“Vigil,” watercolor woodblock print by Annie Bissett, from a series called “Playing with Fire” anniebissett.com
I share here about my grandmother’s light. Killed in the Holocaust, she is one of the grandparents I never met, but who reached me anyway. I hope that you will read the story and receive what was not meant only for me.
Fifteen years ago, my father had a dream that offered me a life-changing answer to the question: Is it all right to be happy?
The daughter of Holocaust survivors, I had carried this question since a young girl. As I became an adult, although I wanted to believe that the answer could be, “Yes, of course, it’s okay to be happy,” I still couldn’t accept this to be true or even possible.
The belief that it’s not all right to feel happy (or free, or successful, or too relaxed, etc.) when others are suffering had taken up residence in my DNA.
What right did I have to happiness in the face of the nightmarish brutality my parents had faced in the Holocaust, and given the ongoing injustices suffered by countless others throughout the world?
If I hadn’t called my father just when I did on a particular morning, I might never have found out about his dream and its transformative message In fact, both might have been lost.
I phoned my father in Philly from my home in Massachusetts at around 11 AM, surprised and a bit concerned to find that I was waking him. His voice was more than groggy. He sounded unusually subdued as he told me that he was sad, very very sad.
Then, as if he were recalling it at that very moment, he said quickly, “I dreamed that I died and I went to—how do you say it in English?Ha’Shomayim. Heaven, that’s it. I dreamed I died and went to heaven.”
I had never heard my father, whose first language is not English, ever say the word heaven, much less talk about it as somewhere one goes after dying. I didn’t think he even believed there was a heaven—in any language. I remained silent for fear of dispelling what subtle dream images might be still within his grasp.
“When I was there…when I was there, I saw…”
It seemed difficult for him to get the words out. I was relieved when he continued.
“I saw my mother. This was my first dream of her since the day she sent me away to save my life. I was a boy.”
I could hear him crying. I pictured his head hanging, shoulders rounded. How I wished he could feel my love spanning the three hundred miles between us.
“Tell me about the dream, dad,” I said softly. He drew in and let out a long breath.
“I was in a big, big field. I knew right away it was Ha’Shomayim. I don’t know how I got there and how I knew it was heaven, but I did. There were women, so many women, all standing. They were my mother’s age, all of them holding candles. Every one of them. When you looked out you saw flames as far as you could see; every woman held a candle in her hands.”
“I knew, don’t ask me how,” he went on, “that my mother was there somewhere among them. I looked but couldn’t see her. I needed to find her because I knew she was there. I kept looking and looking!”
“I began to ask— like a crazy person—going from one to the other asking if she knew Simmah Tuzman, if anyone had seen Simmah Tuzman.”
He was breathless in the middle of the search he was describing. I felt as if I was looking with him for the grandmother I had never met.
“Finally, I saw her from a distance,” he said. “I ran to her. That’s when I saw that her candle was not burning. She was the only one who held a candle that was not lit.”
“Mamesha,’” I begged her, suddenly so afraid, ‘Why isn’t your candle lit like the others?’” My father’s voice was desperate, insistent. “I begged her to tell me why hers was the only candle not burning!”
“’Arralha,’ she answered me, ‘you keep putting it out with your tears.’”
My father cried harder than I had heard him cry in years, maybe ever. I did not expect him to interrupt the heaves of his grief when he did.
“I know why she came,” he announced, his voice changing as if he had decided to pull himself together. I felt him back in his apartment now, having left heaven.
“She came because I called to her, I asked her to help me.”
Just as it was the first time I had heard him talk about heaven, this was also the first time I could remember my father asking one of his deceased parents for help—actually asking anyone for help other than a well-to-do distant relative he asked for a loan when newly immigrated from Poland. My father was the strong one who helped others, who saved others— and who had failed to save his mother. Now, asking his mother for help?
“I wanted to end my life last night,” he said, his voice slowed down and lower. I took a lot of aspirins and I drank and drank. Then I went out. It’s a miracle I didn’t crash the car. I wanted my life to be over.”
Had I really heard him? Not only was my father a savior in his own eyes and in the eyes of many others, he was also the ultimate survivor, the one who had and would always defeat death. I had heard my mother speak of wanting to end her life during World War II, but I had never heard my father even come close to uttering what he considered defeat. To die, let alone to wish to die, was the ultimate failure—unless one were taken captive, like his mother and younger brothers, with no way to defend themselves.
