writing

A hippie homesteader in B.C.

“When I came to Galena Bay, I had been afraid of many things,” writes Ellen Schwartz in Galena Bay Odyssey: Reflections on a Hippie Homesteader (Heritage House Publishing Company, 2023). “Of the physical work I would have to do. Of trying new things I have never done before, like gardening and building and raising animals. Of living in isolation. One by one, I had attempted these things, and I had survived. I had even mastered some of them. Those fears had fallen away.”

This paragraph comes as Schwartz is atop a hill, “too scared to move,” and her skis start sliding. She survives the “ungraceful and disastrous” run, even pushes through a second one. But she can’t keep her vow to never to do that again because, in the 1970s, she lived in such a far-flung place that skiing was a necessary mode of transportation, not just a leisure activity.

It is easy to see why Schwartz chose to write a memoir about this period of her life. Born into a middle-class family – her father an internist-turned-cardiologist, her mother a teacher before becoming a stay-at-home mom to Schwartz, her younger sister and brother – and raised in New Jersey, Schwartz went to university in Chicago. There, she did all you might expect a young person with the new freedom of being on their own to do. And then some, as it was the late 1960s. She writes openly about her experiences with drugs and having sex for the first time: “I figured Ned was The One. I imagined that we’d go through our four years [at school] together and eventually marry.” That didn’t happen. Nor did Schwartz go on to lead the conventional life she imagined for herself at the time.

Instead, she went to join a close friend at a farming commune in Pennsylvania, the members of which ultimately wanted to move to British Columbia. Not intending to stay longer than summer break, Schwartz fell in love with one of the commune’s founders and, well, ended up in British Columbia with Bill, who would become her husband. The group didn’t last long, but the Schwartzes are still together, though no longer in Galena Bay, which is in the West Kootenays. They now live in Burnaby.

The young urban-raised couple faced many challenges homesteading, and Schwartz has many stories of taking on the unknown, whether it be camping along the route across the continent to British Columbia, building their own cabin (including chopping down their own trees), growing their own food, raising a child in a remote area (their second would be born in Vancouver), etc., etc. Not to mention finding work that would sustain them physically (keep them housed, clothed and fed), if not spiritually. She shares the details of her hippie days matter-of-factly, with humour and with the perspective of reflection. For example, after recounting her parents’ muted reaction to her and Bill’s homemade home, she offers potential reasons for their lack of enthusiasm.

Schwartz’s unique history encapsulates the overarching idealism of many in her generation. Her grandparents were “impoverished Jewish immigrants who had fled the hardships and pogroms of Lithuania and Poland” to give their kids a better life in the United States, so their grandchildren also were well set up for material success. The grandchildren – Schwartz and her peers – had an idea but no real understanding of the sacrifices that had been made to achieve the comfortable lifestyle they rejected, because of the racial and social inequality they saw around them, the environmental degradation and the war in Vietnam.

“Bill and I, part of the first wave of baby boomers, were in the privileged position of having enough education, enough wealth and enough leisure to be able to criticize our parents’ lifestyle,” she writes late in the memoir. “We were well-off enough to be able to turn our backs on materialism. We were prosperous enough to indulge in idealism and, idealistically, to define an entire new set of values. (At the time, I didn’t appreciate the irony.)”

But her desire to make the world a better place was – and is – genuine and remains a guiding force. Schwartz, who was a teacher for many years, began her subsequent career writing educational material. We find out in her memoir that the first fiction story she sold was released in 1980. She is now a celebrated children’s author, with almost 20 books to her credit directed towards younger readers, ranging from picture books to novels for teens to a couple of non-fiction publications. She is also a freelance writer and editor.

Galena Bay Odyssey is a wonderful glimpse into an integral part of Schwartz’s life. It also offers insight into North American hippie culture and the strength and ingenuity required to live in an out-of-the-way place like Galena Bay. That the “action” takes place in British Columbia will make the memoir of even more interest to local readers.

Meet a total mensch

Nathan Niigan Noodin Adler at the JQT Vancouver artisan market last fall at Or Shalom for Sukkot. (photo by Carmel Tanaka)

When you enter Massy Books in Chinatown, one of the main Indigenous authors featured in the centre book aisle is Nathan Niigan Noodin Adler. I smile every time I pop in because I see signed copies of his award-winning young-adult horror fiction for sale – Wrist and Ghost Lake, both published by Kegedonce Press. Of course, Nathan would take the time to sign each book! He’s a total mensch, and we met in the best of ways.

I was having brunch with my dear friend Evelyn Tauben of Fentster Gallery at Toronto’s Pow Wow Café, owned and operated by Nathan’s brother, Shawn, an Indigenous Jewish chef. We bonded over being “Jewish&” and he mentioned that he had a sibling out west and that we should connect. So, I reached out over Facebook and we met up at the Fountainhead Pub in Davie Street Village, Vancouver’s “gaybourhood,” a few months later. Since then, Nathan has become a good friend, and you’ll also see him around JQT events, sometimes tabling as a JQT artist or just showing up to enjoy the festivities and the food.

I caught up with Nathan when he was guest curating Centring Indigenous Joy: A Celebration of Literature, Arts and Creativity with Word Vancouver for Indigenous Peoples’ Day last month. The Jewish Independent asked me to attend the event and interview Nathan for the paper.

CT: In your opening remarks, you state that you are Jewish, Anishinaabe, Two-Spirit and a member of Lac des Mille Lacs First Nation. You go on to say that your father is a Holocaust survivor and that your mother is a residential school survivor. What has the journey been like for you? How has the way you introduce yourself evolved over time?

NA: Part of my idea behind the Centring Indigenous Joy event was related to the number of emotional film programs I’ve attended that are about processing historical trauma – really important work, but also kind of a downer. Sometimes a late-night shorts program full of zombies and gore is more cathartic somehow? I wanted people to come away feeling uplifted and happy rather than heavier, you know? Especially since it was an event for Indigenous Peoples’ Day, I wanted it to be celebratory. We’re more than our trauma.

