Hitler Made Me a Jew

by Nadia Gould

  The super of our building was a French Canadian, Madame Nunez. She was married to a Spaniard. She loved my mother. She was also the only person in the house with a telephone. She took messages for us and called us from the back yard so that the whole house knew our business even if she spoke French because her Canadian French had so many English words in it. But her partiality towards us didn’t make us popular with our neighbors. She would reassure us by telling us we had nothing to lose because these people were no good anyway.

  The family in the apartment just below us was often the focus of attention in the back yard. The man drank and beat his wife, who was frail and toothless. They had five children, all under five, whom they never took out. One day the neighbors gathered to watch the man shouting that he was going to drop his wife to the ground. He was holding her by the legs out of the window. Aghast, no one dared to move. Mrs. Nunez called the police on her telephone. As soon as they arrived, the man hauled his wife inside. The neighbors rushed upstairs hoping to see him arrested. But all they saw was the woman back on her feet, standing between the police and her husband, imploring the police, “Leave us alone. There is nothing wrong.” With her children hanging at her skirts, she begged, “Let him be.” Everybody snickered, greatly disappointed as she shut her door.

  I forgot about them until months later I met her in the street. I was not even sure it was her, she had gained weight, her hair was stylishly cut, her new teeth sparkled. She said they were living down the street where she was the super of the building. I didn’t dare ask about her husband, but later Mrs. Nunez told me he had drowned in the East River.

  To go to school, I took the Third Avenue elevated train. It was fun to look into people’s homes. At every stop I had my favorite apartment to peek into. I studied curtains or the gas ranges, the tables near the window, a cat, a dog, a man drinking in his undershirt, or a woman looking in a mirror. There was always something to look at and imagine even if no one was in. Some houses with fire escapes on the street had people lounging on the stairs, and in the hot weather I saw people sleeping out. There was an old-fashioned nineteenth century look to Third Avenue with its many junk and antique stores. I liked collecting old grammar books and I spent long hours browsing in used bookstores.

  I decided to attend Washington Irving High School as Annette had suggested. At that point I didn’t know it was a school well known for its art department. Annette had her own circle of friends, so I had to find my own friends. In Biology class I sat next to Joan. We were looking at an amoeba under a microscope. I had never heard of an amoeba before, and I didn’t know what we were expected to do with it. Joan offered to help me. She saw to it that I understood everything that was going on. She was fascinated that I was a foreigner.

  Joan had a Joan of Arc haircut and wore glasses. Her haircut made her stand out; in those days girls were not supposed to look like boys. Joan was bold and independent. She was not afraid to talk back to teachers and correct them. Because she was so smart, the teachers didn’t mind being corrected by her. They were even grateful to her. Joan was a “woman of the world.” She knew about men. They were all bad. (Her father had abandoned her mother for another woman.) She knew the workers were abused and that Negroes were unjustly treated. She also knew that there had been a Holocaust. She overwhelmed me by all she knew, and I looked up to her. I was enormously pleased to be her friend.

  She invited me to her house in Greenwich Village. It was my first visit to the Village. She met me near the subway, and on our way, we stopped at the Lafayette Bakery to buy French pastries. The atmosphere of the shop and the small streets of the neighborhood reminded me of Chatenay-Malabry. I told her how much I missed France and how strange it felt to have all these odd yearnings brought up in my throat at the sight of the quaint streets and the French pastries. Joan loved my stories of my life in France. I had at last found a true friend.

  Joan’s mother was an activist, before the word became popular, and a divorcee. She was on the side of the oppressed. She reminded me of the people in the Cité.

  Joan, her mother and brother lived in a three-story Tudor-style apartment house. As soon as I entered their apartment, I felt at home: books were scattered about; paintings hung on the walls: bright colored Mexican and Indian blankets were thrown casually on the Swedish style furniture; tall plants turned to face the sun through the windows. It was the sort of interior I would have chosen for my house if I had known about those things. Joan’s mother and brother treated me well, and for the first time since I had come to America I felt good about myself.

