Windsor, Canada – Just in Case

When I was around 11 years old in Detroit, my parents told me that they had a small bank account in Windsor, Canada, just in case. Oscar and Rita were not holocaust survivors. Their families ran from Europe much earlier than that – they fled the Ukrainian pogroms of the early 1900s and arrived on the shores of America, where a Jew could live in safety. But they were well versed in the history of Jewish persecution, so even in the Land of the Free there were things that they did just in case.  

For example, when my father was about to start college to become a chemist, his mother told him to become a doctor. “Ohsher, wherever you go, they will always need doctors.” Just in case. Because a portable career is like a bank account that waits across the border.

In case America turned its back on the Jews or threw its bricks through their windows. In case the hordes came running down the street bearing torches, axes, shotguns. When the antisemites would inevitably come for us, we’d pick our moment, get to the Detroit river, find a boat to row, row, row to Windsor, Canada, and would start anew with the few dollars that Oscar and Rita had socked away. 

Since October 7, the feeling of needing to prepare, just in case, has been gnawing at us. Where would we go if we couldn’t stay here? If Iran finishes building a nuclear weapon or America doesn’t renew Israel’s arms supply, where do we head? Italy? Portugal? Costa Rica? 

The saddest part of these thoughts is not that they were triggered by Hamas, and Hezbollah, and Iran, and Syria – we expect them to try to destroy us. What’s sad is that our uneasiness lingers because of the behavior of our own government. Whether the changes it is making are good or bad; whether those changes will outlast the current government’s time in office or not; whether Bibi has the best interests of the Israeli nation at heart, or is a selfish, self-preserving, egomaniacal schemer – there are so many “what ifs” that could make our state unlivable, or barely so.

And though it’s remotely possible that Bibi does, in fact, have our best interests at heart, it feels highly improbable. Italy, Portugal, Cost Rica.

We know a man who helps people invest in houses in Ohio. The houses are really just for investment, not for Jews to live in. Nonetheless, there was one that my wife Rachel thought was ”cute.” “We could live there, if we had to.” So we added Ohio to our list. Just in case.