Omer 2025 Day 39

Day 38 | Day 40

Day 39: The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
Netzach in Yesod, Endurance in Connection

"I don't want to have lived in vain like most people. I want to be useful or bring enjoyment to all people, even those I've never met. I want to go on living even after my death!" -Anne Frank

When I was in 7th grade, my first class of the day was a study hall called "Skills." Different teachers chose to use this time for different things - some told students they could complete homework, others (like my 8th grade Skills teacher) had no rules and I ended up playing a lot of card games that year. But my 7th grade Skills teacher, Mr. Zverbilis, maintained absolute silence by turning the class into an independent reading hour. We could choose any book we wanted and read it at our own pace. Whenever we completed a book, we were expected to spend time in class writing an essay about the book before choosing another book. I loved reading, so this class was mostly well-suited to me. Yet, I only remember two of the books that I read that year - White Fang by Jack London and The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank. Honestly, at that age, I should have read both with an adult providing context, but here we are.

Sometime that spring, I pulled Anne Frank's diary from the reading display at the front of our school library and started reading without any context. I hadn't grown up Jewish and my school didn't have a standardized Holocaust education curriculum, so I had no idea what I was getting myself into. Some of the Language Arts teachers in my school taught Number the Stars by Lois Lowry, but not mine. With this complete lack of Holocaust awareness, I started quietly reading Anne Frank. It was compelling and heartfelt and relatable - all the reasons Anne Frank has become the standard book to begin students' Holocaust education. And then I got to the end. I read the epilogue in a completely silent classroom surrounded by 7th graders who were not reading about the Holocaust, and just absolutely sobbed through it. Anne Frank's life, her murder, and her lasting legacy are a testament to the idea of endurance in connection. Our ability to connect with her is what makes her story endure.

I don't always have a call to action in these posts. Most of the time, I like to let them speak for themselves and have you take what you will from them. But today, I want to encourage everyone, especially if you live in a state or school district without Holocaust education, to contact your representatives to advocate for it - your principals and superintendents and school board members, city councils and mayors and governors. We are missing out on a vitally important piece of world history and, more importantly, human understanding, when we don't learn the history and human cost of the Holocaust.