Binder2

This assignment forced me to learn more than ever before about Gerry’s world. Grandma Deitch
(Celia) was Gerry’s mum and although we grew up most of our lives living with Grandma Deitch,
we knew very little about her family. There was no mention of her husband, there was always a
vague story floating around how he ‘ran off with another woman’ or he left the family stranded in
bankruptcy and was never to be seen or heard of again. Gerry’s sister Zena was also estranged
from the family and it was never spoken about. We had only seen pictures of her but had never
met her and never knew why she was ‘not part’ of the family. We always assumed it was because
she had married out of Judaism to a Christian. Since the Genogram days I have heard dribs and
drabs of Deitch history, all strange and weird and not conclusive. I heard Zena was sent to a
Catholic school as a child because they offered a good education. I couldn’t help but wonder how
odd that the family put her in a situation with double standards. She can go to Catholic school but
she can‘t marry a Christian. Our Ray was traveling to England in 2016 and tried to reconnect with
Zena after all these years but she declined to meet him and frankly I can’t blame her! I discovered
Gerry’s father, Jacob was a carpenter, and he made furniture. This came as a shock to me because
prior to going to University, I decided, for the first time, to delve into making something out of
used wooden pallets. I ended up making a cabinet! This is just a thought for you to delve into as
well. Have you ever done any woodwork or made something and wondered how did I know how
to do that? I always thought our family structure was the same as Gerry’s, Three older boys, Cecil,
Gerry and Norman and the youngest a sister Zena. Just to confuse things, I was wrong. There is
another untold story of a boy called Roy who was born before Cecil. Roy was either born with a
mental or physical disability, possibly both. From a genogram perspective these are important
facts that help future generations know their hereditary genetics however unfortunate they may
be. We do not have a concrete story here, but the story we heard vaguely was that Roy was
dropped as a baby, therefore he had a disability, and we believe he grew up in an institution but
know nothing about his life or death and how long he lived. We do not know who and, if ever, he
was visited or in contact with the family at all.
These disconnections and interrupted relationships indicate why Gerry would be interested in a
permanent form and concrete way of documenting stories for our family and hereafter. Gerry will
literally be illustrating the Deitch shenanigans in our life stories. I did not perform very well on the
Genogram assignment because at the time I didn’t understand the extent of it. If only Penny my
lecturer could see me now ... she would be delighted to see how that assignment planted the seed
for me to write this preface. Gerry decided to leave England at the age of 39 taking his wife Sheila
and their children Leonard, Martin, Raymond and Corinne with him to do the Zionist deed
and ‘Make Alia’, that is immigrate to Israel. The characteristics of emigrating back in 1975 before
the world “got smaller” with technology, meant the remaining family and friends in England were
left behind and we became quite isolated, remote and somewhat estranged once again from the
family.
Corinne’s World
I was born in England, making me the third generation to be born in England. Just before I turned
11 years old I immigrated to Israel with my family in September 1975. Being so young this was a
choice made for me; I was uprooted from my short-lived English life and plonked into a new
world. I am not sure exactly how this was explained to me but I do remember something that
caught my ear “you only go to school for half a day” dad said. I was delighted at this, as I wasn’t a
good pupil and didn’t like school, I thought this was a good exchange rate and was encouraged
about the move to Israel. I must have miscalculated the part where you only get “one day for your
weekend” instead of two! Mathematics has never been my strong point, and I don’t think I ever
got used to a 6-day week instead of 5 days. Even years later it felt as though I had ‘pulled the short
straw’, feeling betrayed, while the rest of the world lives with Sunday off as well as Saturday. My
world had turned upside-down. I had left behind toys, places like the “muddy-way”, friends, pets
and neighbours. I traded it all in for new friends, new adventures and a new language. I was
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