Last week Reuben, myself and a friend Nico were enjoying lunch and the conversation moved into talk of the holocaust. I shared the experience of my visit to the camps several years ago. The memories re-appeared as if it was yesterday.
I went to Auschwitz with my father, long before we knew we were Jewish (that´s another post, another story). I was prepared for the figures of Jewish mortalities as I had learnt them in school but what took me, and my father, quite by storm were the figures for gypsies, gays, the mentally ill, the undesirables. We stood in front of a chart that explained all the different classification systems and colour coding. 375,000 Gypsies were killed at Auschwitz - a shocking figure.
As we moved down the wall of photos of victims, each one identified for their ¨crime¨against the Aryan Ideal, eyes stared out at us. We stopped in front of a section of gay men. I came out to my parents when I was 21 but it´s still an issue and it was even more of an issue back then. My father who has done an amazing job at throwing off the shackles that his English, war torn British upbringing afforded him moved a milestone and touched my arm. There were no words but that little "arm touch" was worth a monument in my mind.
But that was then and this is now. I am confronted with Reuben sitting in front of me tucking into his Sunday lunch of Iberian Pork and the tears pour out of me. Maybe I was feeling "Sunday Sensitive", maybe I was feeling hungover from a brilliant Saturday night of festivities. Reuben´s identification under the Nazi´s would have been of the most complicated. A Jewish Star made up of one black inverted triangle for having Down Syndrome, overlaid by a yellow star for being Jewish and topped with a pink bar for being gay. He was the kind of human the Nazis felt threatened the Ayran race. Those of you that know me know how much I adore Reuben. Those I´ve never met, I´ll sum it up for you; if I had to take one person to a desert island it would be Reubs. He is the most wholesome, loving, accepting person I know, who never criticises and is eternally grateful and positive. I wondered what might have become of him had he been born in Germany in 1920. Reuben is unique and under the Nazis he would have been singled out, I´m sure, but for all the wrong reasons. As I write this in 2014, I am bursting with pride and gratitude that he can live freely without threat or hindrance. He has a gay flag in his bedroom, a Jewish star on his desk and wears a T shirt from the Down Syndrome association that says "Keep Calm, it´s only an extra Chromosome."
He smiles at me and speaks his secret word "Nnya" (the name of this blog) and tucks into his pork. He is free and he is happy. He makes me happier and causes more tears to rush of of me. But these are good tears and need to form and fall.
