Memorial for Margot and Anne Frank at the former Bergen-Belsen site, along with floral and pictorial tributes. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Lately, I can’t seem to get Anne Frank out of my mind. She’s always around; hanging around in my head. I don’t know why this is. Maybe it’s her spirit. Who knows if spirits exist, but I feel something.
Since I keep thinking of Anne Frank, I decided to go to the library and re-read the story of her life. When I first read Anne Frank, I couldn’t relate to anything that happened to her. Now, that I’m going through what she went through, I can relate to her. I even cried when I finished reading the book. I suppose I cried for her, myself and for all the targets who are going through the same thing.
Anne Frank wrote this in her diary: “After May 1940 good times rapidly fled: first the war, then the capitulation, followed by the arrival of the Germans, which is when the sufferings of us Jews really began. Anti-Jewish decrees followed each other in quick succession. Jews must wear a yellow star, Jews must hand in their bicycles, Jews are banned from trams and are forbidden to drive. Jews are only allowed to do their shopping between three and five o’clock and only in shops which bear the placard “Jewish Shop.” Jews must be indoors by eight o’clock and cannot even sit in their own gardens after that hour. Jews are forbidden to visit theaters, cinemas, and other places of entertainment. Jews may not take part in public sports. Swimming baths, tennis courts, hockey fields, and other sports grounds are all prohibited to them. Jews may not visit Christians. Jews must go to Jewish schools, and many more of a similar kind.”
Though the above things Anne wrote are not done to us, we wear an invisible yellow star. And though, we’re not told to stay indoors, every store we go into everybody knows who we are. And they might as well keep us out of the stores, public sports, etc., the way we’re treated. And everybody’s told to stay away from us because we’re all so dangerous. And we sure as hell can’t just sit in a garden and enjoy the sun and flowers. We’re driven from the garden by the perps.
And even though, there are no decrees written on what we can and cannot do, these decrees are silently told to others on how to keep us out. As Anne writes: Our freedom was strictly limited.
And our freedom is strictly limited. We can’t do whatever we want. There’s always some perp around preventing us from doing what we want to do. We’re driven to stay in our homes and live a life of no pleasure.
So, Anne suffered in a different way than we do, but we have a lot of things in common with Anne Frank. She was a prisoner, and so are we.
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