Me and two of my siblings recently traveled to Europe to work on a documentary about our great-uncle who didn’t survive the Holocaust and, after visiting so many museums, memorials, internment camps and historical sites, all I wanted to do was … party!? I insisted my brother quit his delivery job so we could spend an extra two weeks outside our work on the documentary to just have fun, do touristy stuff, go to clubs and the beach. I think balance is needed.

I don’t usually include stuff about my parents being survivors in my introductions, but I felt it was part of my thought process behind the theme for the event (Indigenous joy), and I wanted people to know it wasn’t some kind of toxic positivity in the face of harsh realities, but something that I’d deeply considered. It was more about a shift in focus.

CT: How did your parents meet? And what was their families’ reaction to their union?

NA: They met in French class at the University of Guelph in 1967. My mom missed a class and asked my dad what she missed. That’s how they started talking to each other. My mom mentioned the ballet was in town (“a leading question,” she says) and he asked her out. There were very few Native people in university at that time, so it’s pretty unlikely they [would even meet], but that’s how it happened.

My Jewish grandparents were not happy about the fact he was dating a non-Jew, at least until the babies started coming – then all was forgiven!

All my mom’s family said about it was: “Oh, he’s too old for you” [a five-year age difference], but she also probably looked much younger than him at 19 years old.

CT: Where do Jewish and Indigenous cultures meet?

NT: Food and community and tradition, though the types of foods and traditions are different. Also, the inheritance of historical trauma, and overcoming oppression. You know, just a few minor things.

CT: When did you realize that you were Jewish and Indigenous? Was there a moment?

NA: I don’t remember a specific moment. I think I always just knew? We spent most weekends either going to visit our Ojibwe grandmother or our Jewish grandparents. We did the Jewish High Holidays, Passover, Hanukkah, Purim, etc., and we went to Sunday school for awhile, and in the summer our mom took us up to the reserve or out on the powwow trail and to Native community events in Guelph, where our aunt lives; there were always feasts and ceremonies. So, we always had that grounding in our cultures, where we come from. It wasn’t always a full picture though, it was also marked by absence of knowledge, language and people – relatives who didn’t survive, the knowledge that didn’t get passed down, a lot of unknowns and absences that also becomes part of who we are. Those gaps also become markers of identity.

CT: What has been your experience of being Indigenous and Two-Spirit in the Jewish community (here in Vancouver and elsewhere)? And vice versa?

NA: Well, I think it’s been pretty great here in Vancouver, thanks to the work of JQT, which really helps build community and creates space. When I lived in Peterborough, Ont., there was also a pretty cool alternative Jewish and queer scene. I went to a memorable queer Passover there once, which is one of the few gay and Jewish events I’ve been to; a gay-Jewish-boy networking I stumbled on in Toronto once; and then the JQT events I’ve attended or participated here in Vancouver, like the arts markets and the Shabbos Queen event. And I’ve been to many Two-Spirit-specific events – my twin brother helps organize the 2-Spirit Ball in Ottawa as part of the Asinabka Festival – and, recently, I went to the 2-Spirit Powwow at Downsview Park in Toronto. It’s actually pretty great being part of these communities. Queers are everywhere, so are Jews and NDNs – add in the arts scene and social networks, and it makes it easier to find community in a new place.

CT: Your jam is horror fiction and documentary filmmaking. What draws you to these genres?

NA: I love all things horror and urban fantasy. I went through a Goth phase, and I’m still a Goth at heart. So, when it comes to making my own work, it just makes sense to work in those genres. I also picked up a lot of film and video post-production skills when I attended OCAD [Ontario College of Art & Design] University in the 2000s. But I feel like fiction isn’t for everyone. A lot of people are turned off by anything that isn’t steeped in the conventions of the here and now. They see anything with an element of fantasy, and it’s too far removed from reality – though I think the opposite is true, the fantastic can make a great metaphor for exploring the realities of this world. But some stories feel like they need to be told as they are, they don’t need any dramatization or embellishment. So, it just depends on the story. The story should dictate how it gets told.

CT: You teach post-secondary creative writing, and your work is showcased in numerous art and film festivals. What are you currently working on? What is coming up next? What’s your dream project?

NA: I’m working on a short story for a horror anthology that Kegedonce Press is planning on putting out – though the story isn’t very scary so far, so I may need to write something else. I’m curating a few panels for Word Vancouver in September as part of their Literary Arts Festival, and I’ll be pretty busy with teaching again in September, which takes up a lot of time.

There is the documentary I mentioned about our Uncle Emanuel that we need to sit down and edit (many, many hours of footage to sift through to put the story together). I also have a graphic novel project that’s been on the back burner that needs to be done asap.

I’d love to write those Y/A [young adult] novels I’ve had in the back of my head for awhile, plus the next novel that’s in an unfinished state. Too many unfinished projects! Dream project: finish these ones first before I tackle anything new.

CT: Have you or your family come up with any fusion Indigenous Jewish recipes?

NA: That might be a question for my brother Shawn – he’s the chef! Though, a lot of my knowledge of Jewish cooking comes from my mom, who learned how to do a lot of cooking from her mother-in-law. I think that’s a type of fusion. Learning how to cook Jewish food by way of my Anishinaabekwe mom – even my Jewish food is Indigenous.

Follow Nathan on Instagram @rivvenrivven or on Twitter @nathan_adler.

Carmel Tanaka is the founder and executive director of JQT Vancouver, and curator of the B.C. Jewish Queer & Trans Oral History Project (jqtvancouver.ca/jqt-oral-history-bc) and the Jewpanese Oral History Project (Instagram: @JewpaneseProject).

This year’s book award winners

The fourth edition of the Western Canada Jewish Book Awards, presented by the Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival, culminated in a May 24 event at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver at which the winners in six categories – fiction, non-fiction, memoir/biography, children and youth, poetry, and Holocaust writing – were announced.