My father went on to lament how hard it was to care for my mother, how angry he was at the disease of Alzheimer’s, at my mother for giving in, at me for not being there more, and at God, for betraying him again as God had betrayed six million Jews, and many since.
My father’s mother and her candle waiting to be kindled seemed left in the dust of his lament.
I had been listening to him rage for several years against the disease claiming my mother, his life-long companion. Of late, his anger had been aimed more and more often at my mother, which had been so difficult to witness.
“Dad,” I urged, “your dream. Your mother. She is trying to give you a message, I think.”
I heard what sounded like a grunt that I hoped I was imagining, but seemed to be his dismissal of the dream and my words. I tried again as gently as I could, wishing he would hear me, really hear me.
“Dad, I think she is showing you that it is your joy she needs, not your sorrow.”
No answer. Could this dream, such a powerful experience and with his mother no less, possibly pierce my father’s despair, anger and self-pity?
“I have to go now,” he said clicking the phone down before I could say anything else.
In the weeks, months and even years that followed, when I would speak of his dream, my father would shrug, turn away or change the subject, but never engage with me about it.
I came to realize that I was powerless over whether my grandmother’s dream visit would change my father. But it could change me. I could cherish the dream’s gift. I decided that my grandmother was sending me a message— not to the exclusion of my father; it was a transmission to both of us. If he could not receive it, I would.
Her message? More suffering does not relieve suffering.
We can serve those who are suffering through our joyous love. My joy is what gives my grandmother’s life, and even her death, meaning.
My grandmother revealed not just a one-time answer to my question, but rather, a perennial one.
It is not only all right to be happy, it is life giving. Being happy brings Light into darkness—and not just into my own shadows. To be fulfilled and present frees us and, mysteriously, even redeems the past. It is my inner joy and peace that invite more joy and peace into the outer world.
This was not a message that my father, as I was growing up, knew how to impart to me or even to receive while he was alive.
Buba Simmah, whom I never knew and whose name I bear, I thank you for coming through time and the vessel of my father’s sacred dream to bless my life with your soul’s Light. I shall imagine my father, your son, standing beside you now with his own candle, kindled from yours.
Rest now, Dad, in the shelter of your eternal flame. I love you.
Your comments make this a conversation. Please share your comments with me below!
Note: To avoid spam, all comments are filtered before being posted. So if your comment is not posted right away, that’s why. It will be within 24 hours and likely with a reply from me! Thank you in advance for taking the time to share with me!
My dear, dear sister,
You are a gifted writer. We are blessed by your ability to express your feelings so eloquently! I can see dad crying and feeling the dream AND I can see him shunning it. He needed to be so strong. But we don’t need to be and we can let this loving message come through and retain its profound message.
Ani,
What a gift to you your father’s dream (and your synchronistic phone call to him soon after it)! And what wisdom your heart holds to make use of it as a transformative indicator that has reshaped your life—and the life of all whom you have touched.
xxoo
Stephanie S.
To be fulfilled and present frees us and, mysteriously, even redeems the past.
Loved your story, Ani, yes, yours but also your dads. As you publish this, if he is not in heaven now, you just kicked him up a notch from the joy you have given him.
What can we do in the face of great suffering that does not add to despair and hopelessness as we bare witness? If all life is interconnected, which I believe that it is, then sending our love , light and prayers can help ease that suffering. As we read in the writings of those who have experienced war, ill health, or great trauma, there has been heroism and a triumph of the human spirit even in the most horrendous circumstances. Also, the horrors of the past may contribute to a greater understanding and compassion of those who have witnessed the suffering and are choosing in the present to see the oneness of all life and to make the planet a more caring , loving, just and peaceful.
Such as you
Thank you so much , you always inspire me,
Linda
Linda, thank you! There is such great solace in trusting our interconnectedness, our interbeing, as Thich Nhat Hanh called it. I find such comfort and inspiration in believing that our prayers, our longing for the lessening of suffering, our compassionate witnessing, and our resistance when it is called for, all DO make a difference.
Your words call forth an image I saw many many years back of a web around our planet made of countless tiny lights. There were so so many, truly countless, each one, truly a source of energy. I love thinking of those countless lights–that is each of us who wanting to send love is in fact radiating light and making a difference. I know you are one of those lights. A strong and steady light.
Thank you for inspiring me and many others,
Ani
Beautiful, wonderful Ani
I am completely touched, saddened, and gladdened by this story and its messages. Tears of beauty and wonder flow from my eyes as I read.
