The threads by which we as Jews all live by came true on Saturday night.
In a Catonsville apartment, I asked my mother-in-law Shirley Cohen, who had moved here recently from Phoenix, Az., if she knew anyone from Tucson.
Mom went to her address book, and pulled out the name of her friend Clair Naftulin. Mrs. Naftulin’s daughter Arlene live in Tucson.
A call was placed.
Arlene Madsen and her husband Phil moved from California five and a half years ago to Tucson, Az.
They were taken in by the beauty of the community.
And they loved that they could be who they were, a Jewish family.
On Saturday, the couple was attending the play “Wicked” in Tucson when during the intermission, they heard the news of the gunfire, the fatalities and the injured.
“I wanted to cry,” said Mrs. Madsen. “It was just so upsetting to have heard that something like this could happen.”
Mrs. Madsen knew well Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.
She had attended Rep. Giffords’ town hall meetings.
“She is a cool lady,” said Mrs. Madsen. “She’s a genuine person who wants to help. It’s just scary to think that is really happening in this country.”
Mrs. Madsen said she didn’t think the shooting was motivated by anti-Semitism. She added that she and her family have lived an active Jewish life in Tucson without issue.
“We’re a tight Jewish community,” she said. “We’re getting ready to have a film festival. I’m proud to be Jewish.”
She did say that one of the drawbacks she and husband have always noted about Arizona is what they see as a laxity in gun laws. Guns, she said, are just way too available.
She wasn’t a member of the congregation attended by Rep. Giffords, but she said she was familiar with it.
Mrs. Madsen noted with a sad smile in her voice that it was so interesting how the Jewish world works, that we’d reach one another because her mother and my mother-in-law were friends from Arizona.
Perhaps another reason why this is all so personal.