Winning the Nancy Richler Memorial Prize for fiction was Simon Choa-Johnston for House of Daughters, a stand-alone sequel to The House of Wives. Based on the author’s family, this multi-generational family saga opens when Emanuel Belilios, a wealthy Jewish opium oligarch, suddenly leaves Hong Kong, and his junior-wife, Pearl, blames Semah, the senior-wife. Pearl kicks Semah out of the mansion where the polyamorous trio had lived and shuns everyone, including her daughter. This is a story of passions and regrets, wealth and survival, set in Eurasian Hong Kong’s high society.

In the non-fiction category, the Pinsky Givon Family Prize went to Alan Twigg, editor of Gidal: The Unusual Friendship of Yosef Wosk and Tim Gidal, a selection of letters between Israeli Tim Gidal, a pioneer in photojournalism, and Vancouver scholar and art collector Yosef Wosk. In the late 1920s, with his handheld Leica, Gidal was able to travel in interwar Europe, capturing rare images of Polish Jews prior to the Holocaust. Wosk first encountered Gidal’s work in a magazine in 1991 – the photo “Night of the Kabbalist” captivated him. Wosk was determined to meet the photographer and eventually did. The two became close and the letters – selected by Twigg from hundreds the friends exchanged over two decades – both memorialize Gidal as an artist, scholar, historian of photography and “hero among the Jewish people,” and also capture the essence of Gidal and Wosk’s friendship.

The Cindy Roadburg Memorial Prize for memoir/biography was given to Marsha Lederman for Kiss the Red Stairs: The Holocaust, Once Removed. In it, Lederman delves into her parents’ Holocaust stories in the wake of her own divorce, investigating how trauma migrates through generations. At the age of 5, Lederman asked her mother why she didn’t have any grandparents, and her mother told her the truth: the Holocaust. Decades later, her parents having died and now a mother herself, Lederman began to wonder how much history had shaped her life and started her journey into the past, to tell her family’s stories of loss and resilience.

Boy from Buchenwald by Robbie Waisman (with Susan McClelland) took the Diamond Foundation Prize for children and youth writing. In 1945, Robbie Waisman, then Romek Wajsman, had just been liberated from Buchenwald, a concentration camp where more than 60,000 people were killed. He was starving, tortured and had no idea if his family was alive. Along with 472 other boys, these teens were dubbed “the Buchenwald Boys.” They were angry at the world for their abuse, and turned to violence: stealing, fighting and struggling for power. Few thought they would ever be able to lead functional lives again, but everything changed for Romek and the other boys when Albert Einstein and Rabbi Herschel Schacter brought them to a home for rehabilitation.

The Betty Averbach Foundation Prize for poetry went to Tom Wayman’s Watching a Man Break a Dog’s Back: Poems for a Dark Time, which explores the question of how to live in a natural landscape that offers beauty while being consumed by industry, and in an economy that offers material benefits while denying dignity, meaning and a voice to many in order to satisfy the outsized appetites of a few. A cri de coeur from a poet who has long celebrated the voices of working people, the collection also grapples with why “anyone, in this era so profoundly lacking in grace, might want to make poems – or any kind of art.”

Rounding out the awards was the Kahn Family Foundation Prize for Holocaust writing, which was given to But I Live: Three Stories of Child Survivors of the Holocaust by Charlotte Schallié (editor) and illustrators Miriam Libicki, Barbara Yelin and Gilad Seliktar. But I Live is a co-creation of the novelists and four Holocaust survivors: David Schaffer, brothers Nico and Rolf Kamp, and Emmie Arbel. Schaffer and his family survived in Romania due to their refusal to obey Nazi collaborators; in the Netherlands, the Kamps were hidden by the Dutch resistance in 13 different places; and, through the story of Arbel, who survived Ravensbrück and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps, we see the lifelong trauma inflicted by the Holocaust. The book includes historical essays, a postscript from the artists and words of the survivors.

Each category in the 2023 Western Canada Jewish Book Awards was assessed by five jurors, in different configurations, from the following professionals: Linda Bonder, a retired librarian; Susanna Egan, professor emeritus of literature in English from the University of British Columbia; Dave Margoshes, who writes fiction and poetry on a farm west of Saskatoon; Norman Ravvin, a writer, teacher and critic living in Montreal; Rhea Tregebov, an author of fiction, poetry and children’s picture books, and a retired professor in the UBC Creative Writing Program; Elisabeth Kushner, a librarian and writer living in Vancouver; Karen Corrin, former head librarian of the Isaac Waldman Jewish Public Library at the JCC; Nicole Nozick, former executive director of the Vancouver Writers Fest and former director of the JCC Jewish Book Festival; and Anita Brown, who is working with the Waldman Library.

Daniella Givon, chair of the awards committee, introduced the May 24 event, sharing a bit about the awards and thanking all the sponsors and participants for the high calibre and diversity of the submissions. The winning authors then said a few words, and Dana Camil Hewitt, director of the JCC Jewish Book Festival, closed the proceedings with more thank yous, and an invitation for everyone to purchase and enjoy the books.

– Courtesy Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival

B’nai mitzvah tutoring

Sasha Kaye (photo from B’nai Mitz-Van)

Sasha Kaye recently launched B’nai Mitz-Van, a tutoring service that prepares b’nai mitzvah students for their Torah and Haftarah readings. She also offers basic voice training, performance anxiety management and d’var Torah writing support.

Kaye completed a double major in voice performance and psychology for her bachelor’s degree from the University of British Columbia, and she has a master’s degree in performance science from the Royal College of Music in London, England. In her master’s thesis, Kaye examined the experiences of musicians with moderate-to-severe performance anxiety in simulated performance environments.

“I came back to Vancouver in January 2023,” Kaye told the Independent. “Most of my time so far has been spent unpacking and readjusting to life in Vancouver!”

Kaye grew up attending Congregation Har El, where she is a member. She has led services as a lay cantor. “I performed at various holiday and milestone community events, and participated in extracurricular, Jewish-led activism with peers from King David High School,” she said about her younger years.

