5 min read

September 1961. We were at my grandmother’s apartment in Brooklyn. But something wasn’t right. For one thing, my father hadn’t finished dinner with us. He had to rush off to a special meeting of his army reserve unit at nearby Fort Hamilton. This was unusual - not planned and predictable like all the other countless visits with my grandparents. Also, the grownups seemed tense and as the hours went by, my mother told me to take a nap on my grandparent’s bed. I never had to do this before. What was going on?