Paula Berinstein
Boy, that's a doozy. You've had me thinking about this question all day.
Whether for good or ill, my life doesn't include mysteries of the whodunit kind. What it has a lot of, however, is psychological mysteries: why has this or that happened? And one of the most baffling of those is, why were my parents' and grandparents' lives so joyless?
As I turn the question over in my mind, I see many possible reasons: personal trauma, flight from repression, daily struggle, a culture that stifles joy. My maternal grandparents fled Russia long before the Bolshevik revolution. I suspect they were fleeing the pogroms that decimated so many Jewish families. My paternal grandparents were born in the U.S., but their parents were immigrants. Perhaps the same was true of them.
My sense, though, is that it goes deeper than that. My father, who was born in Los Angeles in the 1920s, could be downright funereal. Everything was always so serious, so grave. Family get-togethers were so oppressive I felt like I wanted to scream. One of the most vivid memories I have of him was his telling me that this or that relative "passed away," a term I never use as a result.
On my mother's side it was slightly better but a heaviness was always there too. Perhaps it's that people who become refugees are always looking over their shoulders. My grandfather, who left Russia when he was about nineteen, might have felt that way. And yet my grandmother wouldn't have thought of herself that way or even remembered. She left Ukraine for England when she was four, moved to the U.S. when she was eighteen.
Personal trauma? None that I'm aware of. Daily struggle? For a while money was short but I never got the impression that they were desperate. Cultural reasons? We've all heard of Jewish guilt, Jewish seriousness. Could that be it?
There is one other possibility that comes to mind: chemistry. Perhaps my family is simply depressed. My father certainly was. Whether that was genetic or whether the other side of my family had something like that I don't know. But I do think there might be a good story in all this. Now you've really got me wondering.
Whether for good or ill, my life doesn't include mysteries of the whodunit kind. What it has a lot of, however, is psychological mysteries: why has this or that happened? And one of the most baffling of those is, why were my parents' and grandparents' lives so joyless?
As I turn the question over in my mind, I see many possible reasons: personal trauma, flight from repression, daily struggle, a culture that stifles joy. My maternal grandparents fled Russia long before the Bolshevik revolution. I suspect they were fleeing the pogroms that decimated so many Jewish families. My paternal grandparents were born in the U.S., but their parents were immigrants. Perhaps the same was true of them.
My sense, though, is that it goes deeper than that. My father, who was born in Los Angeles in the 1920s, could be downright funereal. Everything was always so serious, so grave. Family get-togethers were so oppressive I felt like I wanted to scream. One of the most vivid memories I have of him was his telling me that this or that relative "passed away," a term I never use as a result.
On my mother's side it was slightly better but a heaviness was always there too. Perhaps it's that people who become refugees are always looking over their shoulders. My grandfather, who left Russia when he was about nineteen, might have felt that way. And yet my grandmother wouldn't have thought of herself that way or even remembered. She left Ukraine for England when she was four, moved to the U.S. when she was eighteen.
Personal trauma? None that I'm aware of. Daily struggle? For a while money was short but I never got the impression that they were desperate. Cultural reasons? We've all heard of Jewish guilt, Jewish seriousness. Could that be it?
There is one other possibility that comes to mind: chemistry. Perhaps my family is simply depressed. My father certainly was. Whether that was genetic or whether the other side of my family had something like that I don't know. But I do think there might be a good story in all this. Now you've really got me wondering.
More Answered Questions
Linda
asked
Paula Berinstein:
I'd like to write an article about the Amanda Lester series for a fanzine magazine called Susabella. It's published for subscribers 6 times a year. I'd like your permission to review the series and also learn a little about the background. This series is not like anything I've ever read. How can I contact you? I don't want to list my email address here. The listed website doesn't work. I've read 3 books so far.
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