After a night of editing....

Wilma and Ernesto Reich (1980s)

Above are two recently dug-up photographs of my maternal grandparents (Oma and Opa), Wilma and Ernesto Reich. Unfortunately, my Opa died when I was still a young girl. I was extremely close to my Oma and hers was the first oral history I collected. She died only 3 years ago in 2005 at the age of 91.

After a whirlwind two-week courtship with Ernesto Reich, my Oma (originally from Berlin) moved to El Salvador from Amsterdam in 1938. With the majority of her family killed in death camps only a few years later, she never saw her mother, brother, sister-in-law, nephew, and niece again.

Hers was a hard life...but she always lived it gracefully, inspiring me to no end.

You can find her complete story in an anthology edited by Marjorie Agosin, entitled "Taking Root: Latin American Jewish Women Writers."

Many thanks to Ruth and Paul Feldman for the photograph.

May 16, 2008: REVERB. Salt Institute for Documentary Studies. Spring 2008 Show

One of the nuns from my radio piece. Sister Mary Emmanuel Masson, 91 years old, rides her exercise bike for "five minutes every day."