Bubby Was Right

Navigating antisemitism as a third-generation Holocaust survivor

This essay is part of a new collection of work inspired by the anthology On Being Jewish Now: Reflections of Authors and Advocates. Want to contribute? Instructions here. Subscribe here.

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Photo by Massimo Virgilio on Unsplash

Bubby Toby used to watch the news, waiting for “it” to return. She was on high alert, searching for a sign.

“It’s starting again,” she would say, when she detected antisemitism. “They hate us. It will never change.”

Like many survivors, she didn’t like to use words like “Hitler” or “Holocaust.” She preferred “it. It was not a matter of if, for her, but a matter of when.

At this moment in history, I have a choice: to feel the shame of being a Jew the world wants to erase, or to choose Jewish pride and love. My grandmother didn’t have that choice, but I know she would have chosen it for me.

I found myself in the Toronto classroom where I teach telling my students that I love being Jewish. That no one can ever hate me more than I love being Jewish. I felt empowered when I made this comment, and I could tell that some of my students were inspired. I started wearing my Hamsa necklace to work, and a few weeks later, one of my students began wearing a Magen David. There is nothing more inspiring than seeing someone proclaim self-love.

I feel hatred emanating from some of my students—almost as if I’d irritated them. Modern-day Jews don’t just suffer because of the antisemitism that appears on social media and in newspapers, but because of what is left unsaid. Not many colleagues have bothered to ask me how I’m doing. When I speak up in defense of Israel or the Jewish people, some seem awkward or quiet.

I’m so sad, as the granddaughter of survivors, that it’s still a crime for Jews to return to our homeland—that the one Jewish nation is depicted so terribly. Living with antisemitism, I can almost imagine what it was like for our ancestors.

I first studied the Holocaust as an undergraduate at Concordia University. It was very difficult, but I feel it’s my obligation to know my grandparents’ history. My grandmother and my aunt had to forget in order to survive. I was more inclined to do all the remembering.

I am glad that Bubby Toby was spared seeing the barbarous acts that Hamas terrorists committed on October 7. Bubby Toby used to look for it, and say it was coming back. It is here. It is back. But like Bubby Toby knew, it never left. 

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Lindsay Soberano Wilson is a poet, mother, and teacher from Toronto, Canada. Her new release, Breaking Up With the Cobalt Blues: Poems for Healing (Prolific Pulse Press), curates artistry from pain. Hoods of Motherhood: A Collection of Poems and Casa de mi Corazón: A Travel Journal of Poetry & Memoir are available on her website. This essay is drawn from her memoir-in-progress.

Instagram: @lindsay.soberano.wilson

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This essay is part of a new collection of work inspired by the anthology On Being Jewish Now: Reflections of Authors and Advocates. Want to contribute? Instructions here. Subscribe here.