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I censor myself. After a checkered military career, I don’t want to unleash a shitload of grief from foreign nationals who were— shall we say— disappointed in my ability. To save their village. To enforce a ceasefire. To hasten the arrival of food, water and medicine. Indignant with righteous anger, they might consider me a bad motherfucker who… yada, yada, yada… let them down. Bigtime.

As Paul Simon said at one of his concerts, in the middle of a bomb scare, “Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you.”

Now that the French and the Russians have both announced that Yasser Arafat died after a massive stroke— and not of radioactive Polonium poisoning— I feel liberated enough to share this anecdotal story of my dinner with Arafat.

I spent a year in Israel in the 1970’s, working as an assistant cameraman and still photog for Israeli television. A spoiled rotten brat, I had a real hard time with the Israelis. They weren’t putting up with my temper tantrums. When things didn’t go my way, they would tell me, “If you want to sulk, Kevin, it’s no skin off our noses. Sulk! Sulk all you like!”

It takes two to tango. The Israelis were not completely guiltless either. For example: Seeing my girlfriend climb on the bus, I called out in English, “Rachel! Hi! Come sit here next to me. I’ll hold the seat.”

At which point a rotund Hungarian man with a bald pate proceeded to march up to me and say, in English, “Who do you think you are!? Screw you and your Rachel! You don’t hold no seat! I’m sitting here!” Which he proceeded to do.

“GET UP!” I screamed.

“Fock you ‘get up’!” he replied.

“Get up so I can stand in the aisle. If you think I’m going to sit next to you…!” I ranted, just this side of coming to blows.

He got up and let me push my way up the aisle to Rachel, who was dying a thousand deaths and pretended, desperately, not to even know me.

WELCOME TO ISRAEL, EVERYBODY!

And that was just a single incident on a typical weekday. Multiply by a thousand and you begin to fathom what it was like to spend a year in the homeland of Holocaust-scarred, battle-ready, hardnosed Israelis.

Ha! I returned to America determined to write the exposé revealing what monsters the Israelis were!

“Don’t do it!” requested Abe Horowitz, one of my mentors when I was growing up. A Talmudic scholar, when Abe made a statement, I listened. “I know you’re sore, Kevin. But I’m asking you, as a personal favor to me, not to write a book lambasting the Israelis. The anti-Semites of the world will latch onto it and use it to punish Jews everywhere. Let’s not give our enemies additional cannon fodder!”

I agreed to swallow my bile and let it go.

Ten years later, a very different Kevin Feingold, I went back to Israel to visit the very people I had befriended and irritated.

“Hey, Shlomo,” Arlene called across the TV studio. “Come here! You remember Kevin Feingold. He worked here ten years ago.”

Shlomo was extremely careful and reserved upon seeing me. “Hello,” he said.

When I started to bring him up to date on my Army career and…

“Wait a minute!” he interrupted me in the midst of my narrative. “So how do you feel about Israel today?”

“Oh! I love Israel. Israel is our homeland.”

“You were such a spoiled brat!” he burst out happily. “There were times I wanted to bop you on the head! What a pleasure that you’ve finally grown up!”

This same thing happened not only with Arlene and Shlomo, but also with Ari, Benny, Shmuel, Josef, Shimona and many, many others. They were glad to see me. I was grateful to be there.

I ended up making several visits in the 1980’s. Ariel Sharon’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon, in response to escalating raids by the Palestinian Liberation Organization, badly scarred my buddies in the Israeli Defense Forces. Not an altogether successful incursion, much Israeli blood and treasure was lost. Ari, nominally retired from the military, settled on a moshav in the Valley of Jordan. A moshav is a collection of farms organized like a kibbutz, but each farmer owns his property. Ari’s particular moshav was chosen for its strategic geopolitical location. In addition to farming, the townsfolk ran nightly patrols throughout the surrounding countryside. When they found PLO raiding parties, they killed some and captured the rest. Meanwhile, daytime, Ari’s business was growing carnations for the European market. I spent many happy hours with him and his wife Erit planting and harvesting carnations. They had a sideline in eggplants for local consumption. I’m mad about eggplant, which cracked up Ari. He considers them junk food. Every evening, regardless of what else was on the menu, Erit fried me up a batch of sliced eggplant. Yum!

I didn’t know it, but those were my Halcyon days.