Kaye has performed with the University Singers choral ensemble, UBC Opera, the Vancouver Orchestra Club and Postmodern Camerata, among other groups. She performs as a solo recitalist and has almost 10 years of teaching experience.

“I came up with the idea for B’nai Mitz-Van while I was still in London, and the idea was partially inspired by my master’s thesis,” she said of her latest venture. “In addition to struggling with an anxiety disorder, I had particularly vivid performance anxiety as a musician. The two collided pretty spectacularly for my own bat mitzvah. Despite being well-prepared for it, I was constantly ruminating on potential mishaps and catastrophizing the consequences. What if I got so anxious that I forgot the trope for my Torah reading? What if I forgot the words? What if my voice cracked? What if I dropped the Torah? I would let my family down. These cognitive distortions are evident to my adult self, but the distress was very real to 12-year-old Sasha. When I told people I was anxious, they told me I had nothing to be anxious about. While I’m sure they were trying to reassure me, this ultimately dismissed my feelings and made me feel much worse. I had zero tools to cope with or manage my anxiety.”

Kaye said she has little recollection of the bat mitzvah itself. “I was so anxious, I essentially blacked out,” she said. “Based on second-hand information, I did well enough on the day, but I was unable to enjoy the simchah – and that’s ultimately what the day should have been about. B’nai mitzvot should be joyous occasions for everyone, including the b’nai mitzvah themselves.

“As someone who knows how to chant Torah and Haftarah, and knowing what I know now about performance anxiety, my hope is that B’nai Mitz-Van can both teach young adults what they need to know for their special day, and also give them the tools to manage feelings of nervousness or anxiety that they may have.”

Kaye has experience teaching b’nai mitzvah-age kids from when she used to teach singing lessons, which she did for about three years, and she has five more years of experience teaching older students.

“Performance anxiety is extremely common,” said Kaye. “While it may or may not necessarily impact the quality of your performance, that doesn’t make it any less uncomfortable to deal with.

“The experience can manifest cognitively, meaning through the kinds of thoughts you have, like fixating on the possibility of making mistakes in performances and overestimating the consequences; physiologically, meaning through bodily sensations like racing heart, dry mouth, shaking or feeling restless; emotionally, like feelings of nervousness, dread or irritability; or behaviourally, like avoiding practising.

“How to manage performance anxiety is the million-dollar question!” she said. “There are a number of techniques and methods that have been researched, and different things may work for different people. Some things that can help pretty reliably, if they are practised, are feeling prepared in your material; breathing exercises, like box breathing; grounding exercises that focus your senses on the here and now; and examining your self-talk, that is, how you talk to yourself in your own mind.

“Retraining self-talk can take a long time and it can be very challenging,” she acknowledged, “but it helps to start by noticing how you talk to yourself. Would you speak that way to a friend who was going through the same thing? If not, chances are your self-talk needs some adjusting from the harsh and self-defeating to the encouraging and self-supporting.”

About working with b’nai mitzvah-aged kids, Kaye said they “are at a really fascinating stage in life. They’re starting to come into their own sense of self, and they’re able to start thinking critically about the world around them without the cynicism that can follow us as adults. There’s an enthusiasm and idealism for tikkun olam that’s really refreshing.”

And, given her years of experience as a tutor of academic writing, Kaye can help students organize their enthusiasm and their ideas into a clear and concise d’var Torah. “More importantly,” she said, “I help them find their own way of relating to their parsha, so they can find the lesson they want to share with the congregation.”

Kaye offers both in-person and online lessons. She can be reached at [email protected] or 236-515-9469.

Engaging in guided autobiography

For more than 20 years, the Second Generation (2G) Group in Vancouver has organized and participated in workshops, local and international conferences, meetings and special projects, with a goal of developing a deeper understanding of ourselves and our history, as well as leaving a legacy for future generations. This article is about how 12 members of Vancouver’s 2G community used guided autobiography (GAB) to write their stories of growing up as children of Holocaust survivors.

Deborah Ross-Grayman: For some years, I have co-facilitated the 2G Group in Vancouver. Over time, I became aware that a growing number of us wanted to write both our own stories of growing up as children of Holocaust survivors and document the survival experiences of our parents. We wanted to explore how growing up in our families, and living with a Holocaust legacy, may have shaped our responses to life’s circumstances and influenced decisions we’ve made and actions we’ve taken. I began to look for a class we could take as a group.

Wendy Bancroft: In the fall of 2020, I was leading a GAB workshop series for the Simon Fraser University Liberal Arts and 55+ Program when I received an email from the program office saying they had been approached by a member of Vancouver’s Second Generation community, looking for a writing instructor to help them document their experience of living with this legacy. There are other writing courses offered through the 55+ program but students tended to give GAB high marks for being “safe” and having a “therapeutic effect,” hence my name was suggested.

GAB is a gently structured method designed to help individuals recall, reflect on, write about and share aloud meaningful memories. Feedback focuses on the experience being shared, and theme-based writing provides a ready focus. Stories must be kept under 1,000 words and all stories are shared aloud in a small group.

It’s a method designed by renowned gerontologist and founding dean of the University of Southern California Leonard Davis School of Gerontology, Dr. James Birren, and it was originally intended as a tool to enhance life review for older adults. In addition to choosing foundational and universal themes, Birren developed a set of associated memory-stimulating questions. It was a powerful tool that has, for several years now, been shared in general populations by instructors certified through the Birren Institute of Autobiographical Studies. I am one of some 600-plus individuals, globally located, trained to lead workshops using guided autobiography.

Truth is, I was thrilled to be asked to lead workshops for the Second Generation Holocaust survivors community. Although not raised as a Jew, I learned as a young adult that my birth father was Jewish and, ever since, I’ve wanted to know more about my genetic inheritance.

Ross-Grayman: For our part, none of us was familiar with GAB, nor knew about Birren. We were attracted by the fact that it gave us a structured way into telling our stories, and six of us enthusiastically signed up.

