Description
The author of the passage is Paul Menkus and the passage is about his family. Menkus' mother was a Holocaust survivor and she was very cold towards her children. After she died, Menkus' siblings came home to find out about her legacy. They found out that she had divided her inheritance between Menkus and his brother, who she had not spoken to in years. Menkus found out that his mother had given him the German money, which was a bequest from the German reparations that were paid to survivors of the Holocaust. Menkus was able to navigate the rocky shores of his family's memory and he was able to find the courage to stop running from his legacy.
Paul Menkus has spent his life running-from New York,the city of his birth; from his beautiful beloved; from contact with his own brother and sister; but mostly from his mother, a Holocaust survivor of unparalleled coldness. Her shattering inability to offer warmth and approval, or even remotely show love, has scarred each of the Menkus children-Dina has fled the country and married a devout Catholic; Simon has led a sexually profligate life addled with drugs. Upon their mother's mysterious death, the children dutifully return home in search of answers to the family's legacy of unhappiness. But only more questions confront them: Why and how did this healthy woman die? Why did she divide their inheritance so that Paul, the errant son to whom she hadn't spoken in years, was singled out to receive the largest share, the dreaded "German money," a bequest of a million dollars accrued from invested German reparations to survivors . a gift as cynical as it is generous. Navigating the rocky shores of family memory, picking up the pieces of a life torn apart by his parents' history, Paul discovers the unthinkable, and in doing so finds the courage to stop running from a legacy which is painful to embrace but impossible to forget.
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