“there’s a truth about pain that most people never learn, unless they’re really unlucky. Or really long-lived, long enough to have felt almost every kind there is. Pain has a signature to it, a type, a song. The first time you experience a new one, it’s a bright, white-hot, cutting edge; or a searing, brain-twisting burn; or a shattering, soul-crushing thud; or any of the thousand other forms it takes to torment you. But the second time? Or the third? Or the fiftieth? No. It’s still terrible, still rage inducing, still debilitating, but it’s not the same shock as at first. You know this song, all its terrible highs and dismal lows; you can hum it with your eyes closed, because it’s just that familiar. Not like a friend—never that—but like an old enemy you’ve grown to know as well as to hate, his weapons and his limits. You know what he can do to you.”
For me, the Holocaust is a real emotional thing. I had no grandparents growing up, but we spent lots of time in our apartments in Miami in a Jewish enclave, I guess. It was a gated community on North Miami Beach with three towers, a little convenience store, a restaurant and pool, and Dock slips for boats. And so my babysitters were retired Jewish retirees, most of whom were holocaust survivors. I was 2 or 3, the first time I heard of the Holocaust. I was spending the night with the Fusses, whom I called Grandma and Grandpa Fuss. I had taken a number and written numbers on my arm, to be like them. I didn’t understand why it horrified these two Holocaust survivors. I still remember the tears pouring down Grandma Fusses face as she scrubbed my arm with a sponge from the kitchen. Eventually, I learned their story. Two people who were the only survivors of their families who found love after the camps. I heard about their parents and siblings who died in the camps. I remember that one of their sisters was a ballerina. She was a teenager when she went into the camps and she ade it through the initial separation because a guard thought she was beautiful. As an adult, I know what that meant but as a child I remember thinking it was so beautiful that she gave the food to her sister. He would take her to his office and have her dance for him. She would come back with extra food for grandma Fuss and cry herself to sleep. She never made it out of the camps. And though it hurt, Grandma Fuss to tell me that story, she did it in whispers and with tears. She told me it was my job to remember her sister, the ballerina, always and forever a teenager.
I was in 1st grade before I thought of it again, in a meaningful way. I went to school in our temples basement in Dunwoody, Georgia. and one Monday we didn’t have school. Over the weekend someone had broken in and defaced desks, couches and chalkboards with swastikas. I saw that symbol and remembered Grandma Fusses tears. And I knew that it was evil and I was hated. I never understood what those teenagers were thinking as they painted a symbol of hate or scratched it into surfaces.
I am shocked and horrified at the news today that Hitler never gassed his own people. I know that is not true. I am one generation removed from the survivors. Their children were my parents generation. As we remember our flight from Egypt this week, so too do Jews remember the Holocaust. Last year, Elie Wiesel , a Holocaust survivor, and Nobel Laureate author, died. He has many quotes…too many to list about why Jews wrote down their memories for my generation and forward. Read his Nobel speech, or even just the quotes that come up on google. We remember the generation lost. All 6,000,000 of them. Men and women, Mothers and Fathers, Children and Artists, Brothers and Sisters.
But I want to be real here. These are the approximate numbers:
Number of Deaths
Jews: up to 6 million
Soviet civilians: around 7 million (including 1.3 Soviet Jewish civilians, who are included in the 6 million figure for Jews)
Soviet prisoners of war: around 3 million (including about 50,000 Jewish soldiers)
Non-Jewish Polish civilians: around 1.8 million (including between 50,000 and 100,000 members of the Polish elites)
Serb civilians (on the territory of Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina): 312,000
People with disabilities living in institutions: up to 250,000
Roma (Gypsies): 196,000–220,000
Jehovah’s Witnesses: Around 1,900
Repeat criminal offenders and so-called asocials: at least 70,000
German political opponents and resistance activists in Axis-occupied territory: undetermined
Homosexuals: hundreds, possibly thousands (possibly also counted in part under the 70,000 repeat criminal offenders and so-called asocials noted above)
But, Hitler never used chemical weapons on his own people, Right?!?