Since America is not a country inherently at peace with the rest of the world, my U. S. Army career took off in a big way. It was many years before I could get my sorry ass back to Israel.

By then I had a bone to pick with Mr. Yasser Arafat. At Camp David in 2000, President Clinton and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak negotiated a settlement—amidst angry recriminations and bad blood on all sides— for the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Barak was elected specifically on a promise to negotiate a settlement, once and for all, between the two peoples. A workable, usable settlement. Which he, Arafat and Bill Clinton did. At which point Yasser Arafat declared, “If I sign that, when I get home to Ramallah, I am a dead man!” Gathering his papers and his retinue, Arafat traveled home to the Palestinian Authority and unleashed the Second Intifada. When asked about the riots’ bloody, horrendous carnage, Yasser said, “It makes me sad. I am so sad.”

Herblock in The Washington Post drew a cartoon of Yasser Arafat sitting on the sidelines declaring “This is so sad.” Boo hoo hoo for Yasser Arafat!

Think of Yasser Arafat as the original long distance runner. No tennis player could keep the ball in play like Arafat. As long as the Palestinian-Israeli negotiations never ended, everybody— Arabs, Palestinians, Israelis, Americans, indeed, the whole world—desperately needed the undisputed leader of the PLO, Yasser Arafat. Without him, no one knew who to negotiate with. “Mr. Palestine,” the father of his country, Yasser made sure never to become redundant, get retired emeritus or reach an accord.

*

            “We’re going,” announced Björn in 2002 over the phone from Stockholm. My Swedish buddy from my junior year abroad at the University of Uppsala, he and I stayed in touch over the Net. Whereas I had a career, Björn lived by the seat of his pants: One day he was a filmmaker, the next a journalist, a photog, a radio commentator or even a rock musician. I enjoyed the tales of his ridiculous escapades. “We’ll be accredited journalists. I can get you accreditation. We’re gonna interview Yasser Arafat.”

“No way!”

“Way! We’re Swedish neutrals. We can do anything we want!”

The Swedes enjoy a reputation for neutrality which is not entirely deserved. They are less interested in neutrality than in “What is best for Sweden?” During World War Two, the German war machine ran on ball bearings from SKF, Svenka kullagerfabriken, The Swedish Ball Bearing Factory. The king of Sweden was blatantly pro-German. At the University of Lund, students held demonstrations, protesting the arrival of German Jewish professors among the faculty. Under Germany’s Nuremberg Laws, starting in 1938, the Germans printed a red “J” in the passports of Jews. Sweden used these to more easily extradite refugees back to Germany, and almost certain death, whenever they appeared in small boats along the Swedish coast.

It wasn’t until Rommel’s defeat at El Alamein that the Swedes realized they were on the losing side in the war and switched allegiance to the British. Sweden then interred any Brit aviator who crashed on Swedish territory, giving them a safe haven from the war. One of those Joes was still broadcasting English-language shows on the Swedish Radio’s foreign program in the 1970’s! Some old soldiers never die, they just grow cornier with age. (There, but for the grace of God, go I?)

Yes, the Swedes saved the Danish Jews, but that’s because they were Danes. Their religion was secondary. And, yes, there were some true heroes. Diplomat Raoul Wallenberg played a cat and mouse game with the likes of Adolf Eichmann, saving the Jews of Budapest, Hungary. Count Folke Bernadotte, a nobleman, arranged a caravan of Red Cross buses in March,1945 to go down to German-held territory and rescue 15,345 prisoners from the concentration camps. Something which he did not have to do. He did it anyway. The Nazis used the event as a propaganda victory, but lives were saved.

These may seem like revelations to Americans, but the Swedish public has already hashed out their guilt in public discourse in the 1990’s, admitted to it and decided to let bygones be bygones. Stockholm even has a Holocaust memorial, an accomplishment that was totally inconceivable even 25 years ago in chillingly anti-Semitic Sweden.