  When girls wore A-line skirts, baggy crew neck sweaters, pearl necklaces, white and brown Oxford shoes and bobby socks, Joan wore pants and tennis shoes. One Easter day Joan said to me, “Let’s go to the Easter Parade in dungarees!” I couldn’t think of anything more courageous to do. And so on Easter Sunday we walked down Fifth Avenue with our rolled-up dungarees. We were scorned because the Easter Parade was sacrosanct in 1944. People prepared for it months in advance. Joan and I knew that it was a big holiday only for commercial reasons—that it was Madison Avenue pressuring everyone to buy a new outfit. Madison Avenue making sure you felt there was something morally wrong with you if you didn’t have a new hat or outfit. Joan and I were ahead of our time in knowing these things when there was no alternative media to tell you the truth. We were the only ones who dared do something about it. Joan began a crusade so that girls could wear pants in our high school. In our senior year she single-handedly won us the right to wear pants. Joan was raising our consciousness before we knew there was a consciousness to be raised. At her house I met fascinating grownups: journalists, writers, poets, friends of her mother who wanted to change our society.

  My other girl friend in high school was Ingrid. She was very different from Joan. She could have been a cover girl for Vogue she was so willowy, small-chested and clean-cut. She wore the latest styles because her mother made all her clothes. She also wore a lot of makeup even though her complexion was perfect. I didn’t know then that wearing a lot of make up was a sign of insecurity. Her reticent, slow manners gave me the initiative when we were together. I thought I could protect her. We told one another secrets and that’s how I found out she liked an older man. She was not interested in boys the way I was or rather would have been if I had had a chance! Ingrid didn’t think I looked so bad. She told me she wished she could have thick hair like mine, her thin hair troubled her. I didn’t think hair was that important. But she disagreed, and told me other important things about looking good.

  Ingrid lived at Sixty-first Street at the corner of Third Avenue. Every time the elevated train passed by, her house trembled. She would say, “We’re used to it.” Her parents doted on her because she was, like me, an only child. They had come from Germany a long time ago, and she was born when they were already old. They were a devoted couple who kept to themselves and lived a conventional life. Her mother ironed on an electric ironing press that overwhelmed their cramped quarters. It was the first time I ever saw such an appliance, which I later saw only in cleaning establishments. She ironed everything: sheets, pillowcases, even kitchen towels, and their house smelled of fresh linen and lemons.

  Ingrid brought snacks to school prepared by her mother: sandwiches made of thin dark pumpernickel bread with a smelly German cheese that tasted like an overripe Camembert. Ingrid was embarrassed to eat her sandwiches because they smelled so strong. But that didn’t bother me, so she gave them to me. I was often thrown out of class, with everyone laughing, because of the smell of those sandwiches. At that time, Americans didn’t get any cheeses from France, so they knew nothing about cheese smells.

  When I was in Washington Irving High School I daydreamed a lot of having a vanity table (even though we had no space for it in our two-room apartment) with a flowered-print skirt and covered with a glass top that held many bottles of perfume. I dreamed of meeting someone who would love me, someone who would not think my looks were a handicap. In these wartime ye
ars, desirable young men were in uniform. I longed for them, but I was in no hurry because I was not ready for it. Real love was going to mean marriage and at sixteen I certainly didn’t want that.

  I discovered a group of French Girl Scouts in a notice on the bulletin board of the French Consulate. Janine was the scout leader. She was a few years older than me. She wore no makeup, had an earnest way about her, and was extremely attractive. I joined her group of six girls. The best part of being a regular member was that we could speak French during the meetings, and we could pretend we were in France. Her apartment house was near the statue of Joan of Arc on Riverside Drive. Usually we met at the statue and sang French folk songs. I never missed a meeting, and because of my perfect attendance Janine proposed me to represent the Girl Scouts at Camp Northway Lodge in Ontario, Canada.