Answer (1 of 2): As the other two answers have stated: “Those who do not learn from the past are condemned to repeat it.” But a quote on the wall of the Jewish Holocaust Centre in Elsternwick (near Melbourne, Australia) says this: “It…
For me, the Holocaust is a real emotional thing. I had no grandparents growing up, but we spent lots of time in our apartments in Miami in a Jewish enclave, I guess. It was a gated community on North Miami Beach with three towers, a little convenience store, a restaurant and pool, and Dock slips for boats. And so my babysitters were retired Jewish retirees, most of whom were holocaust survivors. I was 2 or 3, the first time I heard of the Holocaust. I was spending the night with the Fusses, whom I called Grandma and Grandpa Fuss. I had taken a number and written numbers on my arm, to be like them. I didn’t understand why it horrified these two Holocaust survivors. I still remember the tears pouring down Grandma Fusses face as she scrubbed my arm with a sponge from the kitchen. Eventually, I learned their story. Two people who were the only survivors of their families who found love after the camps. I heard about their parents and siblings who died in the camps. I remember that one of their sisters was a ballerina. She was a teenager when she went into the camps and she ade it through the initial separation because a guard thought she was beautiful. As an adult, I know what that meant but as a child I remember thinking it was so beautiful that she gave the food to her sister. He would take her to his office and have her dance for him. She would come back with extra food for grandma Fuss and cry herself to sleep. She never made it out of the camps. And though it hurt, Grandma Fuss to tell me that story, she did it in whispers and with tears. She told me it was my job to remember her sister, the ballerina, always and forever a teenager. I was in 1st grade before I thought of it again, in a meaningful way. I went to school in our temples basement in Dunwoody, Georgia. and one Monday we didn’t have school. Over the weekend someone had broken in and defaced desks, couches and chalkboards with swastikas. I saw that symbol and remembered Grandma Fusses tears. And I knew that it was evil and I was hated. I never understood what those teenagers were thinking as they painted a symbol of hate or scratched it into surfaces. I am shocked and horrified at the news today that Hitler never gassed his own people. I know that is not true. I am one generation removed from the survivors. Their children were my parents generation. As we remember our flight from Egypt this week, so too do Jews remember the Holocaust. Last year, Elie Wiesel , a Holocaust survivor, and Nobel Laureate author, died. He has many quotes…too many to list about why Jews wrote down their memories for my generation and forward. Read his Nobel speech, or even just the quotes that come up on google. We remember the generation lost. All 6,000,000 of them. Men and women, Mothers and Fathers, Children and Artists, Brothers and Sisters. But I want to be real here. These are the approximate numbers: Number of Deaths Jews: up to 6 million Soviet civilians: around 7 million (including 1.3 Soviet Jewish civilians, who are included in the 6 million figure for Jews) Soviet prisoners of war: around 3 million (including about 50,000 Jewish soldiers) Non-Jewish Polish civilians: around 1.8 million (including between 50,000 and 100,000 members of the Polish elites) Serb civilians (on the territory of Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina): 312,000 People with disabilities living in institutions: up to 250,000 Roma (Gypsies): 196,000–220,000 Jehovah’s Witnesses: Around 1,900 Repeat criminal offenders and so-called asocials: at least 70,000 German political opponents and resistance activists in Axis-occupied territory: undetermined Homosexuals: hundreds, possibly thousands (possibly also counted in part under the 70,000 repeat criminal offenders and so-called asocials noted above) But, Hitler never used chemical weapons on his own people https://www.quora.com/Why-should-we-never-forget-the-Holocaust
Happy Passover from the White House. Sean Spicer claims Hitler “didn’t use chemical weapons on his own people.” Uh, GAS CHAMBERS anyone? Or are we reading Richard Spencer’s history books now?
This is what happens when you elect white nationalists and the alt. reich to run the country.
For a moment, I just stared. Not because of the hovering in midair thing. Levitation charms aren’t exactly rare, although using them in full view of norms is a no-no. But human laws aren’t so easy to apply to a prince of the fey, and anyway, that wasn’t the problem. No, the problem was that this particular prince hadn’t stuck his charm on a chair, a bookcase or a rug à la Aladdin. No, he’d stuck it on Slava. Which meant that both of them were about to be way. But Æsubrand obviously didn’t know enough about human charms to realize that. Or that he would need a propulsion system, or at least a good push, if he wanted to go anywhere. Which he hadn’t gotten because he’d been too busy kicking me in the head. Leaving them stranded—for the moment. I stopped staring up at them and started looking around the office, hoping for a grappling hook—preferably one attached to an M16. But I guess Slava kept the weapons elsewhere, because I didn’t see one. Of course, there was another option. “Pull us in when I grab him,” I told Marlowe, who had just staggered up behind me. “Grab who?” he rasped, and then stopped, staring in disbelief at the insanity outside the window.“Æsubrand,” I said shortly, jerking down the office blinds and stripping off the cord. And thankfully, Slava’s impressively tall windows extended in here, and they had cords to match. “What? There are fey now?” Marlowe demanded, outraged. And I had to admit, it did seem a little unfair. “Looks that way,” I said and threw myself out the window. I ignored the stream of cursing from behind me because I had about a second to time this right or I’d be a greasy spot on the sidewalk.
