Today is my grandmother's birthday

Liebe Grossmutter! Herzlichen Glückwunsch zum Geburtstag! -- My grandmother would be turning in her grave if she knew how the world has turned. It is now upside down, and she would have to do a 180° turn to see the beautiful trees at the Osterholzer Friedhof. That's where she is buried in Bremen. She would be pleased about the new University there, exactly at the spot where we used to go ice-skating, and not far from where her son Helmut used to go dancing at the Munte II. She went there with me often to reminisce about what might have been if he had survived. She didn't tell me what she thought, but I knew. She thought about her dead son. He was only 20 years old when he died. The year was 1940, and this was his second tour of duty in the German Luftwaffe. The mission was "Unternehmen Seelöwe".

My grandmother would not believe that America is now fighting this senseless war. How many American mothers will think about their sons and what might have been?