So this was an english essay and the prompt I used was to write about something that deeply affected you and or changed you for the better. So I'm having a little trouble with some of the sentences, the first one especially so if you could help me I'd be really grateful!!
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At the United States Holocaust Museum I rounded a corner into a cold, plain room, and was bombarded by my senses and emotions all at once. The pungent smell of old, musty leather hit my nostrils, and the sight of hundreds of pairs of shoes reached my horrified eyes. A bridge stretched before me to the other side of the room, and laid out beside and beneath it lay shoes, nestled together in remembrance of the owners whose lives were tragically lost. Those shoes bear testimony that the Holocaust happened, they bear testimony of the human beings who wore them moments before they died.
In that room of shoes taken from concentration camp victims, I was changed forever. Leaning up against the bridge railing I was tempted to reach slowly out and brush my tingling finger tips against the old leather. Tears filled my eyes as I focused them on a tiny pink shoe, a little girl’s shoe. In that moment the people who died in the Holocaust became real before my eyes. They once had worn these shoes. In that room of cement walls I realized that lying all around me was all that remained of those people... it was all that remained of their hopes, and their dreams, the last remaining proof of their very lives.
“We are the shoes, we are the last witness. We are shoes from Grandchildren and Grandfathers, from Prague, Paris, and Amsterdam, and because we are only made of fabric and leather, and not of blood and flesh, each one of us avoided the hellfire.” The words written across the wall blurred as tears ran down my cheeks. In that moment everything I had ever had the courage to believe in burned deep inside my very being.
An icy hand clenched my stomach as I realized I could have worn a pair of those shoes. Those girls had been just like me. They dreamed of big futures, of getting married, and having
families of their own. They were crazy about boys, and studied late into the night cramming for a chemistry exam that awaited them in only a few hours. They laughed on warm summer days in the park with their best friends! What had they done to deserve death? The answer that breaks my heart still is that they were Jewish, and they were born unfairly into a hateful world.
They were just like me.
The apathy of mankind was splayed around me, in a cold, dim room, just like the chambers that the owners of those shoes had been murdered in. My sympathetic heart shattered and in that moment whatever faith I had left in mankind was abolished.
And yet... in many ways I was given hope. Hope that through what I had now witnessed I would no longer be afraid to stand up for what I believe in. In my heart burned the new belief that somehow I can have an impact on mankind. I know now that even though I’m only one person I can change the world in someway for the better.
As I stared down at that little pink shoe I understood why one must speak up, why exactly one must be heard. The reason? Because if you remain silent eleven million people could die. If you go along with what you don’t believe in, others will suffer the consequences. I believe that I can make a difference. I believe that every human being is worth something, and I believe that I can help others to see the good in themselves.
Those shoes of the past, speak to the people of the future. They tell a horrifying story, that maybe in years to come will seem distant and almost fictitious. Yet they will lie in that museum forever, reminding the world that it was not a fictitious event. It happened.
Four words are written boldly across a wall in the lobby of the museum. Those words will be engraved on my soul for an indefinite amount of time. They read:
“You are my witnesses”
I am their witness.
And as for the part with the rant when I said "Unfairly" I totally see what you mean. I feel bad that comes across the way it does I really didn't mean for it to be that way. The funny thing is as I reread it I'm not even sure why I put that.