So, earlier I said that the first trip to Dante’s on the first night that Cassie finds out about the Pythian power is going to be called spot one. Its important that this distinction be made because here is the long and short of it. These books are about Cassandra Palmer a 20 something clairvoyant who was raised inside a low level vampire’s court with very little training in magic. She doesn’t know it at the beginning but she is a super special snowflake. She inherit’s the power of the Pythia, the supernatural world’s arbiter of disputes and protector of the time line. The Pythia’s draw their power from Apollo and are clairvoyant so they can know when to intervene in the time line to insure that it is protected. For over 2000 years, the pythian court has been attached loosely to the silver circle, a body of mage’s who try to keep the world safe and battle the Black Circle. The Silver Circle thinks they control the Pythian court, but the Pythia’s have long been secretive and have kept many of their powers secret. The Pythian power is somewhat sentient and the current heir Myra has been lured to the dark side by Rasputin, the evil vampire trying to change the world order and he has a bunch of people on his side, from the Black Circle to some of the vamps, weres and others who are unhappy with the current state of things. One of the vamps who have joined Rasputin is Tony, who was in Mircea’s line and raised Cassie. Tony has been especially bad- he is working with Rasputin to kidnap witches right before they were fated to die and sell them into sexual servitude to the light fey. But on this night, the Pythian power has started to transfer and part of it has come to Cassie, the daughter of the last heir and a mage who worked for Tony. Cassie took off before she found out what the senate wanted to try and get info on her parent’s from Jimmy the rat who Tony had kill them. She went into Dante’s to try and find Jimmy before he is killed for going against Tony and finds him in a basement cell. Tony is not one to let an opportunity to make a buck go by, so he has a fight club in the basement for when he wants to get rid of people. Jimmy is slated to fight a were pack whose leader he killed for Tony. When Cassie finds him in the cage, there is a pixie, Radella, who is trapped as well. She tells Cassie she was able to find the witches, but got caught and that she needs to free her. Cassie doesn’t know what Radella is talking about and Radella realize’s that this is not her Cassie. Regardless, Cassie isn’t going to leave anybody, so she frees Radella, Jimmy and three witches-one of whom is Francoise who she saw burned alive when she went back in time as
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. Jimmy makes a run for it and Cassie tries to catch him and runs into trouble in the parking lot.
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, Tomas and Pritkin are there to bring her back to MAGIC. She is trying to get Billy Joe to possess Jimmy so she can find out info on her parents. Jimmy’s pack of were rat/ satyrs is there and there are vamps around the parking lot who work for Tony. Tomas grabs Cassie and Louis-Cesare tells hi to take her back to Magic. Cassie objects and Pritkin says he will take her. Tomas picks Cassie up and takes away her gun. She tells him she has been looking for Jimmy for years, but Tomas ignores her. She tells Billy to go into Jimmy quickly because she is afraid of what’s about to happen. Billy Joe goes into Jimmy and rockets back out of him and into Cassie, but unlike what usually happens he pushes Cassie out of her body and her spirit goes into Tomas.
Cassie/Tomas looks down and sees Billy Joe/ Cassie in his arms. Jimmy bites Tomas/Cassie and Cassie throws him across the parking lot. Cassie sees everyone in slow motion. Pritkin fires at where Jimmy was causing an explosion and turns to meet the rat things.
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is moving in regular motion and he skewers a rat and yells at Tomas to take Cassie out of there. Cassie is confused and looks down to see a rat sneaking up on her body.
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throws a knife and skewers it in the throat. Cassie figures out that she is in Tomas. Billy Joe in Cassie calls out “Cassie where are you?” as he panics. Cassie in Tomas looks at her body and asks “who are you” and touches her body. Billy Cassie says to stop that. Cassie says who are you who is in there. Jimmy comes back at Cassie in Tomas and Cassie shoots him but he keeps coming. She shoots him again and Jimmy says to call off her gorilla or she will never find her dad. Cassie/Tomas ssays what but Jimmy says he isn’t talking to him. Jimmy looks at Billy Joe in Cassie’s body and tells her that they can make a deal. Tony will never tell her the truth he likes where Rog is too much. Cassie Tomas says my father is dead Jimmy says he isnt talking to Tomas. Cassie Tomas looks up to see that Louis-Cesare and Pritkin have killed most of the were rat things and are making short work of the others. The vamps are standing around watching and Cassie doesnt get that at all.
