We’re reading the accounts of November 9, 1989 in Berlin, and, in retrospect, it seems almost absurd. A wall? Between two halves of the same city? Ludicrous? But it was *only* 20 years ago, and I remember that day so very clearly.

And, at the same time, almost daring to hope that our kids will see a day when they can look back 20 years and say, really? was there really a wall between the USA and Mexico? It seems so absurd!

It’s amazingly difficult to look at the fence between the US and Mexico (and the lack of one between the US and Canada) and think of it as any different from that between East and West Berlin. I’d really like to believe that we, the people of the United States of America, can arrive at this conclusion within my lifetime. Alas, we seem to be moving, quite rapidly, in the opposite direction.