Embarrassing Work Moments, Part 89,463

I just learned I can’t listen to Bob Marley while I’m at work.

I may have previously mentioned that my job is extremely boring. So when I’ve got a stack of work, I usually listen to my iPod. It keeps me conscious when the job itself is trying to bore me to sleep. So I had it on as I was finishing up the credit bureau requests. And I printed some anniversary certificates. And then Exodus came on.

First I started lightly tapping my wrist rest. Before I knew what was happening, I was pounding away playing virtual keyboards and drumming on my wrist rest with great enthusiasm. And then one of the managers walked by my office and looked in with a funny grin on her face.

:blush

I’d already gotten caught jamming; a manager told me to “rock out.” I didn’t think I was being that obvious. Guess I was.

 

Thursday 13–18th Edition. Yom Hashoah

Thirteen Books Faith Has Read About the Holocaust

1. Diary of a Young Girl - Anne Frank. I was so moved by this when I first read it as a child. As I’ve gotten older, I find her story even more extraordinary. Anne, her family, and another family go into hiding in Amsterdam above her father’s place of business and protected by Dutch friends and colleagues. They were betrayed most likely by an employee of the business, and Anne died just a few days before the camp she was in was liberated.
2. The Devil’s Arithmetic – Jane Yolen.  12-year-old Hannah is tired of hearing all the stories about the Holocaust. One night during the Passover Seder, she is whisked back into 1942 Poland, where she and her family are taken to a concentration camp. Her memories of her former life fade and vanish, and she is completely caught up in her identity as Chaya and the things that are happening around her.
3. I Have Lived a Thousand Years: Growing Up in the Holocaust – Livia Bitton Jackson. Jackson describes the experiences she and her family had when they were sent to Auschwitz.
4. Number the Stars – Lois Lowry. 10-year-old Annemarie has a Jewish friend, and helps shelter her from the nazis in German-occupied Denmark.
5. Man’s Search for Meaning – Viktor Frankl. Frankl not only survived the concentration camps, but found spirituality in his life there.
6. The Hiding Place – Corrie Ten Boom.  Ten Boom describes her experiences in the death camps with a great level of spirituality that enabled her to survive and forgive. This is a most remarkable book.
7. Exodus – Leon Uris. This epic novel of a family caught up in the Holocaust and all the associated ordeals is a must-read.
8. The World Must Know: The History of the Holocaust as Told in the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum – Michael Berenbaum. This book tells and illustrates the story of the Holocaust beginning with the Nazi rise to power.
9. The Upstairs Room – Johanna Reiss. Two sisters are hidden in a tiny room in a Dutch farmhouse for two years.
10. We Remember the Holocaust – David A. Adler. This book discusses the events of the Holocaust and shares personal accounts from survivors.
11. Behind the Bedroom Wall – Laura E. Williams. 13-year-old Korinna is a member of the Nazi youth who is shocked to learn that her parents are hiding a Jewish family.
12. Anne Frank and Me – Cherie Bennett, Jeff Gottesfeld. A girl suffers a concussion while on a class trip to a Holocaust exhibit, and finds herself living the life of a Jewish teenager in Paris.
13. Last Seven Months of Anne Frank – Willy Lindwer. What happened to Anne Frank after she and her family were captured by the Nazis and transported to the death camps?

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Yom Hashoah

Yom Hashoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day, typically falls on the 27th of Nissan. This year that is on Thursday, May 1st.

I didn’t know that until yesterday, but I’ve watched quite a few documentaries recently about the Holocaust. Forgiving Dr. Mengele tells the story of Eva Mozes Kors, one of the twins upon whom Dr. Mengele conducted his inhumane experiments. Auschwitz: Inside the Nazi State is a 6-part documentary that focuses mostly on Auschwitz and Birkenau. It is horrifyingly graphic, showing film and photographs that give a tiny glimpse into the atrocities that took place there. The Nazis: A Warning from History is another multi-part documentary that chronicles the rise and fall of the Nazis. Nuremberg: Tyrrany on Trial examines the trials in Nuremberg of some of the most egregious Nazi war criminals.

It is almost incomprehensible to see the photographs, the film, the remnants of the millions of lost lives. I have asked myself multiple times over the last few days how humans can do such things to any other creature. I wept.

Please, take a few moments out of your busy schedules today. Stop what you’re doing. Turn off the television or the computer, and be still. And in that stillness, remember. Say a prayer if you’re so inclined. Light a candle–light 6 candles, to represent the six million Jews who were slaughtered. Light a candle for the 200,000 to 500,000 Gypsies who were murdered. Light a candle, or 3, for the three million Polish Catholics put to death by the Nazis. Light a candle for the 5-15,000 homosexuals who died in concentration camps. And light another candle for the mentally ill and physically disabled who were also murdered in great quantities.

And if you want to educate yourself a little more, any of the documentaries listed above would be a good place to start. You can also find a list of films and documentaries pertaining to the Holocaust at this site. Visit the official website of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum or the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.  Visit the website for Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Authority. 

Remember. Always remember.