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calls out tomas behind you and jumps toward cassie/tomas. Cassie picked a bad moment to get distracted and Jimmy capitalized on it grabbing Billy Joe/Cassie.
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is furious with Tomas saying he told him to get her out of there. Cassie/Tomas is more worried about the claw Jimmy has to Billy Joe/Cassie’s throat. When Billy Joe starts cursing Cassie figures out that he is in her body and tells billy joe to shut up. Billy Joe is relieved to have found Cassie as he thought maybe she was dead and finding her in Tomas is a relief. Cassie decides to deal with one problem at a time and asks Jimmy what he wants to let her go after telling Billy to shut up.
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tells Tomas he has screwed up enough and he will take care of this. Cassie/Tomas tells
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to shut up which freaks him out as Tomas should not be able to do that.Cassie asks Jimmy what he wants. He says he wants to get out of this alive and Cassie is his meal ticket out of this. Cassie tells him no way, try again. Jimmy says he will kill her and still get a reward from Tony.
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says if he does that it will take him days to die. Cassie Tomas tells Jimmy
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is right if Jimmy kills Cassie then they will just kill him. Jimmy says that the alternative being that he lets her go and they kill him anyway doesn’t work for him.
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says that there are many ways to die. Cassie Tomas tells him to shut up again.
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tells Tomas he doesn’t know what is wrong with him but they will talk later. Cassie tells him he really doesn’t know. She smiles at Jimmy but Tomas’ fangs are fully extended. Cassie Tomas asks Jimmy to give up Cassie and they will give him a 2 hr start and even distract Tony’s vamps who she has figured out are there to finish the job if Jimmy gets away. Jimmy says that they would say anything to get Cassie back and then just kill him anyway. Cassie Tomas asks since when do were’s take orders from vamps and says she cant believe hes been toadying to tony all these years. Jimmy tells Tomas that there is a new world order coming and vamps may be taking orders from were’s soon. Cassie Tomas back tracks as she wanted to prick his pride not goad him into something stupid. She tells him that that wont matter if he’s dead from this fight. She asks him if he will take Cassie’s word on it. Jimmy looks torn and Cassie Tomas realizes that the shot to his chest nicked his lung. Jimmy is running out of time and when he figures that out she’s out of time. She realizes she can smell Jimmy’s fear. This makes Cassie realize she can smell everyone’s emotions and its distracting/
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is way past mad and is furious a simmering peppery scent that is coming off him in waves that seem equally directed at Tomas and Jimmy. “It was mixed up with the myriad scents suddenly hammering me from all around: the faint, far-off whiff of the sewers running beneath the earth, diesel fumes and cigarette butts from the parking lot and the reek of sauerkraut from a day-old reuben in a Dumpster. My body, on the other hand, smelled good, really good, and at first I thought it was because it was familiar. Then I realized with a shock that it actually smelled like a favorite meal, hot and fresh and ready to eat. I had never thought of blood smelling sweet, like warm apple pie or steaming cider on a cold day, but now it did. I could almost taste the blood running under the warmth of that skin, and feel how rich it would be sliding down my throat. The idea that I smelled like food to Tomas staggered me to the point that I didn’t see what happened in front of me until it was half over.” A Suffocating cloud of blue gas surrounds Cassie Tomas,
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, Billy Joe/Cassie and Jimmy.
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tells Pritkin to stand down . Shots ring out and Cassie Tomas eyes begin to burn. As she gets ready to go into the cloud of gas to try and save her body, Billy Joe Cassie comes crawling out crying and gasping for breath. Cassie Tomas can’t figure out whats wrong until she realizes Tomas doesn’t need to breathe and hasn’t been since she has been in him which causes him to start hyperventilating. Billy Joes Cassie graps Cassie Tomas around the feet and starts crawling up saying Help. Cassie Tomas asks Am I ok and drops down to check her body saying tell me you didn’t let me get cut up! Her body seems fine except for a thin wound at the neck and watering eyes. Cassie tells a confused Billy Joe to stay her and goes after Jimmy after pulling up her shirt so her breasts stay in. Pritkin is yelling something but Cassie can hear too much in Tomas’ body and so she goes into the blue cloud to try and get Jimmy, but he is down.
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comes into the cloud and says something and Cassie says he better not be dead but then Louis-Cesare reaches out and grabs Tomas Around the throat so hard it would kill a human. As soon as
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touches Tomas though Cassie is thrown back in time, although this time as a spirit and with Tomas along!
