David McElroy

Monday marks the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz. I’m not sure the world has yet learned the lessons of the horrors discovered there.

The Soviet Red Army reached Auschwitz first on its way through Poland. That was on Jan. 27, 1945. U.S. and British forces coming from the west found and liberated similar camps in the weeks to come.

In each place, the story was the same. There was evidence and testimony of an efficient killing machine. Those still alive were used as forced labor. Those who became unable to work were killed. Mass numbers of people were also executed as part of Hitler’s “final solution” for ridding his world of Jews. The survivors were emaciated and dying.

I frequently come across people online who claim that the killing that went on in these camps — of Jews, gypsies, gay people, mentally ill and other “undesirables” — either didn’t happen or else has been exaggerated.

Every time I hear such claims, I want to show these people the photos that I printed from very old negatives when I worked at a University of Alabama photo lab while I was in college.

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I haven’t had the nightmare for years, but it used to terrorize the darkest of my nights.

It always started out in a familiar place, with people all around. I would try to speak to others, but they wouldn’t respond. It seemed as though they couldn’t even hear me. When I couldn’t get their attention, I would start frantically trying to get someone to notice.

I would try to touch the people around me, but my hands would go right through their bodies and then the image of the person would disappear. One after another, everyone around me would disappear — until I was left all alone.

And then the place where I was — home, school, office, whatever — would start getting hazy and dark. The physical world around me would slowly disappear. I could still see my body if I looked down at myself — as though something was illuminating me — but there was no physical substance of any kind for as far as I could see.

I was in a dark void. I was all alone. Worst of all, I would always feel as though there was no other presence that I would ever experience again. I knew I would be alone forever.

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I’ve never taken a job because of the money. Not even once.

That came as a shock to me when I realized it the other day. The entire assumption behind the labor market is that we take increasingly difficult roles or maybe jobs that require longer hours because we make more money by taking them. So it confused me when I first realized that financial incentives have never motivated a job change for me.

I don’t mean I haven’t wanted more money when it was available. Each time I changed jobs — back when I worked full-time for others — each promotion meant more money than the last job. But did I take the promotions because they came with more money?

No. I wanted the excitement of doing something new. I wanted a new challenge. I wanted the enjoyment of moving up in the pecking order. I wanted the feeling of achieving something.

I was having fun.

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