Now I take your story one and two generations further from this time and see how your grandmother, your father and your mother’s legacies created your amazing soul and how through the generations, so much light, goodness, strength, and beauty reside in you and your children and grandchildren. So now you live in gladness and freedom and you teach the rest of us how to live sacred lives. I am stunned by the legacies and the grace-filled outcomes that you all embody. Namaste, Ani. Deep bow.
Oh Dear Elaine, thank you. What you have written and reflected means a great deal to me. And also, speaking of forgetting and reminding each other, you have reminded me of another profound experience.
Years ago, in what felt like we were in a liminal space between realities, my father actually came to meet the meditation master central in my life who he had shunned until then. He was so moved by meeting her, he wrote her afterwards, sending a number of clippings about events that had happened in the Holocaust. She responded, thanking him and saying that his daughter and grandchildren would “carry the torch of love.” He seemed to dismiss the reply, clearly having hoped for something else. He never wanted to talk about that message or the teacher again, tossing me her letter. Like with my grandmother’s dream, I was given and heard the message. Your sacred comment here has just reflected back what was illumined all those years ago before I even had grandchildren who are indeed lights!
I believe it is grace that has enabled me not to be more wounded by my past, to be metabolizing the pain so that it is fuel for love.
Namaste, dear one.
Ani
Dear dear Ani,
Your story arrived at a time I most needed it; what a compelling message! How you weave the generational narrative; how it is you who is summoned to find light in the darkness is a sacred gift. Thank you, dear friend.
Although the story takes place in the past it resonates with what is unfolding now in the world….how in the face of all that is toxic, it is critical to find “what is good..” Interesting… for my adult poetry class, I have created a theme: “Finding the Good in our Broken World.”
Sending love and Gratitude,
Ann
Amen, Ann, to “how in the face of all that is toxic, it is critical to find what is good.” I know that I am lost without that. I had a profound experience in my childhood of seeing the goodness where I did not expect it. ( I write about this in my forthcoming memoir.) Like my grandmother’s message, that also was a pivotal, life-changing experience for me. Still, I forget. Then I remember. And forget again. But even in my forgetting, the impact of the knowing remains. We are fortunate (are we not?) to have glimpsed the Good—call it essence, call it Soul, Self, Source—within each human and other life forms. It is the complete ignorance of that truth that is so dangerous.
Keep being the Light, Ann.
Ani
This is so beautiful, and a message I needed to hear. Thank you.
Christine, I am so grateful that my grandmother’s message landed from her heart through my father’s through mine to yours. All One. As a friend said to me years ago: the One who is many that we might remind each other when we forget.
🤗
Ani
Ani, I am moved by the question . Is it all right to be happy when other are not?
I’ve wrestled with this all my life. Growing up with an ill younger brother, and finding in my nature, to quiet my needs, hopes and joys thinking that would make more room for his. Somehow we might be lead to think Joy is finite. That if we feel it there is less remaining for others. Even in competitions (very different theme) I only feel good to strive to win when the competition is internal, there is not someone else’s unique story and disappointment to cushion.
Thanks so much for your beautiful sharing. I am honored by being a small part of your inner circle.
oh beloved Mindy..yes, yes, a beautiful response to Ani’s moving, rich story…I am weeping and weeping here. In its depths, so many of us know the outlines of those losses and griefs…and our poor society, so ignorance and unskilled at helping us navigate those troubled waters. And then people like you and Ani and many others come with their great stores of blessing, and we begin to take some courage and then take some steps out of these wretched self-silencing and self-imprisoning “rules”….sigh….much love to you both, alwaays
Ah Penny, so good to feel your open open heart. Talk about someone who brings great stores of blessing—whose writing and life inspires us to “take steps out of these wretched self-silencing and self-imprisoning ‘rules.'”
Your tears bathe the heart, as my meditation teacher has described such tears of love and longing.
May we be the light we long for… and help summon it through our very longing for it.
With respect and love,
Ani
Dear Mindy,
Thank you for what you have shared about your own experiences and contemplation as you’ve wrestled with this question.
I believe you are on the pulse when you say that we have the illusion that “joy is finite. That if we feel it there is less remaining for others.” How liberating to free ourselves from that illusion. To know the supply is infinite and we expand it by allowing and feeling joy.
And in response to your last line…I am honored by your being an important part of this inner circle!