In our modern world, with its frigid winters, Sweden found itself dependent on Arab oil. Thus the Social Democrats’ crocodile tears over the plight of the Palestinians. For over ten years, Swedish Foreign Minister Sten Andersson adamantly, repeatedly claimed he was “a friend of Israel.” He demonstrated this steadfast Freundschaft by constantly inviting Yasser Arafat to Stockholm. Where Arafat made derogatory, inflammatory statements about wiping Israel off the face of the Earth! This was the same Sten Andersson who called the reunification of Germany in 1989 “A dangerous thing for Europe.” He delivered this public announcement from Moscow, of all places! See, as foreign minister, he was on a diplomatic mission to Moskva when the Berlin Wall came crashing down and… Hey! We’re Polish-Russian Jews from Bialystok. My grandma spoke fluent Russian. That doesn’t mean I would make a public statement from the capital of the Soviet Union!

Things are not always what they appear. Perplexed by the Stalinist behavior of the Central Committee of the Swedish Environmentalist Party the Greens, it wasn’t until I perused their library that I discovered what was going on: The Communists had hijacked the Greens! Every fifth book was in Russian

*

            I burned some leave, packed my gear and flew to Stockholm. Joining Björn and his crew, we got organized and flew straight south to Israel. I knew we’d have primo weather. It’s a man thing: We control the weather through our choice of clothing. If I wear my summer khakis, the day is sure to be cold. If I pack snow boots, we’re guaranteed to have blisteringly hot, sunny days. By packing my winter duds and a pair of shorts, I could look forward to balmy days, temps in the high 80’s. Which is what we got. It never fails! Glaring, garish yellow sunlight poured down from a cloudless sky. We put our Ray-Bans to good use.

Already at Lod Airport’s Customs and Immigration we seemed suspicious as hell. Cordoned off and led to a separate, bomb-proof room, we got the third degree from an Israeli female officer of quiet determination and startling good looks. “You want to go where?” she demands.

I’m in love!

Since our papers are in order, we grab a taxi to Jerusalem. Approaching on foot the Arab bus station to the right of Damascus Gate, we catch a Palestinian taxi for Ramallah. Sitting in front with the driver, I squint at Route 60, which will eventually become the Derekh Ramal’ah, a veritable road to nowhere unspooling underneath the Mercedes hood ornament. In many ways, this asphalt highway traversing the desert is a time machine: After leaving the very modern metropolis of Jerusalem, we travel north. The further north we get, the poorer and more run-down the venue. We do see some splendid individual houses, one shaped like an alpine ski lodge, another like a Colonial mansion, a third shaped like an airplane.

“New money,” mutters our driver, smiling wolfishly.

“Israeli money?”

“Palestinian money,” he grunts. “The owner of the cement plant. The Chief of Municipal Services in Ramallah…”

Aha! At least somebody knows how to work the system.

We get stopped at three separate checkpoints. Forewarned not to take photos or video, we gawk instead like a carload of tourists, admiring the various armament on display. The first checkpoint is Israeli, equipped with American M-16’s and light 50-caliber machine guns. Old home week! The second checkpoint is an all-Palestinian do, all Kalashnikov AK-47’s all the time. Finally, at the town limits of Ramallah, a Fatah roadblock directs us into the middle of their checkpoint, 7.62 mm Kalashnikovs and Dragunov sniper rifles pointed at seemingly every inch of our vehicle.

Ten dollars in baksheesh paid at the checkpoint like a toll finds us winding our way into the city. “Welcome to Ramallah,” sighs our driver.

We’re staying on the 4th floor of the Count Messerschmitt Inn, very five star, on Emil Habibi Street, paved in sand and pot-holes. The hotel, on a main drag, is a popular hangout because of its outdoor Olympic-size western swimming pool. Many cute young men sit around the pool on folding chairs, hungrily chain-smoking, flirting with their eyes.

We soon learn that Ramallah is not a town in which to take an afternoon stroll. Various scruffy A-habs in kaffiyehs openly tote AK-47’s across their backs. Today’s Palestinians are descendants of the Philistines in the Old Testament. Remember Samson and Delilah? No wonder the Palestinians can’t get along with Israelis, a Jew pulled down their temple! They’re nursing a 2,000-year-old grudge. The tension is palpable. Also, the place is infested with mangy, feral dogs. “They should shoot them,” Björn suggests diffidently, practicing his English.

This immediately puts us at the barrel end of an AK-47, shoved in our faces by a militiaman who is also an angry dog-lover or a dog-lover who is also an angry militiaman. “You… don’t… shoot… my… dogs!” he demands uncertainly.