Bancroft: Shortly thereafter, I had my first meeting with Deborah and Henry Ross-Grayman, co-facilitators of the 2G Group.

Planning the workshops

Bancroft: Deborah and Henry told me about the group and what they hoped to get out of the writing; I helped them understand what GAB was about. Then came the important task of choosing from the many writing themes offered in GAB. Deborah and Henry chose themes addressing experiences they felt would be especially relevant for their 2G community: family, spirituality and identity, facing fear and finding courage, love and intimacy, and finding resilience.

It was then my job to adapt the introductions and associated questions to be relevant and sensitive to the 2G life experience. Up to that point, my knowledge of Judaism had been limited to novels and what I had learned in the past from attending a three-night series of information sessions offered as a Taste of Judaism through Temple Sholom. I worried I might use insensitive language and references so I read books and articles dealing with Holocaust effects and watched interviews available on the internet.

Our first official GAB for 2G workshop series took place on March 14, 2020.

That this was a special group was immediately evident. Many already knew each other so they had a head start on bonding, but they were also unusually open and deeply sharing, warm and … vociferous. The term “herding cats” often came to mind. Some were already outstanding writers. One was an actress and did marvelous imitations of her parents and grandmother.

Most stories were linked to Holocaust effects and led to insights about family or other events in the past. I think here of one that had to do with driving anxieties triggered by bridges. The author remembered being 3 years old and hiding with her family under a bridge to escape bombing. While the stories could be painful, pain was often offset by laughter.

Ross-Grayman: Wendy guided us on our journey with sensitivity and care. In the first session, each of us committed to confidentiality, which created a safe container for our exploration. And, as a result, a deep intimacy developed as we shared things that some had never shared. Through the process of writing, reading and listening to our authentic and honest pieces, we increased our compassion and understanding of ourselves and each other.

In reflecting on the impact of these powerful sessions I wrote: “Like Partisans in the woods, with words our weapons, we fought for truth and liberation. Arm in arm we supported each other, witnessed ourselves mirrored in the other and found the strength to continue excavating. Our expert guide pointed the way with care. We arrived at the end of our journey full of purpose and understanding, more connected and less entangled with the past.”

What began as a six-week course for six of us, grew to a two-year writing project for 12 members: Fran Alexander, Olga Campbell, Esther Chase, Barbara Gard, Jane Heyman, Gabriella Klein, Agi Rejto, Marianne Rev, Deborah and Henry Ross-Grayman, Sidi Schaeffer and Marg Van Wielingen. A majority are in the helping professions and the arts. We were born in Australia, Hungary, Iraq, Germany, North America, Poland and Romania.

We continue to meet bi-monthly as an informal 2G writing group.

Bancroft: It has been a deep and meaningful experience for me. Over the time I’ve spent with these dynamic, compassionate and highly intelligent individuals, I’ve come to feel an even stronger attraction to Judaism. The 50% of me that is Ashkenazi Jew keeps pushing for more and more recognition.

Ross-Grayman: It is important for these stories to be recorded for posterity so future generations can have a greater understanding of the impact of the Holocaust and intergenerational transmission of trauma and resilience. This is not just for the future Jewish community, but for all communities and peoples affected by war, genocide and trauma.

We are now organizing a Second Generation anthology, which we hope to publish soon.

Wendy Bancroft has been helping people tell their stories for 40 years, eight of those as a guided autobiography instructor. In 2022, she was awarded the Betty and James Birren Award for Excellence in Practice from the International Centre for Life Story Innovation and Practice (ICLIP). More information about Bancroft and GAB can be found at storycatchers.ca. Deborah Ross-Grayman brings her background co-founding and running a woman-owned business and her work as a child and family therapist to her role, over 20 years, as co-facilitator of the Vancouver Second Generation Group. She is also a visual artist and writer, currently working on her memoir. She can be reached at [email protected].

The elements of a hit song

I freely admit it, I was one of those angsty teens who wrote bad poetry to express all my big feelings. I also wore a lot of black, but that’s not relevant here. What kind of surprises me about myself is that, despite having taken piano for years, learned various other instruments and sung in choirs since I was in single digits age-wise, it wasn’t until last year that I put some not-bad (not-great) poetry to music and wrote a song. It was inspired by my wife and it must have been beginner’s luck, because I’ve not been able to replicate that success.

This is a long preamble to why I was excited when award-winning songwriter and music consultant Molly Leikin emailed that she had a new book out: Insider Secrets to Hit Songwriting in the Digital Age (Permuted Press). While it’s too soon to say whether it will help me write another song, I did find it informative, easy to read – Leikin has a great sense of humour – and full of practical advice. I’ve just been too busy to do many of the myriad exercises and put in the time necessary to hone any skills.

There is a whole chapter on making the time to write, as well as how to quiet the inner critic, who often stops creative-aspiring people dead in their tracks. Other chapters focus on writing lyrics, composing a melody, picking a strong song title, working with a writing partner, overcoming writer’s block and other aspects of the process. There are also chapters on what needs to be done to get a song published, what royalties are, and what types of jobs you might be able to do to sustain yourself until your music can. Interspersed between the how and what chapters are interviews Leikin has conducted with some of her peers, other songwriters, producers and industry professionals.

Insider Secrets is targeted at writers who want to get into the business. And whether one succeeds at that is as much hard work as it is talent, probably more. One great aspect of Leikin’s approach is that she believes in being kind to oneself, so offers several ideas for how to reward yourself when you do put in the hard work.

“Whatever you do,” she writes, “make a point of acknowledging that you’re doing it as a reward for what you’ve just created. It is a victory in itself, just because you did it, not because your song was downloaded 10 million times. The victory starts with you.”

Ultimately, Leikin says, it comes down to persistence. It is also crucial to understand that a creative life is not a straight path, but an up-and-down one, and you have to learn how to navigate the challenges.

“A writer’s job is to write,” states Leikin. “If you do that, keep raising the level of your craft and write your fingerprint, and hustle your hustle, someday, the world will know your work. But until then, I want you to feel in your bones that you have the magic to go the distance. No Grammy can give that to you. Honestly, you have to give it to yourself, every day, all day, for the rest of your life.”

