Table of Contents
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Site Page Counts
Public: 229
Restricted: 51
- Overview
- NY Kletsker Cemetery Data
- Searching for KIRZNER
- UKR 1946
- Benari Memoir
- Kletsk to Zaostrovechye
- Recreating Kletsk
- Pshepyurko Interview
- Sonia's Places
- Gelfand Memoir
- Introduction
- Father Leaves
- Word from the US
- Father's Secret
- Money ...Lost
- Most Difficult Period
- Living in War
- Germans Arrive
- Bolsheviks Arrive
- We Leave Luban
- A Narrow Escape
- Difficult Departure
- Life in Luban
- Terror at Shavuot
- Return to Normal
- To Slutsk
- To Kletsk (1)
- To Kletsk (2)
- HIAS Help
- Kletsk Life (1)
- Kletsk Life (2)
- Kletsk Life (3)
- The Doors Close
- Mother's Final Illness
- I Am Courted (1)
- I Am Courted (2)
- A Dilemma
- Mother's Last Breath
- Motl Leaves
- Our Problems
- To Argentina
- My Sisters Join Me
- Rejoining Father
- Rochl Returns
- To My Children
- Yizkor Book
- Contributors Only
Site Page Counts
Public: 229
Restricted: 51
Sara Gelfand Memoir
A Young Woman’s Dilemma
Mother was very happy that I already had a fiancé, yet for me it was not easy to accept. My mother, who by then already was not feeling well, wanted us to be formally engaged as soon as possible -- meaning before his departure. And Max's --this was the name of my fiancé-- mother complained and reproached me saying: “Why are you being so proud and feeling so important, not wanting to be engaged to Max before he leaves?”
And I answered to all of them that not only did I not want a formal engagement, but also not a verbal one. I said that I do not want to have neither myself nor Max bound by a rope. We both should be free, and if it is God's will that we are meant to be together, we will find the way to find each other. I was not ready to accept anybody's demands and did not realize that by acting this way I was creating pain and suffering for Mother. When Mother became ill, she talked to me about Max and begged me not to reject him.
“Be aware of the fact that he does your bidding in all matters. He went to Argentina to help us. If he only wanted to earn money, he could to it here in Kletsk”.
My answer was always the same: “I will not stay in Kletsk, but I also do not want to be tied to anyone.” While I was having these conversations with Mother, Rabanit Kotler was offering a shiduch with a student of the Yeshivah.
To all these propositions I answered the same: “I do not want to be tied to anybody and I will nor stay in Kletsk”.