Yesterday was the 20th anniversary of the opening, and thus end, of the Berlin Wall. I never thought I'd see that. There was always going to be a wall and an East and West Germany. There was always going to be a cold war. I was amazed at how fast events led up to the opening of it and then the collapse of the Soviet Union after that.
I will always remember the people standing on top of the wall and thinking they would have been shot for doing that just 24 hours earlier. Then, there were the guys with sledgehammers wailing away on it and the big celebration when one section fell.
A year later, I found out the owners of the Black Bear Lodge, a German restaurant in Ingleside, Illinois, were going back home for a visit. I asked them if they could bring me back a piece and they said they would. I was teaching in nearby Round Lake and thought my 7th graders would appreciate actually touching something that was that important in history.
They brought it back and what I got was about a one inch square piece of concrete in a a leather bag for $10, a bit steep I thought for something so small. The next 16 years I taught, the kids got to actually hold it and I think get an appreciation of the significance of something so small.
This Cold War that it represented also had a big part in the next anniversary I'm going to write about.
A Real Piece of History. --RoadDog
Being an account of some things I'm interested in, what I'm doing, and reflections on my past, especially music.
Listen to this man. Seven years of college, you know. Trying to reason with 2020 and, now, 2022.
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