My Life as a Quest

A brief excerpt from ‘Holocaust to Resistance’

#1 : RETURN TO AUVERGNE

Once again, I was on my way back to Auvergne, to the hidden home of my early years. Exhausted from the transatlantic flight, I rested my head on John’s shoulder — John, my loving and devoted partner. We have done many expeditions to France, the land of my origin. I listened to the rattle of the train and watched the green fields fly by. It was on such a train that I first came to Auvergne, in 1943, still an infant in the arms of a woman. My mind drifted back. She was a stranger. I sensed her apprehension. I was restless and fretful. Then I drifted off. I felt a jolt. The stranger holding me was talking to two men. They asked questions. She showed papers. I sensed her fear — but the men passed on.

As I grew up, I forgot that voyage, forgot the green farmlands and hills of Auvergne, and forgot the French language, my mother tongue. I left France as a child and I vowed never to return. I wanted to erase those bitter years. But now, revisiting Auvergne after seventy-two years, I knew that I owed everything to this region — not only my life but its direction and its pervading sense of purpose….

An Auvergne journalist wrote that I had “lived many lives during my 75 years.” Very true. I had taken a battering during my childhood years that left its mark on me. My life took shape as a quest to heal wounds of wartime trauma and seek links with communities striving for social justice. My direction was set during that time in Auvergne as a child in the care of the anti-Nazi Resistance.

from Holocaust to Resistance: My Journey, pp. 2, 4 Copyright © 2019 Suzanne Berliner Weiss