  I was invited to spend two months at the camp in the wilderness of Algonquin Park. Miss Case, the director, lived in a small New England town. She was elderly and didn’t stay at the camp except for short visits. I remember her well! English-looking, proper, her silver hair held in a bun. She wore thin glasses and long khaki skirts pleated at the bottom. She also had definite ideas about life. My presence in her camp was an illustration of her belief that people should mix with people from other lands and learn about different cultures. Even though her camp was exclusive and catered to rich girls, she believed that her girls should live simple lives close to nature. The girls stayed in tents on the border of a lake. There were two solid and primitive log cabins, one for the cooking and the other for dining and recreation when it rained. Algonquin Park was in a reserved forest area where new construction was prohibited, and Miss Case’s camp was famous among the wealthy all over the United States. The grandmothers of the girl campers had attended the camp when Miss Case was a young director. But in spite of Miss Case’s ideals, it was a snooty place.

  I remember three things about this summer: Miss Case, the lake, mostly in the morning, and an incident on a canoe trip. The camp’s main activity was camping trips into the wilderness. An expedition group would comprise six girls with a group leader and a male guide. A new camper would begin with a test: a three-day trip. Then she could undertake longer expeditions if she showed herself capable.

  On one of these beginning trips, I imagined myself to be an Indian as we paddled in our canoe in the middle of a peaceful lake gliding on the motionless water. I watched the foliage soon to turn gold, in the distance. It was all tranquil and grand. Then a girl on the boat broke the spell, asking our guide, “What is that awful-looking purple house?” I was surprised to see the purple house in the wild.

  “It’s a shelter for fucking Jews.”

  The girls giggled and chatted about these Jews and their nerve to settle everywhere without respect for nature, and the nerve of them to have come here in Ontario from who knew where, and how disgusting they were, and how like them it was to have built an ugly purple house in this glorious nature setting.

  My throat tightened. Before I realized what I was doing I said, “My father is Jewish!” In the quiet that followed I felt a great relief and some shame. This mixture of feelings seemed to me so wrong that I promised myself never to be embarrassed about my being Jewish. I kept asking myself why hadn’t I come out with it “I am Jewish!” Did I want not to embarrass the people? Or was I ashamed of being Jewish with these people?

  Miss Case heard of the incident, and she apologized, but I couldn’t erase the memory from my mind. I told her how bad I felt not to have told I was Jewish. She said she didn’t blame me. She knew her girls were prejudiced, and that’s why she had wanted me in her camp. I guess I was the only Jewish girl in this camp. The sole representative of a minority for those days.

  The lake in the morning remains fixed in my mind: huge and silver. I liked it best early in the morning when we plunged in it as soon as we woke up. I liked to be the very first one in the water because I liked breaking the smooth surface. Then the water tickled my bare body with the most exquisite touch. We also went in the nude at night before going to bed, but I didn’t like it then as much. It was too dark, and I couldn’t see anything, but early in the morning when everything wakes up and begins it was delicious.

  Later after that summer, when she thought I was older, Janine invited me to tea. I didn’t expect to find two uniformed French soldiers when I arrived. They were training to become pilots. No one else was coming, that was clear: I could see the table set for four. I was flattered that she had chosen me to come to tea. I noticed that the most talkative soldier (and the one who looked the older) was trying hard to impress Janine. She didn’t seem to mind. In fact I had never seen her so skittish.

  I pondered about the good-looking younger soldier whose name was Jean-Marie Meunier. He explained to me that the Bretons add Marie to their sons’ names. He had to explain many different things because I was so ignorant. He was an intellectual. He liked Giraudoux, Matisse, Miro. I liked being in the company of people who knew about writers and painters even though much of what they talked about was above my head. I planned to be attentive and have Jean-Marie like me because I was a good listener.

