Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

Erna Blitzer Gorman - April 26, 1984

Life in the Barn IV

Okay, what shall I tell you next? Um, still in the barn. Well, I, I remember how I used to sit. Uh, uh, there was one corner um, I would um, sit with my legs very close to my... and just sort of had my arms around me sort of like this and hold very tight. That was my favorite position. Uh, I'm sorry I gotta regain myself. Okay what can I tell you about this time? Um, the just endless looking for lice in our hair. And you know the seasons were, you know, especially in the summertime it would get, you know, there were drastic seasons. It was very cold and it was very hot. And uh, you know, in... My favorite time which I--my favorite time--it prac... ??? the kids playing outside and I would imagine them being in the water and playing or, or, or something, um... Anyway, whenever um, whenever it was getting very bad um, I... My mother and I um, had sort of like a special... She was, she... All she had to do was look at me, that kind of a relationship. I, I guess I must have admired her a great deal because uh, I can't find any fault with her at all, really. But um, she still uh, she's a, to, to maybe to, to relate to the stories that my father was telling us, she used to take my face and, and cau... Say uh, "Don't cry my Kleine ???" Um, see maybe I was imagining all kinds of. Any rate. Um, maybe it has something to do with my, my mother calling me Esther. I was an Esther, actually, not Erna. I don't know, all these fantasies in a, in a small kid's mind.

You mean fantasies about your name.

Oh no, no, I mean, I wa... I'm thinking why did she call me this. She always used to call me my ??? I don't know why, and so, I'm trying to... I, I have to find a rationale for everything. So, maybe because of the stories and maybe I, I, I was fantasizing at the time, I don't know. So, that was for...


© Board of Regents University of Michigan-Dearborn