With love,
Ani
Oh Ani,I’ve read this before, but reading it now again…what a gift you and through you all of us, have received. Thank you.
Thank you, dear Susan for receiving this rare and amazing gift that was given me and that I still manage to forget! I seem to regularly forget the deeper truth of my grandmother’s message. I saw the signs of that forgetting recently (as I wrote to Cie below). I knew I needed reminding. I imagined some others might as well.
I receive the gift again when I share it. And I feel such immense and tender gratitude when it is meaningful to others.
🙏🏽
Ani
As always, my dear unmet friend Ani, your words have woven a most beautiful message. I can see every scene you describe, the ones in this reality and in the other. As above, so below. And vice versa! The lines of communication are there if we are ready to have them opened! So glad your Buba Simmah came through…for all of us who read this story. Thank you!!
Dear Unmet Friend Wanda, thank you for receiving as you do.
I love “the lines of communication are there if we are ready to have them opened.” A beautiful reflection.
One day, we will meet! (I believe that you will love the new book, Angels on the Clothesline. A book very different from The Tremble of Love, but also infused by love.)
B’shalom,
Ani
As always Ani, you come from a place of unconditional love. You are a gift to the world. The timing of reading this is very synchronistic, as I have been dismayed by all the violence and lack of love that seems to be everywhere. Lately, there have been some experiences that have emphasized this for me, so I’ve been pondering how I can be a force for Love when I feel so down. Your story helps tremendously to remind me to BE in the energy of what I want to see more of in the world.
Also, my mother, who was a health fiend all her life, died of Alzheimer’s when she was 90 and last night I was doing research on it. Anthony William, the Medical Medium says it originates from old Epstein Barr virus which many of us had passed down to us from our mothers. So, the good news is that doing protocols to weed out the virus may very well insure future health. As they say in Jersey – It couldn’t hoit (hurt) Lol
Thank you, and much love and happiness to you
UPDATE: Oops Ani. I confused his “cause of Alzheimer’s” with his cause of Thyroiditis since I was researching both. He says the cause of Alzheimer’s is toxic heavy metals. Just wanted to set that straight both for us and for anyone else reading these comments. Thanks.
Oh Cie, The other day, on my way to play the game Spelling Bee, I passed headlines about more tragedies in Ukraine. I saw the part of me that clutched up inside at passing by these on my way to playing this game–which in itself is a new pursuit for me and that I have to give myself to play, rather than doing something more productive–and that is when I don’t see the headlines. I knew then that I needed reminded as I felt the question arise again: how can I be happy?
And, just as you write, the question lives and pulses in me, pretty much all the time, about how I can contribute and help–how I can be the love that I yearn to see expressed among us.
I figured that I was not the only one and from there came the impulse to share this again.
Keep shining, Cie!
Love,
Ani
PS. God bless our mothers. May we both continue to live with all our marbles. (There is probably a better way to say that!). Let me try again: may our minds be clear and strong and our hearts expansive, tender and strong. 😉
Ani
Such a profound and beautiful story.
I know your joy and light has brought me hope in darkness on many occasions.
And I know, dear Faith, that your light and tender heart have illuminated the way for others. How fortunate that we are all lights on the path—-and that when some of us cannot see our own light, we beam and remind each other. You are reminding me.
With much love,
Ani
“marbles” is okay to use too. Remember, I’m a Brooklyn girl. We always used “marbles” Lol
Oh, Ani, what a beautiful story! Thank you for sharing it.
Thank you, Peg, for reading it.
That is a gift in itself.
With gratitude for this and more,
Ani
Ani, what an amazing and beautiful story of Love, Compassion, Yearning and Acceptance.
Thank you for the Gift you continue to give us as you seek to keep alive, the powerful Truths of Love, Death and Healjng. I feel so grateful to know you.
Dear Marcie—thank YOU for receiving what my heart yearns to share (to fathom and to live)—and for living with loving compassion in your life and relationships.
💗Ani
A beautiful story, told by a natural and talented storyteller! It brought tears to my eyes.
Dear Cindy,
Thank you for receiving “Vigil of Light,” and for allowing it to touch your heart.
I believe that one of the keys to healing the divisions in our world is to open our hearts to each other’s stories and deep inner experiences. To listen and allow ourselves to feel with each other. Thank you for opening like that!
With gratitude,
Ani
It was wonderful to meet you, Ani, and thanks for sending this to me. I sobbed all the way though it. A dream meant for so many of us.
