Writing Assignment #1

Imagery: 

It’s that sort of giddy feeling you get. When the mitochondria powered elevators in your gut don’t remember which way is up, and just start butterflying about. It’s the feeling when you know that someone has nothing to give you, but still manages to give you something. Now that’s beauty. To some it’s the final dimes of a paycheck being spent on your favourite bag of chips. To Karen Weese, an author for the Washington Post, it’s her friend who tipped 5$ at a Denny’s even though she “worked as a caregiver and was raising two kids on less than $19,000 a year.” How can someone who is in an inescapable hustle for a minimum living still be generous? Weese dictates that it’s empathy by proximity. Humans have the innate ability to feel for themselves, and the more they see themselves in others, the more empathetic to those they become. The issue arises as we climb closer to the ‘One Percenters’ of the tax bracket. While a poorer person looks around and sees crowded markets, overflowing with similar people. On the other hand, rich people look around to see vast, empty and lonely savannahs. That’s why “John Paulson gave $400 million last year to Harvard University, his alma mater, and not to, say, Habitat for Humanity.” It seems as if the thicker the wallet, the thicker its asbestos walls become.

Scene: Great Grandmother’s story

She had 2 parents, 4 grandparents, 12 brothers and sisters, and a near exponentially increased number of cousins, nieces and nephews. While many families this sprawled out, and copious in size tend to fall on the poorer side of the spectrum, hers did not. They owned a variety of beer factories, giving them enough money to comfortably bathe in the finest of Poland’s riches. My mom told me that she was the only 4 foot 9 polish grandmother who can drink a beer. My great grandmother came from a family that had it all, and had all of it to give her. But they were Jewish. And the 1930s were not kind. While some may call it fate, luck or a lame apology from their creator, it was love that in turn saved her life. In the early 1930s, my great safta found her Romeo. It wasn’t an easy ride off into the sunset, because much like the play, the Capulet’s were unfond of Juliet’s boyfriend. This led to their great escape; a harrowing bolt to the land of Israel. She went from riches to rags, upgrading from a 5 star suite to a tent and a Torah in the desert. Now while love saved her life, it was not as empathetic to her family’s. While she never saw her family again, I got to: peaceful, in a pile of ash, at the centre of Majdanek.