Each time I look down the barrel of a gun, I am filled with the same sense of dread, regardless of the make and model. Since no Swede can admit error without a total breakdown of identity, I intercede. “Yes, that’s right!” I tell the Palestinian. “You got it right. You don’t shoot my dogs! It’s fine. You speak good English!”

The angry furrow on his noble Arabian brow dissipates, replaced by an enormous smile. His teeth are a wreck, but I much prefer him this way. He smells like he only bathes when the moon is full. “You Englishmen!” he exclaims.

Pushing the gun barrel ever so cautiously out of our faces, I chuckle and say, “Actually, we’re Swedes.” This leads to the usual long palaver over who is Switzerland and where is Sweden.

The more we talk, the more enraptured he becomes. “Dolph Lundgren!” he exclaims, waving his rifle and making shooting sounds, “Da da da da! ”

“Yup, that’s us!” I laugh. “Dolph Lundgren!”

Björn has used his contacts in the world of journalism to secure us a fixer named Fawzi. Meeting with him that afternoon in our room, we explain what we want to do.

“Yes, yes,” he tells us excitedly. “But you can’t!”

I try to ignore the fact that Fawzi resembles a ferret. People cannot be held responsible for the looks God gives them. Still, I’m not happy with his answer. “Björn! Show Fawzi the emails and stuff!”

Seeing the way Fawzi holds the paperwork, the nickel falls through the slot: Our fixer can’t read. “Let me point out some of the relevant sentences,” I gently suggest, relieving Fawzi of the documents. He looks overjoyed to hand them over. Once I’ve finished explaining that the Arafat contingent actually has agreed to a Swedish TV interview, that they are expecting us, Fawzi pulls out a cell phone and makes a few calls.

“Okay!” he announces. “We got it!”

*

            You’ve never had a full-body cavity search like what we suffer chez Arafat’s royal palace cum office building, the Muqata’a, in Ramallah. (In September, the Israelis will blow it all to hell.) Touching every part of our naked bodies, the Arab security boys leave no parts untouched. Since a Northern Alliance chieftain in Afghanistan got assassinated in 2001 by terrorists claiming to be a film team— their camera and battery pack were loaded with shaped explosive— our equipment is combed over inside and out by— get ready for it! — professional cameramen from Fatah!

“I hate to tell you this, Björn,” I remark, “but from what I can see, their camera equipment is several upgrades better than ours!”

“Var tyst nån gång,” suggests Björn, polite Swedish for “Shut the fuck up!”

“SPEAK ONLY ENGLISH!” screams Arafat’s security chief. Having got our attention, he then explains that Chairman Arafat’s stomach is upset. “Please don’t aggravate him. He is forced to drink herbal tea, eschewing other beverages. This has left the chairman testy.”

We promise to be on our best behavior.

Björn: Mr. Chairman, how did you become involved in politics?

Yasser: Palestinian anger knows no bounds!

Björn: Yes. I understand that. Considering that you won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994, at what point did you realize that politics would be your chosen profession?

Yasser: When the Israeli aggressor occupied Palestine, all Palestinians of courage pledged to force the occupiers back into the sea! Insha’Allah! It is a pre-condition for any negotiation with the Israeli and Jordanian occupiers, that we return to the 1923 borders. After that, we’ll talk!

Björn: Excellent! And you joined the PLO when?

Yasser: When pushed too far, back against the wall, the Palestinian fights with the might of a tiger. Always this is so!

If they were just starting out today, many of the Palestinian groups would probably end up being labeled as terrorist organizations. In September of 1970, the PFLP, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, hijacked five passenger jets and landed them in Zarka, Jordan. Holding the passengers hostage, they eventually blew up the empty aircraft rather than let them be recaptured. In 1972, the PLO’s armed wing Black September murdered eleven Israeli athletes at the Munich Summer Olympics. Frustrated, angry and suicidal, Palestinian suicide bombers have become the bane of the western world. They blow up busloads of soldiers and civilians. They blow up themselves amid market squares, pizzerias, synagogues, movie theaters and hotels. Hamas in Gaza has rained thousands of missiles on Sderot and other southern Israeli towns.

Yet all you get out of chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat is how the Palestinian people are the victims of Israeli oppression. That the Palestinians themselves might be murderous sons of bitches he blithely blames on “the occupation” of Palestine. Give them back all of Palestine— goes their “narrative”— and there will be peace on Earth and good will toward man. Until then, whatever happens, it’s all Israel’s fault!

