By my count, it’s been 147 days–just under five months–since we left Krakow and landed safe, but certainly changed, back in Pittsburgh. On the one hand, I’ve very much fallen back into the habits of my ordinary life, just as if this summer had been the same as any other: I still go to the same school, I still take similar courses, I’m still applying to the same universities for the same degree programs to which I had planned to apply prior to landing in Warsaw. And yet, if I look deeper into myself, I see in me someone with the same basic values of the Pre-Poland Dani Plung, but someone more driven, much stronger, a better assest to herself, and, I hope, a better assest to the communities in which she resides. Undoubtably, this person is closer with the other people who went on the trip with her–teachers, students, administrators, and everyone else–so great and powerful are our shared experiences from the summer. There are still things that we can truly share only with each other, because though we might write about them, talk about them, sing about them, paint images of them, develop photographs of them, there are some things that can only been known fully by empirical experience. This bond keeps us close as a family.
And though expressing the full extent of our summer experiences to others might be difficult, we have to try. On our last afternoon in Krakow, both Avi and Elon told us that, as inspired as we were in Europe at what was then the present time,that we’d come home, ordinary life would take over, and the trip would fade into nothing more than a fond memory. We’d do nothing with it. Well, I don’t mean to make Avi or Elon look bad, but we proved them wrong. For the past five months since we’ve returned we’ve been working on organizing an exhibition and showcase of our work, so as to share it with those who were not on our trip. Someone else thought of the wonderful idea to raise money to send our peers at the Urban Pathways Charter School, who otherwise would not have an opportunity to learn about the Holocaust, to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial in Washington D.C., free of charge. Noah and Madeline, with help of other students, edited and published a book–Seeing Through: Reflections on the Holocaust that is a compilation of our writings and artwork from the summer. We’re combining all of these efforts together, and this Wednesday, December 5, we are holding our event titled “Seeing Through: Reflections and Reactions from Poland 2012,” which will both be a venue to express our voices and share our experiences through performances, readings, and exhibitions, and a way to fundraiser for our Urban Pathways project. The book will be on sale, and both Howard and Avi are in town to attend. Howard will even be speaking! We’ve taken our trip, and made it mean something, and of that I am incredibly proud.
I close my eyes, and I’m back in Poland. I think about numbly weeping in Majdanek, and I feel myself sunburned in Auschwitz. These are potent memories. But I also see Howard’s smile, and I’m inspired to both seize life and live it. (I’ve even made one of Danielle’s pictures of Howard my phone and computer desktop as a reminder of such!) I think of Mr. Smith–because now that we’re back in school, we must return to calling the teachers who are really now members of our family by their “proper” titles–compelling me to not sit on the bench but instead to dance at the Klezmer Festival in Krakowe. I danced to music then, and I try to dance to the Music of the Spheres now. Life is precious and short, and, since the trip, I’ve tried to live it as such. I think I’ve done so.