War, trauma, hope
How to talk to humans who lived through war; community trauma; war and children, and a Hiroshima survivor speaks.
Content warning: violence and trauma
I have never met Ida Millman. I will never know what she looks like or how she sounds. Yet Ida, who would be 95 today, has been in my thoughts this entire week.
Ida and I briefly became pen friends when I worked a different job, where she followed my newsletter. She was the daughter of Russian and Central European immigrants and had lived with depression for 75 years. "I have spent the last three unknotting the events that caused the dis-ease [her spelling],” she once told me.
Another time, she sent me a happy note describing the bright sun-soaked view outside her window: "There are two big old Winged Euonymous in full flame – gorgeous!"