Much love to you.
Dear Elsa,
Thank you for reading Vigil of Light and letting it enter you and yourself enter this dream.
Perhaps, we daughter of survivors of the Holocaust and in the lineage of intergenerational trauma, could remind each other that it is our loving joy that blesses the world and the essence of what we must “never forget.” And your tears? I call them love tears.
Let’s stay in touch and cultivate joy together.
With love and love tears,
Ani
Love this so incredibly beautiful. Have you seen the documentary Big Sonia?
Francine, what a sweet surprise to find your comment here and to feel you. Thank you for reading this and for pausing to comment. I hope all is well by you!
I have not seen “Big Sonia.” Sounds like something you are recommending? I will look it up.
With love,
Ani
That was beautiful, Ani. I have also asked the same question, “Is it alright to be happy?” YES! Our ancestors are with us and loving us, as we will someday join them and love our children and grandchildren…and on and on. Sending you hugs, Ana
Oh Ana, the love and nurturing going “on and on” generation to generation. How wonderful to imagine and have faith in that flow of Love. To not just imagine, to know.
💜
Ani
That was so beautiful. It really touched me. You were named after your grandmother whom you never met. I was named after my grandfather whom I never met. I cried many love tears while reading your story to my wife, who was named after her grandmother that she never met. Thank you for sharing your father’s dream & your response to it.
Dear Jack,
Somehow I missed your comment here and am finding it now! How very moving it is to me to read it! You, named after your grandfather who you never met. Your wife, named after her grandmother whom she never met.
I imagine you reading this to your wife.
“Love tears,” I have never heard anyone else use that phrase.
Thank you so much for reading this and for your open heart.
With love,
Ani
Thank you for sharing your incredible experience. I am grateful, touched and revered by your honesty and ability to love with your Open Heart.
Thank you, Diane, for taking the time to read this and for opening your heart to the gifts imparted through my father’s dream. 🙏🏼
Even though my father had to, at times, harden his heart to survive the Holocaust, to endure the losses he suffered, then to bear my mom’s Alzheimer’s—-he somehow still opened his heart enough to allow this dream to come through. Then he gave it to me. And now I have been able to give it to YOU!
With gratitude,
Ani
Ani, you offer so much insight and touch my heart with this Dreamtime story. I cherish it in this season of light. I can hold this dream image throughout my life also. Much love, sz
Ah, Suzani, you touch my heart with your words here. These dream gifts breath life into my life as well—year round. Am thinking, too, as I reread what you wrote: even though we call this time of year, season of light—when is it not a season of light?
Love back to you!
Ani
Beautiful, timely reminder. Thank you for writing this. Holiday blessings to you.
Thank you, Jen, for taking the time to read and receive this—and for the blessings! I wish you a peaceful and blessed holiday season as well! 💜 Ani
A question many of us who are fortunate to be blessed with home, health and the freedom to practice a religion or not, should ask every day. We have a responsibility to light our candles and seek the shimmering beauty of those that came before us. Blessings to you for giving me a light to follow today
Dear Kathleen,
I love what you say about our responsibility to light our candles!
Blessings to you for being a light,
💜
Ani
Dear Ani
I just found this story again. It is truly beautiful and profound. My guess is that your grandmother’s message was heard in the heart of your father and it definitely runs through you all the way to the love and joy you send unceasingly into our world. We all are far better for your grandmother, your father’s healing dream and your brilliant interpretation of it. May we all learn to live in such love and such joy.
Oh Elaine,
Your words have been heard in my heart, as has your beautiful wish and benediction that we all learn to live in joy and love. I am still learning, that’s for sure!
With much love and gratitude, dear kindred spirit,
Ani
Thanks so much for sharing this amazing story Ani. It’s validation that it’s OK to be happy when others are suffering. I’ve struggled with this too. Your grandmother’s dream visit will be a blessing to so many people.
Dear Denise,
Amazing and also so understandable that many of us question our right to be happy or at ease while others are suffering. And then there are those for whom this might be difficult to even understand.
I am happy that this story touched your heart and may bring greater ease and expansiveness to your heart and life. How wonderful if it might do so for others who feel this struggle within as well!
With love,
Ani
Wonderful of you to share this experience, and do it so well.
Evelyn, thank you for reading this sharing! And for taking the time to comment also! Means more than you might imagine.
💜
Ani