Björn: I’m just trying to get a feel for your personal history, Chairman Arafat. Where you grew up, which schools you attended, when you helped found Fatah…?

Yasser: When life under the yoke of Israeli aggression became intolerable, we Palestinians fought back with all our cunning, with total conviction. This cannot be denied! Cannot! We Palestinians have given everything to free our homeland! Everything! No one has fought harder for their freedom! This I can assure you!

Björn: Oh yes, Chairman Aeroflot, I too feel exactly similar to whatever you just said! We Swedes know which side of the bread our toast is buttered on. We’re wholly dependent on Arab oil. You shall never find a better friend than Sweden! Maybe Denmark…

Yasser: We Palestinians are prepared to begin negotiations tomorrow, but first the Israelis must show good faith by agreeing to the parameters of the guidelines for the structure of the framework for the contents of the agenda regarding the preconditions which must be met to fulfill the basis for substantive talks. Otherwise, both sides are wasting their time!

Pausing to slurp from his tea cup, the chairman then proceeds to lecture us on the nobility of his mission: “Where others have expressed doubt, I have never wavered. When my wife Suha brings my little daughter to me, I place her squarely atop my desk. ‘Why are you the leader of the PLO?’ asks my sweet child. I wag a finger in her face and say, ‘Because daddy loves you. Just as he loves all the Palestinian people and will never stop fighting in our struggle for independence from the Israeli aggressor. Never! Not until the last Palestinian has exercised his right of return to the land of Palestine! Insha’Allah!’ ”

For many years, the PLO was headquartered in Beirut and southern Lebanon. If nothing else, the 1982 Israeli invasion forced Arafat and the PLO to flee to… Tunisia! Tunis is a long way from Palestine. During the years of their Tunisian exile, it looked almost as if Israel and the Palestinians would reach an agreement free of PLO involvement. The 1993 Oslo Accords dashed that assumption entirely. The best thing that ever happened to Yasser Arafat, they specified the PLO as the sole representative of the Palestinian people! Not the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, not a handful of other factions. No, Oslo gave Arafat— and Arafat alone— legitimacy. Whenever Arafat went to the john, the entire Middle East was expected to hold its collective breath. When Arafat sneezed, half of Arabia caught a cold. No wonder the sheiks and kings of North Africa looked down their beaked noses at Arafat and the PLO, calling them fedayeen, peasants, rabble. No matter! The PLO came roaring back into town— figuratively speaking— waving banners proclaiming “Re-Opened For Business!”

Since then, bitching and attacking, cajoling and whining, condemning, calling for sanctions and boycotts against Israel, rioting in the streets and throwing stones, demanding recognition at the United Nations, the PLO does everything except make a final status agreement. The Palestinian Liberation Organization is immovable when it comes to this central premise: To never, ever accept anything less than the entire state of Palestine as it was in 1946, the dagger-shaped land which the Palestinians claim as their rightful homeland, but which, peculiarly, goes by the name “Israel” in western society. The vision of the Palestinian people is simply to regain everything lost in the Nakba, the “catastrophe,” that was the 1947 founding of the State of Israel. They’re not sure how it will come about, but the Palestinians certainly will never settle for anything less. By their reckoning, they have waited so long and sacrificed so much, they would have to be crazy to accept anything less than the whole loaf. That is the 800 lb. gorilla in the room: Total Palestinian intransigence. This “word on the Arab street” has made fools of western diplomats and presidents in the past. It is doing so again to Secretary of State John Kerry, who is stupidly shuttling back and forth between a rock and a hard place.

The Palestinians will never give up hope: They want their country back.

I find Arafat’s obfuscation meaningfully upsetting and upsettingly meaningful.  That doesn’t mean I’d vote for him.

“I hope this answers all of your questions,” says Chairman Arafat. “You should consider making a donation to our cause.”

Everyone knows Yasser was “fat”— not in poundage but in money. Show me an Arab and I’ll show you a man with his hand in the till who is also busy running several deals on the side. You and I should be “fat like Arafat.” We’re talking major coinage. When Yasser died in 2004, the leaders of the Palestinian Authority came to Suha Arafat, put a gun to her head and said “Give us the Swiss bank account numbers or you’ll never see daybreak.” Suha handed over the account numbers and the P.A. recovered 1.3 billion dollars Arafat had skimmed. That money was returned to the government treasury of the Palestinian Authority.

