‘War in Europe: 50-Year Legacy’
On Aug. 31, I was strapped to a table in surgery where sharp steel parted my flesh and optic fibers recorded on a screen how my bones and sinews tied together while the surgeon scraped and sewed with the tools and knowledge accumulated by mankind since it began. Two days later, home in bed, bandaged, catheterized, annoyed with age, and watching television portray the horrible techniques developed for World War II on its 50th anniversary, my 2-year-old grandson came and took my hand to get me up and out to the patio to play.
His lovely prattle countered the human stupidity and ugliness I witnessed. Holding hands, I slowly creaked along with him to watch his smooth-skinned body, naked to the sun and breeze, watered by the garden hose.
His great glee was good medicine for me. He laughed away my gloom and raised my hopes for mankind once more.
All over the world healthy little boys and girls with full tummies should play and shout with joy. And the only, but tiny, growth towards that ideal lies in the United Nations.
BURTON WITKOVSKY
Laguna Hills
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