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Apr. 2nd, 2009 06:31 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kittydesadeHuh.
I'm not sure how to react to the story (stories) I've just heard other than that. As always, learning about my family history from my aunt takes me a bit of time to digest.
The subject started with a woman who came into the store today about my age (apparently) and with three kids, digressed through no way am I giving my Mom any grandchildren anytime soon, and somehow managed to wind up into family history. I learned, several months ago actually, that my great grandmother, my mother's mother's mother, was a (Russian? I believe) Jew, or married to one. Or perhaps it was my mother's mother's father... yes, it was my mother's mother's father, I think (will confirm with Aunt) who was a Russian Jew who was hidden under a butcher's? floor, someone's floor, and smuggled to the United States.
My mother's mother's mother, whatever her country of origin, was also apparently subject to the influence of the pogroms. She either came over to this country or was born to immigrants, of that I'm fairly certain. It's my mother's father's mother's family, at the very least, that's been in this country for some time. And from what Aunt E tells me, she wasn't a very pleasant woman. I remember visiting her when I was very very young and she was in the nursing home, and she scared the living daylights out of me. I remember my grandmother and I pushing her around in a wheelchair. Aunt E says she died young, which, for our family, probably means in her sixties. The nursing home staff said there wasn't anything significantly wrong with her, she was just unpleasant and hated her life and everyone around her, and possibly she simply didn't want to live any longer. My possibly, not the staff's.
She said that when Great Grandma D had Grandma, that she went into some sort of post-partum depression (or what we would call post-partum depression now) and shut herself in her room for a week, and Great Great Aunt? C had to take care of the baby. And then when Great Grandma D came out of her fit she accused Great Aunt C of trying to steal her husband and her baby and my Grandma didn't see her aunts for 8 or 9 years. They had them over for dinner, Great Grandpa D and my Great Grandmum, and she refused to cook for her sisters. So Great Grandpa D went and got some things from the delicatessen and Great Grandma D made a great show of cutting a single blintz or something into thirds and serving it to them.
From what Aunt E says Great Grandma D was just a woman who never liked life, the world, or the people in it very much at all. Which fits with the only other story I have of her, which if I remember right was at my uncle's wedding (the first one, not the second one), where she accused everyone of trying to kill her. Just a generally unpleasant woman.
The other thing Aunt E said, and I didn't manage to catch enough of it in my memory to figure out whose sentiment this was, was that my mother's mother's parents' generation, siblings and so on (and I'm guessing this was either mother's mother's father or mother's mother's mother's siblings) were just utterly baffled as to why anyone would feel that way about them, want to do such things to them. The pogroms, I mean.
I should remember more of this more often.
I'm not sure how to react to the story (stories) I've just heard other than that. As always, learning about my family history from my aunt takes me a bit of time to digest.
The subject started with a woman who came into the store today about my age (apparently) and with three kids, digressed through no way am I giving my Mom any grandchildren anytime soon, and somehow managed to wind up into family history. I learned, several months ago actually, that my great grandmother, my mother's mother's mother, was a (Russian? I believe) Jew, or married to one. Or perhaps it was my mother's mother's father... yes, it was my mother's mother's father, I think (will confirm with Aunt) who was a Russian Jew who was hidden under a butcher's? floor, someone's floor, and smuggled to the United States.
My mother's mother's mother, whatever her country of origin, was also apparently subject to the influence of the pogroms. She either came over to this country or was born to immigrants, of that I'm fairly certain. It's my mother's father's mother's family, at the very least, that's been in this country for some time. And from what Aunt E tells me, she wasn't a very pleasant woman. I remember visiting her when I was very very young and she was in the nursing home, and she scared the living daylights out of me. I remember my grandmother and I pushing her around in a wheelchair. Aunt E says she died young, which, for our family, probably means in her sixties. The nursing home staff said there wasn't anything significantly wrong with her, she was just unpleasant and hated her life and everyone around her, and possibly she simply didn't want to live any longer. My possibly, not the staff's.
She said that when Great Grandma D had Grandma, that she went into some sort of post-partum depression (or what we would call post-partum depression now) and shut herself in her room for a week, and Great Great Aunt? C had to take care of the baby. And then when Great Grandma D came out of her fit she accused Great Aunt C of trying to steal her husband and her baby and my Grandma didn't see her aunts for 8 or 9 years. They had them over for dinner, Great Grandpa D and my Great Grandmum, and she refused to cook for her sisters. So Great Grandpa D went and got some things from the delicatessen and Great Grandma D made a great show of cutting a single blintz or something into thirds and serving it to them.
From what Aunt E says Great Grandma D was just a woman who never liked life, the world, or the people in it very much at all. Which fits with the only other story I have of her, which if I remember right was at my uncle's wedding (the first one, not the second one), where she accused everyone of trying to kill her. Just a generally unpleasant woman.
The other thing Aunt E said, and I didn't manage to catch enough of it in my memory to figure out whose sentiment this was, was that my mother's mother's parents' generation, siblings and so on (and I'm guessing this was either mother's mother's father or mother's mother's mother's siblings) were just utterly baffled as to why anyone would feel that way about them, want to do such things to them. The pogroms, I mean.
I should remember more of this more often.