We just had our first grandchild!!!!!!!! It got me thinking….

On August 22, we had our first grandchild! A beautiful baby boy!

To be sure, I instantly fell in love with the little bundle of joy. He was named after my Dad of blessed memory and my son-in-law’s grandpa as well.

When I held him and stared into his beautiful eyes, for some reason, I began thinking about the character, Hans Sternlicht, in my book, Kill Brothers. When Hans was a baby, his grandparents, Josef and Bette Sternlicht, lived a fairy tale life in pre-war Berlin. They prospered in a modern and cultured Germany, traveled freely and enjoyed wonderful relationships with their family and friends, Jews and Gentiles alike. But the Nazis came, bearing hatred and evil. In a relatively short period of time, Hitler and his thugs destroyed everything they had. The Nazis raped Germany and pillaged all of Europe, deliberately murdering millions of Jews and other ethnic groups that they considered non-Aryan. The fictional Josef and Bette were forced to flee their homeland after Kristallnacht and ended up dying in London during the Blitz.

Well, I recently saw a news story where Neo Nazis, carrying Swastikas were marching in the modern and cultured state of Florida, espousing the same hatred as Hitler and his minions. As I rocked my little grandson in my arms I thought, ‘will it happen again here…in my beloved, modern and cultured United States of America?‘

Naturally, I thought, ‘I hope not.’ But “hope“ is not a strategy. Hatred is manifest in our beloved country. Its seems to have burgeoned with the advent of social media and political discord. I “hope” that all good people - our public officials, friends and neighbors and educational and religious institutions will rise up in unison against this hatred and not allow history to repeat itself.