The words that a father speaks to his children in the privacy of home are not heard by the world, but, as in whispering galleries, they are clearly heard at the end, and by posterity.” – Jean Paul Richter (German art historian, 1847-1937) Much has happened: Lillie’s knee (thanks for your concern. She’s off crutches!), daily teaching third grade, weekly tutoring, ghost writing, three kids - I’ve had little time to blog. I gave myself a birthday gift: time to write. I wanted to write about what has most impacted me this year. Frankly, I kept getting serendipitous reminders about it, so feel the need to share it – and thanks to my friend Janine, have permission to do so. Last month, my 11-year-old daughter Ali heard about Anne Frank, and wanted to read her diary. Serendipitously, Jory found a used copy a few days later at our local bookstore. We began it that night. The very next day, I received an email from Sandia Prep, Ali’s new school, inviting us to a performance of Anne Frank and Me. What are the odds?? The play is about a class of teenagers in the 1990s assigned to read Frank’s diary, and the pushback some kids give to the assigned reading. But it goes deeper. Since the screenplay for the 1959 film was written by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett, some students believe that the diary, therefore, was not written by Frank. Eerily, their thinking joins those who say the entire Holocaust was made up. The play was incredible, as the kids playing the roles were exactly the right ages, and I was *sobbing* (yes, sobbing) at the end (much to Ali’s everlasting mortification). I couldn’t stop crying because a few months ago, my friend Janine had sent me an email with the letter from her Jewish grandfather (Sadi Lattes), written in French. Sadi was a brilliant engineer who worked at the Citroen factory designing cars. (When I lived in Paris in the 80s, the common French cars were Citroen, Renault and Peugeot). In the 1920s, Louis Renault is on record referring to his rival Andre Citroen as “le petit Juif”. So it is little surprise that when the Nazis gave Renault a choice in 1940 to work for them or see his production moved to Germany, he chose to collaborate. Therefore, the five-story Renault factory in Boulogne Billancourt became a hub for Nazi production of military equipment. In comparison, here’s a study in diplomatic and elegant resistance: Andre Citroen died in 1935, but his successor Pierre Boulanger refused to meet with the Nazis or the Nazi automotive specialist Dr. Porsche (yes, that Porsche), except through intermediaries. When the Citroen factory was forced to collaborate with the Nazis, Boulanger organized a “go slow” on the productions of trucks for the Wehrmacht. Likewise, his engineers surreptitiously moved the fill line on their oil dipsticks lower, causing Nazi trucks to seize under stress after a few months from low oil. In fact, when the French Resistance infiltrated the Gestapo HQ in Paris in 1944, they found Boulanger’s name prominent on a Nazi Blacklist of the most important enemies of the Reich, to be deported if the Allies invaded France. Put yourself in Sadi’s shoes: if you knew your rival factory was willingly collaborating with the enemy, and you knew you could do something to stop production, would you? Sadi did. He and two of his engineer friends built a bomb and exploded it in the Renault factory, halting production. Somehow (Janine doesn’t know how) the Nazis knew who was responsible. On December 12, 1941, they went to Sadi’s apartment on Rue Gustave Zede in Paris' chic 16th arrondisement, and arrested him. Through the Resistance, Sadi’s family quickly got word to his two friends, and both went into hiding. The Nazis could never find them, and both survived the war. Sadi was taken to the Royallieu Internment Camp in Compiegne “Frontstallag 122”, which is 86 kilometers north of Paris. (Formerly, the site was French army barracks that displayed a signing of the Armistice from World War I). It was a camp for “active enemy individuals”. From there, Sadi wrote letters to his wife on any scraps of paper he could get his hands on. These were snuck out of the camp (probably by a nurse). Only one was in pen; time has dimmed the other notes in pencil. The story gets crazier: Janine and her family had no idea these letters ever existed. Until this year. Upon initially receiving the letters, Sadi’s wife Renee put them in a box, and Sadi’s son Robert put the box in the back of his closet in his Parisian apartment. There they sat for 80 years, as Robert was never able to speak of their existence. After Robert’s death last year, his daughter (Janine’s cousin) found them while cleaning out his apartment. This is exactly how our grandparents’ and parents’ generations dealt with trauma. Put it in a box and hide it away. They say trauma is passed on through our DNA. It just takes longer for the physical notes to be passed along. Janine emailed me Sadi’s notes a few months ago. She asked me to translate them, because her French cousin finds them too emotionally draining to work on. Their legendary grandfather has suddenly taken on flesh and blood, as they read his words and see his handwriting for the first time, across the decades. With Janine’s blessings, I sent the notes on to my dear Parisian friend Brigitte McLeavy, who painstakingly tried to decipher them with her cousins. What do they say? Here is Brigitte’s translation of the longest letter (in pen): (Janine is certain that Sadi wrote in a bit of code, so if the notes were intercepted, no one would be implicated.) March 20, 1942 (3/20/42) My darling --Still no news from you but this morning I found out you had seen the wife of one of my office colleagues. I also know you receive 1/20th of my pay, which makes me so happy. How are you all? I would love to have a note from you. The business of the parcels finally sorted itself out a little bit. What had been confiscated from us was redistributed among those concerned, according to their declarations. Of course, there have been