44 remembers a conversation with his mother!
“You know, Barry, she said (that’s the nickname she and my grandparents used for me when I was growing up, often shortened to “Bar,” pronounced “Bear”), “there are people in the world who think only about themselves. They don’t care what happens to other people so long as they get what they want. They put other people down to make themselves feel important.
“Then there are people who do the opposite, who are able to imagine how others must feel, and make sure that they don’t do things that hurt people.
“So,” she said, looking me squarely in the eye. “Which kind of person do you want to be?”
— Chapter 1, A Promised Land, pp. 6 -7
