I had the opportunity to attend a demonstration in support of Ukraine at Washington Square Park, Manhattan yesterday. I'm attaching photos of yesterday's demonstration and a letter I published in this past Saturday's "Saturday Morning Review." This is not my story to tell, but after several supportive emails from readers - I'm sharing my perspective.  I feel helpless against the violence and hatred striking Ukraine and its people, but I know I can amplify the love and support I witnessed for our Ukrainian neighbors.

Letter from the Editor

Jaime Bairaktaris

February 26, 2022

I find myself picking my phone up more often to flip through the images of communities and lives being destroyed in Ukraine. I can’t seem to avoid it. Each time I look, I decide I don’t want to look anymore. Then I look again. And then again. And again. I can’t seem to avoid it. The images of destruction, of bravery, of war. I can’t seem to avoid it.

And at the same time: I need to see it. We need to see it. Because it’s not normal.

I’m not the only one being inundated with the details of war. While at work, one of my school’s 7th graders ran up to me after learning about the Selective Service, asking me if I would be drafted. I reassured him that the Selective Service was not being activated.

Then he asked if I was afraid of the war.

I couldn’t answer him.

It’s 2:00 AM now as I try to write down how I would have answered his question. There aren’t many soft ways to describe that yes, I am afraid of the war.

However, I’m not just afraid of the destruction and human loss - I’m afraid that we may raise another generation of children who will think that watching TikToks and Instagram reels of bombings is normal - that killing other humans is normal.

I’m afraid that we’re raising another generation of children who will grow to remember that an entire military was sent to destroy them and their families - that their childhoods were taken away from them by other humans with whom they share a planet with.

I’m afraid that we may raise another generation of children who think that war is normal.

My paternal grandparents both survived war torn countries - their stories sit in my mind as I pick up my phone another time. And then another time. Their stories formed my belief that war is not normal, and it cannot be normal.

My grandmother, Oma, escaped at a young age from a formerly occupied region as her family lived through World War II Germany.

She describes a vivid memory of being thrown down stairs into their cellar one night. She - as a small child - was not moving fast enough as her family raced the war looming outside.

1,500 miles away on a small Greek island, my grandfather, Papou, sought refuge in a church basement as bomb explosions pierced silence over the Aegean Sea that surrounded Syros. He - as a small child - would faint every time he heard a bomb drop.

`A photo I took of Agios Dimitrios Church in June 2018, with the basement bunker beneath the building and the Aegean Sea surrounding it.`

In 2018, decades after that childhood memory, I had the opportunity to visit this same church with him. We walked the grounds that overlooked the sea until we came to an opened doorway. He pointed to the floor where he and his siblings had hidden during the attacks and explained how the strong stone of “Dimitrios” saved him and his family - a name that both he and I share.

From those two childhoods suffering from violence and famine - they found each other and then traveled until they settled in Larchmont, taking all of their memories and history with them. Each time my brothers and I walk into their house we’re reminded of the stories they’ve told us of their childhoods - childhoods very different than our own. The pictures on the walls, artifacts on the tabletops, the small piece of the Berlin wall on the shelf - as if a small cornerstone of my family’s journey. A reminder that war is not normal.

I hope that as you go through this week, you will help stop the normalization of war and start normalizing kindness for those around you. This will be the first war that we experience through social mediums that keep us hyper-engaged, while also keeping us desensitized. May it also be our last.

Monitor the media your youngest family members are seeing - because they are seeing it. Connect their minds to the communities and people on the ground, educate them on the culture and beauty that comes from these regions, tell them on the facts while trying to sift through the fiction, and remind them that humans must love their fellow humans.

In difficult times, we look for ways to help. So be kind. And then be kind again, and again, and again. The world needs, and will always need, more kindness.

Washington Square Park Demonstration: Sunday, 02.27.22

all photos by Jaime Bairaktaris, Executive Editor. Click to enlarge gallery

Letter from the Editor: Raising the Next Generation During a War