injustices, like, for instance if only I had managed to get all the potatoes…which are delicious (I fried some of them. Such a miracle to eat that after 3 months). I got very little chocolate, no oranges - -- I do not know whether you heard from me via some who left yesterday, but they will have told you to send me what I asked you for regarding my personal belongings plus(adding) some food: bread, butter, jam, biscuits, tinned food, dry fruit.... taking care of noting my name and my number on all the objects and the food, and putting a copy of the inventory. This is this how I can be best helped - But no need to do this very often. Besides one has to live from day to day as it may change. Therefore, do the best you can, pile on the bread, and the jam and the cheese --I have good hope for the liberation especially if you look after me--I have moved and I am in the same bedroom as M. F——Apparently the young friend (masculine) you mentioned is expecting a visit, entrust him with a bit of food for me- Also send me as many noodles and as much rice as you can, to put in soups. When will the official parcels be ? and will they be? I think of you, it’s been nearly 100 days. I have the feeling that there is a detente. My cousins are really only big selfish people, as they virtually left me nothing and, moreover, I had to beg. A thousand hugs for the little darling ones who are fine, I hope. I hold you very very tight in my arms, kissing you a thousand times. 81 years later, Sadi’s emphasis on food is chilling. It seems he was starving. As Abraham Maslow wrote a year later (in 1943), until our physiological needs like hunger, are met, we can’t think of other things. What is surprising is his optimism. Janine believes either he was given bad information, or was trying to lift her grandmother’s spirits – perhaps both. However, on March 27th, a mere seven days after he signed off with a thousand hugs and kisses to his family, things did indeed change. Sadi was loaded on the very first transport to leave French soil: from the Royallieu Prison to Auschwitz. There were 743 French people in his convoy. He arrived at the death camp two days later. According to official camp records, he died in Auschwitz 16 days later, on April 14th, at the age of 41. As soon as it became feasible, Said’s wife Renee became active in working for the deported, trying to find out if her husband were still alive. The family didn’t learn of his death for years. How to properly bury your husband, your father and express your grief under these conditions? Those of us who have lost family know how comforting a formal ceremony is. Sadi’s family was denied this. Understandably, his daughter, Janine’s mother Denise, wanted to get as far away from the war as she could. She married an American GI, and moved with him back to…East Texas. Denise told no one of her true identity, so Janine was raised unaware of her Jewish heritage. How is Sadi’s story relevant and important for us now? 1)This week, the Biden administration released the first ever American strategy to combat antisemitism. This is partially in response to a pandemic poll that revealed that 63% of Gen Z and millennials don’t know that 6 million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust, with 10% unaware that there even was a Holocaust. Upon reading this, you now know one of the six million stories. You’ve read Sadi Lattes’ letter from Royallieu, and understand why, as a French Resistance fighter and Jew, he was considered enemy #1, and put on the first of the 40 transports from Royallieu to Auschwitz. In our day of hate crimes and mass shootings, Sadi’s story is a reminder of how hate can become normalized. 2) Sadi’s example, one of a life cut short, is also one of a life courageously well-lived. Sadi’s life was one of connection. In those darkest of times, Sadi did what he could to improve others’ lives by destroying Nazi production lines. “The secret of life is suffering. It is what is hidden behind everything.” Who wrote this towards the end of his life? Nietzsche? Sartre? Sadi? Actually, it was the famously witty Irish writer Oscar Wilde. Fifty years before Sadi, Wilde had become convinced that suffering was baked into the world, because suffering means we are in touch with our losses, our failures, our disappointments, our weaknesses. Here we are, 80 years after Sadi, and Wilde’s words still resonate. To accept Wilde’s maxim, is to not only better understand Wilde’s humor, but to better prepare us for life. In accepting suffering, we paradoxically free ourselves to really delight in the moments that override it. Moments of joy, of hope, of connection, of light. Sadi lived in a time and place where sabotaging the enemy’s production of war equipment would save lives, even if it meant losing his own. He received no recognition or fortune for doing what he could. Like his brothers and sisters in the Resistance, he just did what he could to keep his fellow citizens safe. Thankfully, none of us live in a time of literal war, so our struggles don’t hold a candle to Sadi and millions like him. Peacetime affords us the luxury of complacency. Unfortunately, it’s easy to forget that everyone around us is fighting some kind of battle, be it loneliness, health issues, financial struggles, anxiety, depression, loss of loved ones, loss of stability, loss of relevance in an ever-changing world…we are all of us fighting a battle of some sort, and usually more than one. Sadi’s sacrifice is a reminder that a life courageously well-lived is ultimately about doing what we can to keep each other safe and well, no matter how inconvenient. It's getting involved in each other's lives when it may be easier not to. It's finding the time and energy to check up on each other, to encourage and to help each other. In the end, there’s only us, after all.
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AuthorSteph: friend, writer, wife, mother, sister, daughter, lover of life, and of chocolate. Archives
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