To purchase the book and for more information on Leikin, visit songmd.com.

The kill fee – and its fallout

I was honoured with the opportunity to chant the first aliyah for the Torah portion Aharei Mot. I’m still new to chanting Torah, so I practise every day. I can read and translate Torah but, for some reason, I didn’t reflect on what I was reading at first. I was chanting that very sensitive set of instructions given from G-d to Moses to pass along to his brother Aaron.

A few weeks ago, we read in Leviticus 10:1-7 that Aaron’s sons Nadav and Abihu offered “strange” or “alien” fire. Their sacrifice was overeager and unusual. They drew “too close” – in some readings of Leviticus 16:1 – to G-d and were struck down. They were killed.

After the death of Aaron’s sons, the instructions Moses passes along to Aaron are crucial. He isn’t to go into the Holy of Holies, behind the curtain, because G-d dwells in a cloud above the cover. Aaron’s sacrifices and his approach to the holiest spaces are scripted, careful and correct. When reading rabbis’ commentaries on this, their thoughts are all over the place, from quoting Sting’s lyrics “Don’t Stand so Close to Me” to talking about vulnerability and the divine. This is a text that has a lot to unpack.

As a freelancer, I do writing and editing jobs with various deadlines. Sometimes, I write a piece months in advance, submit, and hear nothing back until the publication arrives in the mail with payment. With other jobs, I get to revise and review copy edits, the editor says exactly when the piece will run and I’m paid early without prompting. Others require me to submit an invoice or I don’t get paid at all. Every gig is different. I’ve even worked for publications that have gone bankrupt before my article was to appear. So, I did all the work but, in the end, received nothing, not even a publication credit.

In other situations, I write or edit something with a short deadline. These can be very satisfying jobs that happen quickly. Sometimes, it’s a political analysis piece that runs in the newspaper. Other times, it’s a healthcare editing job that might improve the lives of breastfeeding moms. There’s a thrill to a tight deadline where I manage to get it done, and perhaps make a difference.

Before Passover, I submitted some queries (ideas) to a publication with which I’d worked before. I got a very fast response. The editor said she’d been about to write on one of these topics. Would I cover it instead? I said sure, asking for her outline and any other details she wanted included. Instead, she suggested I write it on my own, without her outline. I did this as fast as I could, as I also faced the hard deadline of cleaning and cooking for the holiday. I asked for quick feedback, since my time was limited, but I didn’t receive any.

Almost a week later, the editor asked me for revisions, asking why I didn’t include several items, which were on her mental checklist, unbeknown to me. I didn’t feel prepared to do it, but I researched and did one more rewrite before Pesach.

During the middle of the Passover, the copy edits arrived. I’d never seen so many before! Much of it seemed to ask me to prove mundane things with academic sources. Many copy editors have provided me with corrections and solutions over the years, and it’s usually just an “approve” track changes or a comment or two to move ahead. Responding to these comments took nearly three hours. I felt as though perhaps I’d written something wrong, although I’d been researching, writing and teaching on the topic for years.

The next day, I received a note from the editor. It would take too long for us to come to agreement over the edits. I was sent a “kill fee.” A kill fee is usually a quarter to a third of the amount agreed to for the whole project, if the project cannot go forward. This was a bit of a relief. I had more time for the holiday. I could be done with a hassle that already had earned me less than minimum wage.

Moments after I accepted the kill fee, the editor was on social media, writing glib jokes about the article topic and how she had to write the article herself. So, not only had I lost the gig, but there was some shame now, too. This was public “punishment.” Somehow, I’d been incapable of writing on this supposedly easy topic. With the holiday’s end and Shabbat approaching, I had ample time to reflect on the crummy experience.

For context … in the book Little Women, published more than 150 years ago, the character of Jo March is offered a $100 US prize payment for a story she wrote. I was offered $150 Cdn to write this story and paid a kill fee $50 Cdn.

When I thought back on Aaron’s painful loss of Nadav and Abihu, and how they’d been warned not to do things the wrong way, I wondered what lessons I could find there. I don’t make sacrifices at an altar. I never want to lose my children in such an awful way. However, on a much smaller scale, I pushed myself too hard to meet an elusive last-minute work goal. It cut me close when I failed, and then to be shamed via social media for it. I had my work “killed” – perhaps because my writing failed to come close enough to the editor’s ideas, or maybe because it was a little too detailed or uncomfortable and they questioned it. Who knows? Just as we will never know what Nadav and Abihu were thinking, I couldn’t be inside this editor’s thoughts either.

Unlike Aaron, I don’t have to work with this editor/client again. Aaron serves G-d, and cannot make the same mistakes his sons did. He is in a painful place where he must learn to do better. I, too, am in a place where I need to reconsider how I work and what I will work towards.

Luckily, I didn’t lose anything so precious as did Aaron. I can still explore how to make things better – it’s important to find a work/life balance that works, because that article was not worth the hassle. As the TV advertisement goes, some (important) things, like our family and holiday celebrations, are priceless.

Joanne Seiff has written regularly for CBC Manitoba and various Jewish publications. She is the author of three books, including From the Outside In: Jewish Post Columns 2015-2016, a collection of essays available for digital download or as a paperback from Amazon. Check her out on Instagram @yrnspinner or at joanneseiff.blogspot.com.

Novel informed by life

Alina Adams, author of The Nesting Dolls, spoke at a recent Zoom webinar organized by the Jewish Community Centre of Victoria. (photo from alinaadams.com)

New York City-based writer Alina Adams, author of the 2020 novel The Nesting Dolls – about three generations of Russian-Jewish women – spoke at a Jan. 27 Zoom webinar organized by the Jewish Community Centre of Victoria.

Adams began with her personal story. Born in the port city of Odessa, she spent the first seven years of her life in a communal apartment: a dwelling, including kitchen and bathroom, that was shared by two families.

