FROM PAIN TO COMPASSION

I was inspired to write this story and share it. I often find myself writing, not knowing why, but trusting that what is coming through is not only important for me, but may be for others too.

I was a six-year old boy, living in New York, and heading to my first day of school.
I had my little Superman metal lunch box swinging by my side as I skipped innocently and playfully along the cold morning sidewalk. My attention was abruptly drawn to a loud sound to my right, where a squeeky screen door had just slammed shut on an old porch of a house about 30 feet away. Startled, I looked over and saw another young boy running down the wooden stairs of this older two story house. He was running right towards me. I saw, what I soon learned, was hatred in his face, something I had not seen in my six years of life. "Get out of our neighborhood, you dirty Jew. Get out of our neighborhood. I hate you. I hate you, you dirty Jew."

Without thinking, I burst into tears as I turned around to run home two blocks away. As I ran, I cried and cried, trying to catch my breath between sobs. I ran faster than I could. I pushed open the front door, ran into my room, threw myself on the bed, and buried my head in my favorite pillow, sobbing. I didn't even know what a Jew was. I only felt that boy's hatred. Later, when I told my parents, they told me what a Jew was, and that I was one.

Within weeks, my parents and my brother and I, drove across country, moving to Glendale in Southern California. We found a tree lined street with Spanish style stucco homes, only a block from my new elementary school. My brother Carl, four years older, and I, walked to school each day. On the third day, once again attempting to get to my first grade class, a young boy about seven, whom I did not know, picked up some dog poop from his lawn and threw it at me, screaming, "Jew, Jew, Jew." This time, although feeling hurt and afraid, I ran on to school, which was closer than running home.

Our family soon learned, that at that time, Glendale was the home of the American Nazi party. In an attempt to scare our family to leave Glendale, my father's business was "set up" so the police could put him in jail for one month to force us to move. It worked. We moved 10 miles away to Los Angeles, finding a small two-bedroom home on a palm-tree-lined street, only minutes from the beach. I discovered kind friends, girls and boys, and, once again, my new school was only two blocks from our house.

The really good part of all the city and neighborhood changes we were forced to make, brought us closer to the ocean. I could now ride my bike to Venice beach or Marina Del Rey in 15 minutes. My father changed our last name from Simon to Scott, thus freeing us from being readily identified as Jewish people, and freeing my brother from being beat up anymore. We could safely hide who we were behind a name change. And it worked. I ended up going to a Los Angeles high school, the only one that was occupied by a blend of Whites, African Americans, Hispanic, Asians, and some disabled students. Everyone simply got along really well. Our high school was truly a working melting pot.

My childhood experience of being excluded, ostracized and hated, opened me up to feel compassion for other minority and marginalized groups, including women, African Americans, Asians, Native people, children, disabled, and Gay and Lesbians - all groups I got to work with, and be around over the years. My childhood hurt and pain was a blessing, helping me to deeply feel what many other people in the world live with daily, and cannot escape or find a hiding place behind a name change.

As I look at my life experiences, many of them included losing jobs while standing up for other people - yet feeling good about it. My natural instinct was, to support and stand with others who were marginalized - to become an advocate. I didn't have to take time to think about what was right. Instinct took over. I have been able to appear in court dozens of times for Native people who were wrongly accused and, because I am White, the courts more often than not, would free the Native people. I got to work in Black communities, with Hispanic farm workers in the Central valley, and simply get to know "others." And ultimately see others as me.

Our son, now 16, came to me in a dream before he was born. He said many things that I recorded. One of his statements was, "I am coming here to dissolve the artificial barriers between people." And he does that. Together, we easily and automatically find ways to connect with others. Those little boys of my childhood that caused so much emotional hurt and pain in my early years, also handed me the gift of greater compassion. I was disturbed by them, and now feel only gratitude.