AN EPISODE WORTH REPEATING- Maybe You're Reading Too Much Into Things? (FYI- I wasn't!) My Guest: Stacey Goldring, Traces: Voices of the Second Generation

Prepare to immerse yourself in a profoundly moving conversation with my distinguished guest, Stacey Goldring. As a seasoned journalist and the founder of a nonprofit organization championing storytelling, we embark on an emotional expedition, unearthing stories of survival, resilience, and hope- and the roles they play in shaping our human experience. 

I share that as a third-generation Holocaust survivor, and a global citizen, the importance of historical awareness and the balance of personal activism with self-care. We also explore the dichotomy of shame and pride ingrained in our ancestral languages, reflecting on how these experiences can often be misunderstood or dismissed. This episode culminates with the premiere of Stacey's most recent release, the documentary, 'Traces : Voices of the Second generation.

Please join me on this enlightening journey and, hopefully, find the echoes of your own story within.

#NeverAgain #NeverAgainIsNow #ViewsWithSuze #Holocaust #HolocaustSurvivor #antisemitism #StandUpSpeakOut #BeTheChange #GenerationalTrauma #Sensitive 

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Hi, welcome to my second episode. I taped this over a week ago in an effort to be prepared, you know so I don't sound like an idiot, but the reason for taping is different from the purpose I recorded it, or this podcast, in the first place. The reason for taping in advance and dropping today was designed to coincide with International Holocaust Remembrance Day and the premiere of my guest, stacey Goldring's new documentary Traces Searching for Identity. In this episode, stacey Goldring shares several impactful observations that, since taping just over a week ago now appear prophetic and deserve recognition. Stacey shared that history was your personal experience. I challenge that. It is all of our experiences. My grandparents were branded with yellow Jewish stars as laws were passed against them, and other targeted groups were branded based on their ethnicity, religion, political beliefs or sexual orientations. Last week, I publicly stood together with people of various ethnicities, religions, political beliefs and sexual orientations wearing my own Jewish star, proudly proclaiming my support of legislation that got passed just this week here in Jacksonville that bans projecting unwanted hate speech. Is it everything that I would love to see that fights back against the ugly? No, but it is a start and, as Stacey also shares, evil is universal and so is resilience.

Speaker 1: 1:44

The reason for this episode is Holocaust awareness. The purpose is recording the ideas of those with the talent to translate the past and present for a better future. My friend Ruchy Koval, in her book Soul Construction, writes the vastness of the cosmos is unfathomable, yet so far intelligent life has yet to be found outside of our planet. We are all clustered onto this one huge orb and we further cluster ourselves into countries, communities, churches, synagogues and families. We are inexorably drawn to one another, even while we sometimes repel each other. The desire and the need to connect with other people simultaneously brings us so much joy and sometimes so much sorrow. How are we to understand this? While on this episode I scratch the surface of what it means to be someone with generational trauma and a suitcase at the stairs, get ready for my next episode, where I share my lowest point and detail how facing my flaws and tracing my trauma helped me to discover why I needed that purpose in the first place. Give a listen. I always have a valid passport, cash on hand and a heightened fight or flight instinct, braided like Hala, into my DNA. Why? Because my parents' parents were hunted for extinction during the Holocaust. Generational trauma is something that millions of people deal with every day. So what is it? What does it mean to the people experiencing it? Why should we even address it? And that is what we are going to tackle today.

Speaker 1: 3:39

Hi, I'm Suez here with your weekly dose of culture, values and identity and where we tackle those topics others may consider off limits. A little about me. I'm a busy Gen X mom who, quite frankly, wanted to grow up like the Brady Bunch, but how could I, being raised in the shadow of Schindler's List? So this means I've spent a lifetime navigating these mixed messages we get hit with daily. Don't know those conversations where we wonder if it's safe to speak our minds. Can we share our experiences, voice our fears and concerns, or should we just keep our mouths shut? Well, too bad. I need to know, but I'm no expert, so I'm going to schmooze the experts and get their thoughts. Why so? When we engage with our kids, colleagues or the countless committees we interact with, we can do it with competence, kindness, confidence and maybe a bit of humor. If this sounds like your cup of coffee, welcome to Schmooze with Suez.