  We had tea and cakes. When it was time to go, Jean-Marie asked for my phone number, I felt lucky I could give Madame Nunez’ number. I couldn’t bear the thought of not having a telephone number. The minute I had given the number I was already waiting for his call—almost as soon as I had left Janine’s apartment. No wonder it seemed I didn’t hear from him for an eternity. I was trying to remember his looks. Was he really as good-looking as I thought he was? Why would he like me? Did he know how dumb I was? I didn’t want him to know where I lived. Our tenement was too ugly. I didn’t want him to know I lived in a dump. I couldn’t stop thinking about him. He was the closest to a real lover I had ever had. I was pleased to be able to muse about a real person. All my previous daydreaming had been so vague. Now I had a real image to fantasize over. It was agony and delight—sweet and sour.

  Finally he called, and I could hardly speak. Madame Nunez standing close to me didn’t help either. We made “un rendez-vous,” at the corner of Fifty-fifth Street and Fifth Avenue. That had been my suggestion because I didn’t want him to see my house. We walked and walked. New York was so easy to walk in those days. There was no crime to worry about. We held hands.

  We walked all over town, going down to the piers, talking about books and novels and characters and Montherlant and Sartre and Camus (his favorites), while I was still reading old stuff, Balzac, Zola and first discovering Proust. Sometimes it rained, which made it more romantic. We didn’t kiss yet. We brushed-grazed but hardly touched, and it was tantalizing.

  One day we were to meet as usual. It was snowing. I waited over an hour on the corner of Fifty-fifth Street, but he didn’t show. I went back home with a cold. Why hadn’t he kept his word? Why hadn’t he come? Gloomy, torturous days went by, and then a letter with a distinctive handwriting from him—a handwriting that a lover should have. It made my heart throb just to glance at the address written with black thick strong lines. He was sorry we had not met. Would I come to another rendez-vous? He would explain. Shameless I flew to meet him.

  He said a friend had told him that he, too, was going with a girl called Nadine that same night we were to meet. And his friend told him that this Nadine made love with anybody. Jean-Marie didn’t want to believe it was me, my name was not Nadine, but his friend insisted it could be. The descriptions fit me. Jean-Marie decided to go to his friend’s rendez-vous to check. Then, of course, he discovered the girl was not me. By the time he came to our rendez-vous on Fifty-fifth Street, I had left. He had caught a cold too. It seemed a believable story. I wanted to believe anything as long as it meant it was going to be love. And then we kissed.

  His training was over, and he was now a pilot. He was returning to France. We promised to write, and there was more soul kissing on the benches of Sutton Place facing the East River. And we said goodbye. It was passionate. This kissing was a revelation to
me.

  I thought he had left, but that Sunday I was surprised upon returning home to find Jean-Marie. He was in my house, surrounded by my mother’s guests. The first time he had ever been in my house, the first time he had met my mother. I was deeply embarrassed, but also relieved. He still liked me even after having been in my house!

  We corresponded for many years, when he was sent to war in Indochina. The perfect absent lover.

  Chapter 12

  Summer Camp Jobs 1946-47

  While I was a junior in high school, I found a job in a summer camp for underprivileged children in Long Branch, New Jersey. It was a sad-looking camp with two rows of bungalows facing each other, separated by a rectangular space with a flagpole in the middle. It looked like a set for an army play and it was the opposite of Northway Lodge, my first camp experience in America.

  This was a camp for the poor children who came two weeks at a time to escape the sweltering city heat. The camp season was made up of five sessions. The camp was administered by a charitable agency, and as a junior counselor I received no pay. I was getting experience, however, and that was important.

  The camp was not close to the ocean, but when the wind blew, the sea air came our way. So we imagined we could smell it. Once or twice a session we went to the beach and had a look at the waves.

  I was in charge of ten campers in one bungalow. I still didn’t speak English well, but the children didn’t seem to mind. We led a military life. My only memory of it was my friendship with Gloria.

  She was an art student at Music and Art High School, which was the first time I had heard of that school. We were the only junior counselors in camp. She became my friend because she was willing to be patient with my lack of language and we were both passionately looking for boyfriends. The other girls were full-fledged counselors, one or two years older than us, and they used this age difference to patronize us. They walked around like peacocks, as if they knew everything. Gloria and I knew they were full of hot air, not as pretty as we were and in general lacking all the qualities we possessed. This knowledge cemented our friendship.