Judging from her lifestyle in Malta— Suha never so much as visits the P.A.— Suha didn’t give up all the account numbers. Such a clever girl!

Meanwhile, in Ramallah… Ushered out into the hallway by the security guards, there’s another Keystone Cops moment when Björn asks no one in particular, “That’s it? That’s the entire interview?!”

“The chairman has only limited strength,” the chief of security apologizes. When Björn begins to argue, I point out— in Swedish— “Björn! Don’t you see it is costing the security chief blood to even admit that Arafat isn’t up to snuff? Give the guy a break!”

“I have warned you before!” thunders the chief. “SPEAK ONLY ENGLISH!”

So now I ask to confer with him in private. There, I express our gratitude over his candor. “It cannot be easy dealing with someone as… difficult… as the chairman is in his old age,” I suggest.

Eyeing me craggily, the chief fingers the gun in its holster riding on his hip. He comments carefully, “You have made this statement. Not I! You have said this! Perhaps I agree, perhaps not.”

“Of course!” I gush. “I wish to thank you for whatever forbearance you can show us.”

“We Palestinians are a gracious people! I will arrange transportation back to your hotel.”

Again, comedy intercedes! Hearing my stomach growl audibly, the security chief looks me up and down, suspecting a trick. Making a face, he mutters, “Are you hungry?”

“We’ll take care of it back at the hotel,” I assure him.

“Nonsense!” Leading me back into the hallway where I join the others, the chief speaks volubly in Arabic with Fawzi, who looks more and more uneasy.

“What is it now?” grouses Björn.

“I don’t understand,” bleats Fawzi. “We are being invited to dinner by the security chief and his next in command.”

“That’s great!” I say.

“No, no, no!” whispers Fawzi dramatically, giving me meaningful looks. “We should leave now! This is a very dangerous situation! The less said, the better!”

“I want to stay,” I insist, amazed at this blatant show of cowardice. Still, Fawzi looks so forlorn and unhappy, I am prepared to give in.

“If Kevin stays, I stay!” insists Björn, in one of those mock-heroic statements which Swedes love to make.

“We would like to invite you to dinner. With whomever on your staff you would like to have accompany us,” I tell the chief.

“Come with me,” says he, leading us into a lounge adjacent to the main dining area. “Please to sit.”

I’m not blind. In the next room, at a small table, Chairman Arafat and family take their evening repast. “Well,” I tell Björn, “at least you can claim that you ate dinner with Arafat. I mean, ‘with, with.’ He’s eating. We’re eating.”

“We enjoyed an evening meal in the chairman’s dining room,” declares Björn, trying out the phrasing. “I think Swedish Television will buy that.”

Update: Having converted to Islam during the hunt for Osama bin Laden, Björn has now founded the Non-Islamic State of Unease in Sweden and Denmark, an armed, oppositional non-profit charity.

With the death of Ariel Sharon, the Asplund Vingård distillery of Hagalund is producing a Special 2014 Arik Arrack for the discerning (read: expense-be-damned) connoisseur.

As for me, I am currently dating a 19-year-old, high maintenance Vietnamese lass named Lily. Very demanding, with red-painted nails, her looks are not for the faint of heart: She has a ruby-red, pouty mouth, enormous cheek bones, a pug nose and hair like Medusa’s snakes. Coffee brown eyes and pointed teeth. Broad hips and an I-don’t-give-a-damn demeanor. Even her kneecaps are diamond-shaped and bony, usable for cracking walnuts. She speaks with the dulcet tones of a croaking frog. Sexy, she kisses like a tornado, ripping me apart with those lips of hers. This girl leaves welts! A first-year student at the community college, all Lily talks about is what she is going to do in the future, but I do get to brush up on my Vietnamese. Dating her is cheaper than flying to Vietnam, with most of the amenities. I call her “Popcorn.” Mean as an adder, she excites me, drumming her heels wherever she walks.

When my generation was 25, we said “Don’t trust anyone over 30!” At 35, we changed it to “Don’t trust anyone over 40!” In our 40’s, we said “Don’t trust anyone over 50!” Now that we’re over 50, we say “Don’t trust anyone under 30!”

Still, it’s gratifying to be part of history.