Speaker 1: 4:37

Several years ago, I started to have the beginnings of what my brother-in-law coined as my midlife opportunity, which, by the way is how I have opted to rebrand my crisis. Everybody kept telling me to go find my why. Look for my why. From food to friendship, to philanthropy, everybody was telling me. You know, I'm sure you've been on a search for your own why.

Speaker 1: 5:02

The thing is, the culture of why is a frustrating experience for someone like me, because my why is a bit different from everyone else's. Why. Why do I always look for a means of escape when I enter a building? Why do I have more in common with people twice my age from Eastern Europe than people I went to college with? Why do I feel this compulsion to correct people's historical inaccuracies when it comes to the Holocaust or anything that marginalizes a society? My why was exhausting me. So now you can see why.

Speaker 1: 5:38

My search sent me to a writing workshop that addressed these specific questions I had about myself. It was called searching for identity. What I learned was that I was what they call a third generation Holocaust survivor, and I was not alone. That is where I met my guest Stacey Goldring, a journalist with over three decades of delving deeper for answers and the founder of this nonprofit organization that holds writing and discussion workshops, hosts public programming and produces documentary films and educational videos that tell the tales of survival and how, for many people, that survival was just the beginning of their future trauma. Hi Stacey.

Speaker 2: 6:21

Hi, hi, how are you, susie?

Speaker 1: 6:23

I'm good, thank you. As the first person in my family born in the United States, I didn't know until middle school that all grandparents didn't have numbers tattooed into their arms. I had all these stories and experiences I had never shared because they were foreign to my friends, as far as I felt, until I joined your workshop. How did you come to gather the people, the memories and the stories that would eventually become this documentary?

Speaker 2: 6:52

It's a great question. I never wanted to have anything to do with the Holocaust.

Speaker 1: 6:57

No.

Speaker 2: 6:58

It was too painful, I couldn't handle it. I was a reporter in South Florida for the Boca Raton News in the late 90s 150 years ago and I was asked to do a story and I did. It caused a little bit of controversy, which is fine, and somehow I was intrigued. And then I got pregnant and I thought never again the idea of carrying life in me and having to cover this topic. It wasn't going to happen. And then in the early 2000s, I was asked to write the story of a Holocaust survivor, carla Nathan's shipper and may her memory be a blessing and I said no. I was asked three times and on the third time I said okay, I'll meet her. And Susie.

Speaker 2: 7:51

I walked in the door of her very lovely little Danish design little apartment at the Cove's and my entire life changed and I've been following this path ever since I realized I found my calling. So On, wooden Wheels was published and I don't know, I don't do numbers 2005, 2006, doesn't matter and that brought me into this world of Holocaust survivorship where you've lived your entire life.

Speaker 2: 8:22

So from then, I was asked to come up with a workshop or some type of program with second generation survivors and I did what I only think I know how to do. I've got a pencil, I've got a laptop Probably the second or third workshop I held. I remember going out to my car and putting my head on the steering wheel and going oh my God, I have to share these stories with the world because I thought I was there to document their parents story remarkable, miraculous stories of survival. But I realized that the Holocaust did not end when the gates of the camper opened. It is reverberating, it is here in this room with us right now.

Speaker 2: 9:10

It reverberates generation to generation. That is trauma, susie. The question is what do we do with it? Those brave people that came around the table and the third gen like you? You've answered that question, haven't you? You're doing something about it. You're going to talk, you're going to document these stories, you're going to explain your pain and you exhibit every day the resilience of the survivorship community.

Speaker 1: 9:40

That's such an interesting perspective when we look at the external evidence, like those tattoos I referenced, those are visible. We know that those people experience trauma, but there's a growing body of research suggesting that trauma, like a tattoo, is embedded into the body's DNA and then gets passed on to the next generation. The most recent research was on children exposed to superstorms, sandy, while in the womb, they weren't even born yet. The study found that they had higher rates of depression, adhd and anxiety compared to children who had not experienced trauma in utero. So what does this mean? This means that part of the reason I'm frantically looking for exits is not only did I grow up with people who lived through trauma and described it in detail to me, but genetically that trauma was passed from four grandparents to two parents and then into me. So am I and people like me overly sensitive, or are we just predisposed to being hyper-aware?