“As I mention in The Nesting Dolls, these relationships were not always positive. My parents were lucky in that they got along well with the people they were assigned to share with,” said Adams.

In 1976, her parents decided to emigrate. Two years earlier, the United States had passed the Jackson-Vanik Amendment, which linked U.S. trade with the free movement of Jews and other groups in the Communist bloc.

“I like to say we were traded for wheat,” Adams quipped.

To those leaving the USSR, she said, “it was like stepping off the edge of the earth. You didn’t know where you were going, you didn’t know what life would be like when you were there, and you certainly knew you couldn’t come back.”

The family’s first stop was Vienna. From there, they took a bus to Rome, where they stayed for four months before traveling on to North America in January 1977, first to New York and then to San Francisco.

Adams recounted some of the reactions upon coming to America in the 1970s as a young child: for example, the surprise of watching a television screen in full colour. It was television, namely soap operas, that Adams later credited for helping her learn English.

The young immigrant started out in a Jewish day school, where the differences in various customs – her life in the new versus the old world – became very apparent. Parents in North America, she recalled, did not send their kids to school in the same dress every day; they used Band-Aids instead of green antiseptic to treat cuts; and, if their child had the sniffles, they did not place the child’s feet in hot water and then into socks filled with dried mustard.

Over time, Adams and her family got the hang of life in America. She graduated high school and college. All along, she knew she wanted to be a writer.

“My parents claim my first words were ‘pencil’ and ‘paper,’” said Adams. “And what’s the advice all writers get? Write about what you know. Well, what did I know? I knew about being a Soviet immigrant. I knew about living a culture that wasn’t mine.”

Publishers, at first, were not interested in those themes. Nonetheless, an editor at Avon Publishing did like her writing and contacted Adams, asking if she would write a Regency romance. This would become The Fictitious Marquis, a unique book in the Regency romance genre in that Jews are central characters.

Adams now has more than a dozen titles to her credit, including mysteries, books on figure skating (non-fiction) and other romances.

About four years ago, Adams’ literary agent told her that editors were becoming interested in Russia, and this led Adams to write The Nesting Dolls. The novel begins in the Soviet Union of the 1930s and ends in 21st-century, pre-pandemic Brighton Beach, in New York City. It focuses on the lives of three generations of Russian Jewish women in one family; the periods parallel those of Adams’ grandmother, mother and herself.

For Adams, it is the everyday events that are the most fascinating part of writing historical fiction. “Anyone can look up which date Nikita Khrushchev denounced Joseph Stalin, but it is the small details which make historical fiction compelling,” she said.

As an example, she pointed to a personal account she used in the novel. According to her mother, Adams did not want to be breastfed. This caused her mother to go to a doctor and ask him to write up a prescription for yogurt. “These are the little things, in this case how difficult it was to get regular foodstuffs in the Soviet Union, that bring a situation to life and show the reader what an era was like,” said Adams.

The novel was scheduled to be released in 2019 but was delayed to 2020, which, for Adams, turned out to be a blessing for the story’s timeline, in that she wasn’t finishing it during the pandemic. The last section of the book takes place in pre-pandemic Brooklyn in summer. “The things my characters do in the summer of 2019, they could not have done in the summer of 2020,” she said.

Adams lives in New York with her husband and their three children. She has written about her interracial, interfaith and intercultural family for Interfaith Family Magazine and the Forward, and has written columns and articles for dozens of publications.

Sam Margolis has written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.

Writing story of the moment

(photo from flickr.com/photos/lukas_photo)

“Identity is a narrative of the self – it’s a story we tell about the self in order to know who we are.” (Stuart Hall)

In our day-to-day lives, we are always telling stories. We tell these stories to one another and in our own minds. A story is anything that we communicate to ourselves. Stories are how we create and communicate content, understanding and relevance between random events and details. I engage with stories through my therapeutic practice, Threads Education and Counselling, by way of narrative therapy.

When you sit down and reflect upon the story that you have been living lately, or what I like to call your “story of the moment,” you begin to shed a mindful light on how you are feeling and experience an embodied sense of knowing.

Ask yourself: what is the story that you have been living lately? The lived stories are often multifaceted; can be contradictory and not linear. Is it a story, to name some possibilities, that includes struggle, hope, perseverance, love, anger, disappointment, grief, overcoming, expansion, growth, steadiness, survival or rapid change? How would you describe your “story of the moment”? What is sitting heavy inside? What are you preoccupied with and why?

It is important to explore your “story of the moment” and start in this place in order to gain insights. We gain insights relationally, through getting inside the stories where they are living and contemplating them. Describe your story in five to seven sentences. Some people like to narrate their stories aloud, others like to write or type them out in a contemplative writing practice through which I guide them.

Once the story is expressed, ask yourself if this is the story you want to be living right now. Explore the reasons why and the reasons why not. This allows a jumping off point into expanding on the “story of the moment” and looking at outside and institutional influences (family, school, work, relationships, location, age, gender, race, class, religion, health) that impact the stories we live. As a trained witness and narrative therapist, it is my job to ask questions of how circumstances, events and your particular social locations are colouring the stories that you are living and breathing inside and alongside.

In my practice, we would then explore if you need to make some significant changes in your life in order to change the story; if there is a way you can shift perspectives to understand your current story in another way; or if there is a new story that you can tell and inhabit in place of the story you have been living inside of and are speaking about.

Mindfulness grounding techniques, thematic prompts and the possibility of expressive art techniques help round out and fully access the complexities of the stories inside.

Here is an exercise I do to explore the narratives of our lives. I ask my clients to create a self-portrait. Many choose to draw themselves, while others stick with words and create rich descriptors based on self-reflection of who and how they are today. This prompt allows the “story of the moment” to appear from the corner of the heart of mind, untangle from the mess in a drawer and reveal itself so that it can be expressed and understood.

