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The Bardo Group has merged with Bequine Again, a B-zine featuring
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Tag Archives: healing
Tiny Miracles
I have been out in the world again. All the stories I’ve seen and heard and lived have been patiently but eagerly contained, just waiting to be told.
In Poland and Lithuania, where we were traveling, World War II still casts a long shadow over the land. That is a long, hard, sad story.
But little stories are everywhere, and more often than not, you will find stories within stories. In fact, they will find you.
In Vilnius, even the walls contained stories. We started to notice things, like faded Hebrew lettering on an old wall…
…Or a Star of David scratched in stone seventy years ago.
We learned that our apartment was in the Vilnius Ghetto, where more than 42,000 Vilnius Jews were imprisoned before they were murdered.
Near our place was a statue in memory of Dr. Tsemakh Shabad, a Jewish doctor in Vilnius. A lovely young Lithuanian named Yrita gave us the inside story.
The good doctor was loved by all, especially the children, and not only because he believed most childhood illnesses could be cured with a warm glass of milk and a bit of chocolate.
When a mother brought her little girl to him, that was what he prescribed. They had no money for chocolate, so for a week he had the little girl come by every morning to take her medicine– a glass of warm milk and some chocolate. Sure enough, she soon felt better.
When the little girl’s kitten fell ill, she knew just what to do.
She took her kitten to the doctor and asked him to cure it.
The doctor told her that in this case, they would forego the chocolate, and stick with the warm milk. I’m glad to tell you the kitten recovered as well.
Though Dr. Shabad died in 1935, the children of Vilnius still visit him. When they do, they rub the kitten’s nose and make a wish, certain it will come true.
Yrita told us that for little wishes, you rub the kitten’s nose. For very big wishes, you might need to rub the doctor’s nose.
Sometimes wishes don’t come true, not even the little ones, and not all stories have a happy ending.
Sometimes the best we can do is to search for a little light in the darkness. Sometimes you will find it in the most unexpected places.
Tiny miracles can be found everywhere– even in a bit of chocolate, especially when served with a cup of kindness.
All words and images c2014 Naomi Baltuck.
Today (we are all survivors)
We are all survivors, of our personal histories, our family lines, and of the human race. Since the dawn of time, think of the families ended abruptly by a bullet, a spear, a club, a predator, illness, by accident and even by someone’s own hand.
Today is the anniversary of D-Day, the Normandy invasion in 1944. It was the day my Uncle Lewis was launched onto the Normandy beaches into a cruel war. I think it no coincidence that today is also the anniversary of my father’s death in 1965.
The day before he died, while his kids ran and laughed and played in the yard, my father planted a walnut tree—just a stick of a sapling–by the side of the house. Did he know what he was going to do? Did he plant that tree as his own memorial?
I hope not, because someone else is living in that little house in Detroit, and my Dad’s walnut tree is long gone, cut down in its prime. This I know, because I drive past each time I go back to visit my Aunt Loena. So these words must serve as a memorial to a World War II vet who came home without his little brother and best friend. That was the sin he could he never quite forgive himself for.
My army buddy, Jack Oliver, attended boot camp with Uncle Lewis. He helped me understand that my father was as much a victim of the war as my uncle. When the War Department tallies the casualties, it counts the dead, the wounded, the missing in action. But no one ever takes into account the broken hearts and broken families left by the wayside in the wake of war. If they did, perhaps they would stop sending our children off to fight and die.
But today is a day a of forgiveness, a day of understanding, a day to be thankful that life goes on. It is a day of sorrow, but most of all, today is a day to love.
All images and words copyright Naomi Baltuck.
Click here for more interpretations of The Weekly Photo Challenge: Vivid.
Life Will Out
While traveling in Argentina, we visited La Recoleta Cemetery in Buenos Aires. Since 1822, nearly 5,000 mausoleums have been constructed in the highest fashion of the times, from Baroque and Neo-Gothic to Art Deco and Art Nouveau. La Recoleta is a city for the dead, with elegant marble tombs neatly laid out in blocks over fourteen acres.
Some are maintained, for love or pride. Others, like the poet Shelley’s statue of Ozymandias, have fallen into disrepair, covered with spider webs and graffiti, littered with broken glass and faded plastic flowers. Feral cats stare warily from marble perches and skulk away sideways if approached.
We saw the grave of Eva Peron, and other statesmen, poets, generals, and presidents.
More interesting to me was the final resting place for a mother and her infant. They were not famous, but clearly they were loved. Did she and the child die in childbirth or were they swept away by an epidemic? In any case, a grieving husband and father was spared to erect this memorial. Was he able to pick up the pieces of his broken life to find happiness again?
Wherever we go, we find reminders of all the stories in this world that will never be told. When I photographed this memorial, I could be certain of only two things. Both mother and child were subject to an early and tragic demise. And, as seen by the lush green fern sprouting from the dust collecting in the cracks in the stone, life goes on.
All images and words copyright Naomi Baltuck
Click here for more interpretations of the Weekly Photo Challenge: Spare.
Writing Between the Lines 