Speaker 2: 10:49

The story of generational trauma and how it is manifest in the DNA. The science is growing and growing and it goes back to the basic principle for every action there's a reaction. Right, there is. I have a film called Trace's Voices of the Second Generation and there is a moment in the film where one of the children of survivors says am I who I am because I am a second generation Holocaust survivor? We may never know, it doesn't matter. The fact is, you're here, you've been dealt these cards and what are you going to do with them next? This trauma is manifest in children who are born from people who fought in Iraq and Iran.

Speaker 2: 11:39

I mean, it's everywhere. We all bring our own baggage to every situation, but what's unique about your situation is your family survived mankind's most vile, darkest period in history, so dark that they had to come up with words because language failed in order to prosecute. That's where we come up with the term of crimes against humanity. How do you hold someone responsible when you've never thought of the crime? So this is what makes Holocaust survivorship unique in Western civilization.

Speaker 1: 12:25

I'm a Gen Xer and we're all about owning up to our brokenness and breaking the cycle of generational trauma, whatever that might look like for anybody. So now, as a mother, I'm trying to recognize my triggers when engaging with my own children. So if they have the natural tendencies as I do and I'm going to pause there because when we look at the correlation, I can't help but say, okay, science has suggested well, I came to your workshop feeling very lost and confused and I'm going to ask a very, very unusual question what do you think the age difference between me and the next youngest person in that room might have been, if you had?

Speaker 2: 13:07

to guess Of the third gen or the second gen. I was in both of the.

Speaker 1: 13:12

I was in one group at the time. It was just second, third gen. Oh, a few decades.

Speaker 2: 13:17

It was a few decades right.

Speaker 1: 13:18

So again, I want to express that when we shared stories, it wasn't just that we shared stories. I speak Yiddish fluently as a first language. Yiddish is my first language, so it wasn't people who I grew up with who were able to communicate with me nearly as well as people who had survived, and so when we talked about this I mentioned, as a mom, I'm looking to kind of get ahead of the game, if there is some kind of nature that I can nurture out of them. The goal is to avoid there being a fourth generation. Right, my goal is to be a cycle breaker. Is that even a possibility?

Speaker 2: 14:05

You lead by example. You may not even ever have to say one word to them. They see what you're doing, Susie. They see what you're doing.

Speaker 1: 14:14

Some people have suggested to me that it's it's very disturbing to expose children to the truths. So I will say that I grew up knowing all of the stories, and it wasn't just from the survivors that raised me, but the schools that I attended were very open. They were Jewish schools and because of that, they were very, very open about exposing us to pictures and images and documentation, so that we were very, very clear that this was real, this had happened and, if God forbid, we came across deniers. We had the proof Right. So, in your experience, how has that changed, or has it changed at all?

Speaker 2: 15:02

I think you grew up in an incredibly lucky and unique situation, albeit incredibly painful, because history was your personal experience Right, I grew up playing in cornfields and where I wasn't allowed to play with some people because I had horns. So you come from a very so when you say you speak Yiddish, to me that's like wow, she comes from the city. Like she, I'm a country mouse and she's the city mouse Like I had no way, jose, like that to me, just amazing. So history is so much more part of your every day when, I mean, the first time I was really besides, you know, my family, arguing, you know, at the dinner table after Russian Yemkippur, when, you know, then I heard the Yiddish.

Speaker 2: 16:01

However, I really didn't know much about anything till I went to Ohio State and, you know, needed some electives that were an easy A. So I took, you know, yiddish, you know 341, spring of my senior year, whatever, and I'm like Shalom alechem, what, what, like I don't, I know nothing, nothing, so interesting. So your experience of feeling like you relate to these older people makes perfect sense to me because it was so concentrated that is manifest in your intensity to make sure that this is a reality.