Therapeutic letter writing

A letter is a form of written communication addressed to someone that expresses meaningful messages. In the context of counseling, letter writing has a long history and, in the 2007 book Stories as Equipment for Living: Last Talks and Tales of Barbara Myerhoff, Myerhoff writes about how we can be “nourished by the stories being fed back to ourselves” in the genre of a therapeutic letter. Specifically, in the narrative context, therapeutic letters are used with the purpose of creating double story development, where the listener provides an acknowledgement of the problem as well as rich descriptions of alternative stories that were hidden within the dominant “problem” story.

The therapeutic letter, and the practice and process of writing, offers a tangible and layered documented expression of the complex, beautiful, layered and innovative ways in which the people I work with are responding to the problems in their lives. The letters serve to connect them with the many stories that are circulating around them and permeating inside their mind, as well as embodied within them. Simply, therapeutic letters work in tandem with the therapeutic session to connect them with the stories of their lives. Some people I work with actively respond to the letters I send them, with a response in the form of a returned letter, or a poem, drawing or conversation.

Crafting a therapeutic letter demands that the health practitioner carefully and mindfully reflects on the therapeutic conversational sessions that just concluded. For me, letter writing provides me the crucial opportunity and space to critically reflect on my practices and facilitates further growth and insight on how I can craft more expansive questions, as well as opportunities for the people I work with to engage with their stories with me alongside as an active, trained witness.

Letter writing within narrative therapeutic practice enables a deepening of the work of revising an individual’s relationships with the central issues, preoccupations and problems that inform, colour and get entangled up and inside their selves, bodies and lives. Letters are a tangible product that both allows for and demonstrates active listening and validation. It is an evolving and emergent practice, grounded in the contradictory, the complex, the fluid. It has the ability to hold and express multiple stories of the moment that we all hold, carry and live out in our lives.

Dr. Abby Wener Herlin is a feminist narrative therapist who works with tweens and adults, and a social emotional learning/social justice educator. Her website is threadseducation.com. These discussions of narrative therapy were originally posted at health-local.com/author/dr-abby-herlin.

Making musical amid COVID

Anton Lipovetsky is among the professional artists working with Studio 58 to develop Monoceros: A Musical. (photo by Dahlia Katz)

In the face of a pandemic and all its associated restrictions, the show is going on at Langara College’s Studio 58 – albeit in a very different way. Monoceros: A Musical runs through the end of March and features the contributions of two Jewish community members: writer Josh Epstein and composer/lyricist Anton Lipovetsky.

In contrast to other Studio 58 productions, Monoceros is seen as a “development lab,” an opportunity for the creators to tweak the piece, while allowing students to work on a new musical and learn about the process. The production is not a performance in a traditional sense, as the public will not be able to come and watch it. Ordinarily, shows are performed in Langara’s 100-seat theatre, but this is the first time Studio 58 has created a production outdoors – because of the risks of singing inside.

photo - Josh Epstein — Josh Epstein *(photo from Studio 58)*

Adapted from a Suzette Mayr novel by Epstein and his business partner, Vancouver writer/director Kyle Rideout, Monoceros tells the story of Faraday, a high school wallflower who dreams of becoming a famous veterinarian. When Ethan, a classmate known for wearing a unicorn outfit, dies unexpectedly, Faraday sets off on a quest to fulfil Ethan’s last wish.

“The book starts with one of the most powerful chapters I’ve ever read,” Epstein told the Independent. “I was engaged from the first sentence, my heart was drawn to every word. I, too, lost my best friend much too early and I felt very connected to this book. We were about to turn the book into a film, for which we had funding, but, at the same time, we felt a musical bursting out of it and attached Ben Elliott and Anton to write the music. We fell so in love with the musical that we halted the film for now to keep working on the piece. Our show tackles difficult subject matter but in a fresh, humorous way, daring the audience to go on a wild adventure and to listen.”

“I read the book and I loved it. It was heartbreaking and brutal and honest – the kind of book that really stays with you after you read it,” said Lipovetsky. “We decided to centre the story more on a singular character, Faraday, and her quest to bring unicorns to Calgary in honour of the student who passed away. Her quest challenges who she is as a person and she discovers herself along the way.”

Putting on a production in 2021 is “completely wild,” said Epstein, an award-winning actor, writer and producer. “Until the day we started, we had no idea if it would actually happen. Now, here we are with a full tent city built by Studio 58, a rock concert sound setup and an incredible creative team that includes one of Canada’s top directors, Meg Roe, and Lily Ling (Hamilton’s musical director) – who was only available to us because Hamilton is on hiatus.”

Epstein emphasized that, “while the show’s path has been altered by COVID-19, the team has used the time to strengthen the script and score, as well as attach some of the best people around [to the project]. Above all, the process is very safe and we’re having fun being able to work together, if only from a masked distance.”

“Acting, singing and connecting with your collaborators while most of your face is covered is not easy. The students are doing a wonderful job,” Lipovetsky said. “And rehearsing outdoors during early March in Vancouver can be challenging – but sometimes it’s magical. There are moments where the students’ voices soar in beautiful harmony and the sun will come out above us and I’ll feel real joy. I have missed making music and theatre so much and I’m grateful to get to do it even under these strange circumstances.”

In addition to the staff and faculty who are involved, Studio 58 has 10 professionals working with the students, 14 student performers, and many other students helping with technical requirements. One of the top theatre schools in Canada, with the only conservatory-style program in Western Canada, the professional theatre training program at Langara is in its 55th season. It typically produces four main-stage productions a season, ranging from dramas, to comedies, to musicals.

Monoceros is commissioned and supported by Toronto’s Musical Stage Company and funded by the Aubrey and Marla Dan Foundation. The show has an elaborate development road planned out that will include workshop productions in British Columbia and Ontario – culminating in Toronto – before continuing to other stages.

Epstein, whose work has taken him around the world, is currently writing an original feature for Paramount with Rideout. Lipovetsky is an acclaimed composer, lyricist, performer and teacher, and he is currently an artist-in-residence in the Musical Stage Company’s Crescendo Series.

For more information about Studio 58 and its programs, visit langara.ca/studio-58.

Sam Margolis has written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.