My grandfather was Austra-Hungarian nobility. He was very rich. What did that mean?
He spoke 17 languages and consulted on cultural projects throughout the western world including the original Madison Square Garden.
His father built hospitals and schools for the blind, the first of which ever in Austria.
He bred Dalmatians to run alongside his horse and carriage and made them better and better for use for fire fighters’ carts safely getting quickly to the rescue.
He insisted education be continued and my mother speaks 9 languages.
He was a Hussar.
He was murdered in a gulag after being held captive for over 10 years for the crime of being a rich aristocrat.
Imagine alone the connections and ideas that can be made when you can communicate and read 17 languages.
The word aristocrat now implies egomania, selfish acquiring and soulless self centered motivations.
That’s a lie created by people who wanted to produce the fear of false oligarchies.
Carol VanBreyer’s DNA is in mine and I say this with some epigenetic need to caution some of you today…fear is the hottest ticket in town and the easiest to acquire. You’ll be surrounded by people you know and feel supported and safe as everyone nods knowingly and gratefully at those telling you who to fear. The seat is free of charge.
But you’ll never be able to get up again. That costs way too much.
Please consider this when talking about this election this year. Better to have no one to vote for than vote because you’re afraid.
The America my grandfather touched was made to be beyond and untouchable by such a thing as fear of one man. But the way that must happen is very delicate.
I trust you’ll understand. That’s why America is unlike any other place.
Thanks for reading. smile emoticon
I learned all about this from you the other night, but reading about him in your writing, which you do so well, brings it home to me in a powerful fashion. Hate is the going currency these days. Let us hate those who are rich because they have more than we do, let us hate those who are poor because they threaten our livelihood.
I only speak 2 languages, English and French, but also several fields written in the amazing languages of mathematics. My step-father however, of whom I was not fond but that is another story (forgive me for thinking ill of him, and now that he is gone I do earnestly wish him a happier existence in the next life), was a polyglot linguist, who taught languages such as Tamil, Urdu, Telegu, Malayalam-all the South Indian languages. My first father was an artist, gifted in wrought-iron work, though I’ve never seen any of it.
What is the message, if any, in all of this? Nothing world-shaking, except that both of us are rich mixtures of many peoples and nationalities, Jewish, German, Irish, Russian. True soul-mates.
Thank you for enjoying and thinking about him. He and I are kindred. Soulmates?
Kindred is a preferable word…it allows for the gross nature of life to be both a requirement and a gift met with joy because of its vital limitations. It’s beyond the limitations of any g-d law that might mark one soul for (or) another. It requires responsibility. It demands it. It’s from choosing rather than being chosen or another’s choice.