Speaker 1: 16:41

Okay, so to my intensity, let's speak to that. I've been accused multiple times of being too much right and I sometimes or I should say in my twenties and thirties we spend all of our time excusing ourselves and apologizing for ourselves, and then somewhere we wake up because what we don't deal with by our thirties comes back to deal with us by our forties. I woke up and discovered, you know what? I have no choice. This is who. I am right. The people who came before me have always taught me that I have to be aware I have to keep my head on a swivel, because that's how you're going to stay ahead of the game. They're coming for you, right? And then I'm back to the nature versus nurture. In those moments that I feel this compulsion. Is this something that you, who has heard stories like mine from dozens of people, does this sound?

Speaker 2: 17:27

familiar. Yes, and there's a term for it, and it is called the suitcase at the bottom of the stairs.

Speaker 1: 17:35

Can you tell me more about that?

Speaker 2: 17:38

What you explain is incredibly common in survivors and has transmitted to people like me. The most precious thing I own is my passport and I know exactly where it is. You speak to people who are not Jewish, or are not or like our optimists, and they think we've lost our minds. But we're aware of history and that shit ain't going to happen again on my watch.

Speaker 1: 18:08

Amen. It's interesting because that's a question I get asked a lot. Aren't you reading too much into this? You know there'll be an anti-Semitic experience that takes place in the city that I live in or in the school that my kids go to, and when I question it, the first response is maybe you're being a little too sensitive, and I kind of feel like I've never been a little too sensitive. I feel like it's instinctive. Right, we call it out, we spot things not just about our own inferiority or the way we're treated, but other marginalized groups. Do you find yourself drawing extensive sensitivity to other marginalized groups because of the work that you do?

Speaker 2: 18:49

Yes, because evil is universal and so is resilience.

Speaker 1: 18:55

So my kids ask me Don't you get tired? They do. They ask me there's seven in ten. And so when the menorah didn't go up but the Christmas tree did and I spoke up the first thing, I asked them does it bother you that I speak out? And my son said to me no, I think you're a modern makabe, highest form of compliment, right. But he also asked me but don't you get tired?

Speaker 2: 19:21

And what did you say?

Speaker 1: 19:23

I said what I always say I'm always exhausted, but I can never sleep, right.

Speaker 2: 19:29

Well, welcome to mother Hello.

Speaker 1: 19:32

Right. If you're a mother, you understand that, so does this. What keeps you up at night?

Speaker 2: 19:42

You know I run a nonprofit and running a nonprofit requires raising funds to keep it going. I can't even ask for change. So you would think that what keeps me up at night is trying to keep this going, because there are so many stories that need to be captured for no one to deny Right. My biggest enemy is the clock. My biggest enemy is time, and I look at every individual. I get to meet and document their story and I think about the reverberating effect of the six million lives that don't get to speak. And that'll keep you going.

Speaker 1: 20:31

It's true. It's true, it's funny because not a ha ha funny. But ironically, yiddish is the language that a lot of people will tell me that their parents used specifically to exclude them. It was the language that was designed to keep you out of it. They didn't speak it publicly because they were ashamed.

Speaker 2: 20:49

They didn't want their children to be considered, but also realize if we're talking about the United States Israel I don't know about, I can only speak to the US. And you wanted to assimilate. Thank God you were here. You know what I'm going to get a Swanson's TV dinner. We're going to put up a silver tree and we're going to do it. We're going to embrace so Yiddish, you know, a little too ethnic, a little too rough, A little too rough.

Speaker 1: 21:17

So what happens when we do that, when we assimilate so much so that our own culture is diffused and watered down to when Jewish people are questioning whether the Holocaust happened and I know that you've heard recent outbursts by a lot of younger people in their early 20s who are now questioning along with the deniers what would you say to them?

Speaker 2: 21:49

You know, my grandfather may arrest and peace said you're a bigger art, You're a bigger idiot if you argue with one. So I'm not interested in, you know, engaging with a nobdak. I'm going to keep my eye on the ball and I'm going to do what I'm going to do. Another friend told me, Stacy, you cannot boil an ocean. And that was very freeing to me, Susie, because I've got so much to do. You have so much to do, but I can only do so much and I'm going to do it really well and that's all I can do. So they can deny. You know, you can have these religious people who live in Israel, who deny Israel exist. Let me repeat that. Anyway, I won't because it's anyway, but I'm going to do my thing and I'm going to because that's all I know how to do.

