Tommy, Paperclips, Mistakes
A couple of days ago I heard one of the songs from the rock opera, “Tommy” by The Who. Suddenly I was in Jr. High again, sitting in the basement at my cousin’s house. He was one of those brilliant kids who had interests far beyond what he studied in school. He had purchased a reel-to-reel tape player and had taped all his LP records and all the records of his friends. He showed me the intricacies of threading the tape through the machine and explained why a reel-to-reel tape player was so much better than any other form of listening to recorded music. He could get three albums on a reel, if I remember right. He wanted me to hear Tommy, because he liked it so much. “That deaf, dumb, blind kid sure plays a mean pinball…” Thirteen years old seems like light years ago.
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We watched the documentary “Paperclip” this evening. Maybe tomorrow I’ll watch the special features on the second disc. There was a small town in Tennessee where all the children but a handful were white and protestant. The principal of the middle school there wanted those children to learn about diversity and respect for those different from themselves. They chose to teach about the Holocaust every year in eighth grade.
The kids could not grasp the number 6 million and asked if they could collect something to make it real. The teachers told them to do some research to find something appropriate to collect. The paperclip was invented in Norway. When the Jews of Norway were forced to wear gold stars, the people of Norway started wearing paperclips on their collars to honor the Jews they knew. The eighth graders began collecting paperclips.
It took several years. As the project progressed it took new turns and twists. Some German journalists came to visit and then wrote about it for German newspapers. Paperclips began to arrive from Germany, including one old suitcase purchased by students in a German school who had each written a letter to Anne Frank apologizing for the history that ended her life.
It was reported on national television news one year on Passover. Paperclips poured in. People sent them in honor of relatives who died in prison camps. Letters came telling the stories. Then a group of survivors from New York City came to this tiny Tennessee town. The whole town gathered at a local church and one by one the survivors told their stories. Now there were faces to the pain.
Twenty-nine million paper clips were eventually sent to this little school. They needed some place to keep them. The principal one day wished aloud that they could store the paperclips in a German rail car that was used during the Holocaust. The journalists from Germany told her they would make it happen. The whole town designed the memorial and worked with the display, the landscaping, and the protection from weather.
The eighth graders decided to put 11 million of the paperclips into the rail car; 6 million for the Jews who lost their lives, and 5 million for the gypsies, homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and others the Germans exterminated.
Seeing the inside of that rail car on a screen is heart wrenching, knowing the incredible sorrow and anguish and fear that car once held. Those who were present in Tennessee and could step inside it were visibly moved by the echoes of what had gone before.
* * * * * * * * * *
I had a nasty surprise today. I finished the second sleeve of the sweater I’m knitting. Now all I need to do is sew it together and knit the ribbing around the neckline. I took the newly knitted sleeve and laid it against the first sleeve I had knit. There was a noticeable difference in length. The second sleeve had two less cables knit into it than the first. How could I have done this? I had charted every single row!
I went back to my graph paper where I had written out the way I had changed the pattern for the first sleeve. I had followed every instruction but the last one. “Add two cables before changing the pattern.” Now I need to unravel it and redo the top half of the sleeve.
That used to be enough discouragement for me to put the project away for good. But I am more mature now :-). Besides, I paid a lot for this wool and mohair blend of yarn made by Peace Fleece, a place that blends wools from the US and from Russia as one more way to promote peace and understanding. I picked a pattern harder than anything I’ve made before. This one will NOT get the best of me. It will just take a while longer, that’s all.
* * * * * * * *
We watched the documentary “Paperclip” this evening. Maybe tomorrow I’ll watch the special features on the second disc. There was a small town in Tennessee where all the children but a handful were white and protestant. The principal of the middle school there wanted those children to learn about diversity and respect for those different from themselves. They chose to teach about the Holocaust every year in eighth grade.
The kids could not grasp the number 6 million and asked if they could collect something to make it real. The teachers told them to do some research to find something appropriate to collect. The paperclip was invented in Norway. When the Jews of Norway were forced to wear gold stars, the people of Norway started wearing paperclips on their collars to honor the Jews they knew. The eighth graders began collecting paperclips.
It took several years. As the project progressed it took new turns and twists. Some German journalists came to visit and then wrote about it for German newspapers. Paperclips began to arrive from Germany, including one old suitcase purchased by students in a German school who had each written a letter to Anne Frank apologizing for the history that ended her life.
It was reported on national television news one year on Passover. Paperclips poured in. People sent them in honor of relatives who died in prison camps. Letters came telling the stories. Then a group of survivors from New York City came to this tiny Tennessee town. The whole town gathered at a local church and one by one the survivors told their stories. Now there were faces to the pain.
Twenty-nine million paper clips were eventually sent to this little school. They needed some place to keep them. The principal one day wished aloud that they could store the paperclips in a German rail car that was used during the Holocaust. The journalists from Germany told her they would make it happen. The whole town designed the memorial and worked with the display, the landscaping, and the protection from weather.
The eighth graders decided to put 11 million of the paperclips into the rail car; 6 million for the Jews who lost their lives, and 5 million for the gypsies, homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and others the Germans exterminated.
Seeing the inside of that rail car on a screen is heart wrenching, knowing the incredible sorrow and anguish and fear that car once held. Those who were present in Tennessee and could step inside it were visibly moved by the echoes of what had gone before.
* * * * * * * * * *
I had a nasty surprise today. I finished the second sleeve of the sweater I’m knitting. Now all I need to do is sew it together and knit the ribbing around the neckline. I took the newly knitted sleeve and laid it against the first sleeve I had knit. There was a noticeable difference in length. The second sleeve had two less cables knit into it than the first. How could I have done this? I had charted every single row!
I went back to my graph paper where I had written out the way I had changed the pattern for the first sleeve. I had followed every instruction but the last one. “Add two cables before changing the pattern.” Now I need to unravel it and redo the top half of the sleeve.
That used to be enough discouragement for me to put the project away for good. But I am more mature now :-). Besides, I paid a lot for this wool and mohair blend of yarn made by Peace Fleece, a place that blends wools from the US and from Russia as one more way to promote peace and understanding. I picked a pattern harder than anything I’ve made before. This one will NOT get the best of me. It will just take a while longer, that’s all.
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