The Wall

Twenty years ago today, it came down!   Like millions of others, I watched in excitement...overcome with emotion.



That excitement wasn't fueled by world politics nor did it have anything to do with then President Reagan demanding that Mikhail Gorbachev "Tear down this wall".

More than anything else, I was moved by seeing the hundreds of thousands of young folks (on live TV!)...their excitement and celebration of what the future could offer as they swung at the concrete and danced on its upper edges for all the world to see.   Then there was the stream of Trabants making their way through the wall to West Germany.   It was awesome.

At the time, my oldest daughter was 12 years old.   I'm sure she didn't fully understand the significance of this nor its place in history.   Ten years later, while at college in California, she just happened to meet a young man from the other side of that wall.

It's a long story...but on June 3rd of 2008, they became husband and wife.   That was another day I will never forget.   Many from that side of the wall, were invited...and attended to witness their union.   For many, it was their 1st trip to America!   It was his grandmother's first trip on an airplane!

On their wedding day...that wall never entered my radar screen.   It was the last thing on my mind!   Today I relive that moment and rejoice in the fact that it is gone...or at least a thing of the past.