Letters to America #4: Is the darkness the darkness of the tomb or the womb?

A fall day at the river Oder, the border between my German home to the west and Poland to the east.

Dear fellow traveler,

I grew up behind the Wall in Cold War times, denied freedom of speech, expression, and religion. Speaking your mind, asking questions, or taking to the streets meant risking imprisonment.

That’s why seeing people across the world standing up for democracy, decency, and our brothers and sisters in Ukraine gives me hope.

We still live in a free world. We can voice our thoughts, laugh at those who seek to be kings, and critique the rich in money but poor in soul. We can still write freely, travel freely, and express our concerns and even outrage freely.

This is no small thing, dear friend. Celebrate it. Protect it. Use it.

When I was growing up, Putin was a young KGB officer in Berlin. He never got over the fact that when millions took to the streets in East Germany, demanding freedom, the government did not send in the tanks. No one knew at the time whether they would responded to the thousands of candle holding protesters with tanks. Thank God they did not. And the peaceful revolution brought down the Wall.

To this day, Putin wishes they had brought in the tanks. To this day, he seeks to restore the old world order.

Not in my worst nightmares could I have imagined a time when Putin would be more welcome in the Oval Office of the United States of America than the democratically elected president of the country he is bombing.

And this is where the American story meets my East German story.