Speaker 2: 22:43

Your enthusiasm, if we can go back to that, for a moment you talk about how people think you're a little, maybe too much. Consider the context of your environs, where you live. Maybe you're too much here, where we are in the South, but you're not too much if we're talking about history. You're not too much if we're talking about documenting the truth.

Speaker 1: 23:14

So what I'm hearing is I'm not hyper aware. Most people are just less aware. They're just naive in their perception or in their historical digging.

Speaker 2: 23:30

I don't want to call them naive People are if you're not threatened, why bother? It's really not bothering me. Don't make too much of a fuss, You'll be fine. What are you worried about? Because they don't acknowledge the threat. Maybe they don't know a lot about history, or you know, like I said, you know, God bless the optimists. I love an optimist. They amaze me, but I'm in reality and I've got a lot to do. So do you?

Speaker 1: 24:12

True story Trace is searching for identity Follows 19 second generation survivors as they explain what it's like being raised by parents traumatized by war, death and deprivation. Many Jewish parents were struggling with overwhelming grief from the loss of their prior spouses, children and relatives, while trying to rebuild their families with the memories of atrocities fresh in their minds. Many second generation survivors felt it was their role to fill those gaps in their parents' lives and to protect them from further emotional and mental pain. Would you say they were able to do that, and if so, how is that help them? If not, were they able to recover from it?

Speaker 2: 24:56

The idea that they show up. They all deserve a Nobel, because I think about the people who know about the workshop and can't. So these people carry not only the burden of capturing their parent's stories and revealing how the Holocaust has shaped their lives, but they're speaking on behalf of those who can't and they're honoring those who were murdered. And I don't know if that answers your question, but the people that you will see in traces to me are incredible heroes. They're very brave. They didn't have to sit in front of a camera with hot lights. The lights are hot. People are staring at you. There's a mic involved, but they did it.

Speaker 2: 25:49

None of them came to the workshop considering themselves writers, and now we are publishing a book. They are reading their stories to the world. This will live on. We already have funds to get it translated into Hebrew and we're working to raise funds to get it translated into several other languages as well. So this is going to stand as testimony in the historical record. It will look to acknowledge and validate people like you who think you're a little too sensitive and tell you hell, no.

Speaker 1: 26:32

Right on the pulse, so can you tell us where we can see traces?

Speaker 2: 26:37

Where will it premiere here in Jacksonville it's premiering in Jacksonville at the amazing, beautiful Wilson Center for the Arts which is on Beach Boulevard on the FSCJ campus. Then it will air the next day, which will be Sunday, on PBS on WJCT, and also on Monday. You just check your local listing and it will also be available online through PBS and other stations moving forward.

Speaker 1: 27:08

Traces Voices of the Second Generation's makes its debut tomorrow night, Saturday, January 28th 2023, at 7.30pm at the Wilson Center of the Arts, FSCJ South Campus on Beach Boulevard. A Q&A session will follow the screening Stacy. Thank you so much for sharing this important work that you do.

Speaker 2: 27:30

I am amazed and so proud of you.

Speaker 1: 27:36

It's time for our honorable mention. Mench is the Yiddish word for a person of integrity and honor, with a sense of what is right and responsible. This week's honorable mention goes to Hans Harry Frisch, chairman of Fever Street Fisheries, who died peacefully in his home last week at the age of 99. Born in Austria and emigrating to the United States through Israel, I met Mr Frisch several times since coming to Jacksonville. He was a philanthropic fixture who loved his family and community. I want to extend condolences to the entire Frisch family. May his memory be for a blessing. If you know of someone who is the kind of mench who should get an honorable mention, send me a note at schmoozwithsuesorg or drop me a line on Instagram. That's going to do it for us today. Thanks for sticking around. Make sure to subscribe to Schmooz with Suze on YouTube and follow me on Instagram to get your daily dose of chutzpah. I'm Suze, your well-informed smartass who's not afraid to stand up and speak out. Because what's an envelope if not for pushing? Hey, stay inspired and inspiring.