel-grey sky and occasional drizzle reminded me why this time of year, just too early to start thinking about the holidays, is sometimes overlooked. But the calm and quiet of the path minimized distraction and held opportunities to experience beautiful things.

Here in Weimar, now definitively in the middle of November, we have had some very cold nights. And days, for that matter, but it’s dark at night here, very dark, and I’ve been spending time outside remembering what cold feels like. Damp cold that gets into the bones, crisp cold that leaves fingers, toes, and noses tingling, and then a brief respite from temperatures just above freezing that seem balmy by comparison. There is majesty in clear skies and sharp, brisk nights and seeing so many stars.

It’ll get colder, everyone says. Get ready.

I’m not.

But in the dark and the cold, surrounded by naturechanges and beneath stars, my body, mind, and heart are very much awake.

“Lift your gaze and linger.”
Weimar, Germany – November 2021

Germany

Stumbling Stones

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Several weeks back, I looked over the notes I took years ago as my grandmothers regaled me with stories of our extended family history. I looked over the family tree that my grandmother’s cousin, who I’ve never met, had painstakingly put together, complete with full names and the dates and locations of births, marriages, and deaths. Somehow, the story feels different on this side of the world.

One evening heading home from climbing, an American friend asked how my family had responded when I said I was moving to Germany.

Later, a German friend told me he had been wondering that, too, but as a German, never would have asked. He walked with me through town and pointed out buildings the Nazis had built and used as offices. A small sign, so nondescript that it’s easy to miss, explains it. No fanfare.

It took several weeks of lessons before my German teacher told me she had been afraid to ask about my family history after learning my name for the first time.

My history students and I are studying the period of European diplomacy between the World Wars and it hasn’t yet come up that I’m Jewish. It might. What is obvious is the depth of understanding these young people have about propaganda, hate speech, power, victimization. They do not take today’s world for granted because they know what it cost.

Yesterday I photographed the first stumbling stones that I saw when I arrived here. Before I knew what they were. Before I knew how they got there.

Hier wohnte. Here lived.

Here lived.

Hier wohnte.

As a memorial, the stumbling stones, or Stolpersteine, are not without controversy. (Is there such a thing as remembrance without controversy?) As of December 2019, 75,000 Stolpersteine had been placed in Germany and they are in other countries, too. But not everyone agrees that accidentally tripping over a stone and then recognizing its significance, even if it forces you to kneel before the victim, is dignified. I can appreciate the disagreement because it means that people care. They care enough to argue about the best way to honour lives taken.

It is one thing to be steeped in history. It is another thing entirely to learn from it.

Do you not know that a man is not dead while his name is still spoken? – Terry Pratchett, Going Postal

On My Mind

Zaidy

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I’m supposed to be a writer, which means I’m supposed to have words.

I’m supposed to be a writer. I have no words, so instead I’m repeating myself.

But this isn’t about me, actually.

It’s about you.

Crossword puzzles. Cups of coffee. Taking in the world from the balcony. Stories of the past whenever we were willing to listen. Those young men have a lot to learn when it comes to cutting bagels.

You kept up a running commentary about the state of the world as we drove to your mechanic and related the ethnic and neighbourhood shifts of Montreal. You read the Gazette every day and you’d seen the world change. You had opinions and you made me laugh.

I’m smiling to think of the quips that often came under your breath when you didn’t know anyone was listening, or maybe you did and maybe that was the point. I’m smiling at the expressions that took up your whole face when you’d share a conspiratorial glance and a grin. 

I saw you happiest that one summer at the lake and I’ve missed it ever since. When you smiled, it was impossible not to smile back.

I’m not at my most eloquent and I wish I could be. Maybe the rest of the words are caught up in the waves of feelings that we all rode together, some frequent companions and some too fleeting to even be consciously known.

We were there, and you knew we were there, and we knew that you knew. 

We were all there and you are right here.

I miss you. I love you.

May your memory be a blessing.