Transcript of interview with Lt. Harry Fagel by Barbara Tabach, April 15, 2016 and January 13, 2017

AN INTERVIEW WITH LT. HARRY FAGEL An Oral History Conducted by Barbara Tabach Southern Nevada Jewish Heritage Project Oral History Research Center at UNLV University Libraries University of Nevada Las Vegas ii ?Southern Nevada Jewish Community Digital Heritage Project University of Nevada Las Vegas, 2014 Produced by: The Oral History Research Center at UNLV ? University Libraries Director: Claytee D. White Project Manager: Barbara Tabach Transcriber: Kristin Hicks Interviewers: Barbara Tabach, Claytee D. White Editors and Project Assistants: Maggie Lopes, Amanda Hammar iii The recorded interview and transcript have been made possible through the generosity of a Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) Grant. The Oral History Research Center enables students and staff to work together with community members to generate this selection of first-person narratives. The participants in this project thank University of Nevada Las Vegas for the support given that allowed an idea the opportunity to flourish. The transcript received minimal editing that includes the elimination of fragments, false starts, and repetitions in order to enhance the reader?s understanding of the material. All measures have been taken to preserve the style and language of the narrator. In several cases photographic sources accompany the individual interviews with permission of the narrator. The following interview is part of a series of interviews conducted under the auspices of the Southern Nevada Jewish Heritage Project. Claytee D. White Director, Oral History Research Center University Libraries University of Nevada Las Vegas iv PREFACE In the signature line of Harry Fagel?s emails is a reads: Be the light in dark spaces. This illumines the person that Harry is both as a police officer and a poet in Las Vegas. Harry is native Las Vegan, who has served the community with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department for nearly 30 years. He currently is a police lieutenant serving in Laughlin, Nevada. In addition, Fagel is a respected poet, writing both for the public and on commission. He performs in the local poetry scene. He also has showcased his poetry in two published books, released an album, and is a recipient of the Hilliard Endowment Grant from the University Nevada, Reno. v Fagel is a graduate of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and currently lives in Henderson with his wife, Leilani and two sons, Sam and Jake. In this interview, Fagel discusses his family background, how his grandparents came to live in Las Vegas in the 1950s, as well as his relationships with both his mother and father. He recalls his early jobs which included working for his cousin Freddie Glusman?s restaurant Piero?s and for Circus Circus?long before becoming a policeman. His involvement with the Jewish community started young and he shares how it has evolved over the decades. In addition, Fagel reflects upon his career as a law enforcement officer, the progressiveness of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, and changes in relations between the police and communities, both locally and nationally. Lastly, Fagel talks in detail about his poetry, its dominant themes, and the local poetry scene. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Interview with Harry Fagel On April 15, 2016 and January 13, 2017 by Barbara Tabach in Las Vegas, Nevada Preface?????????????????????????????????..?..iv Images of Harry Fagel, the poet..???????????????????????..ix - x SESSION 1 Talks about family background; maternal grandparents relocating from England to Las Vegas; parents? meeting in Las Vegas and living in Canada briefly, where he was born, before returning; process to get U.S. citizenship. Describes mother?s upbringing in Las Vegas; involvement with Jewish community; importance of Shabbat ritual through generations; impact of parents? divorce on him; importance of achieving bar mitzvah???????????????????..1-5 Discusses changes in relationship with father after divorce; father working for Jay Sarno at Circus Circus, in charge of junkets. Mentions his relationships with Heidi Sarno, David Straus, cousin Freddie Glusman, grandfather, Sam Dvorak. Mentions working at Circus Circus? midway as teenager; involvement with AZA. Shares about becoming estranged from father?s side of family. Talks about attending UNLV; meeting and getting married to first wife, Lisa?...?.6-10 Talks about his father?s later career selling time shares; their current relationship; divorcing first wife; becoming a police officer; evolving relationship with religion. Discusses meeting second wife, Leilani; Leilani?s conversion to Judaism; raising their children Jewish and their participation in temple; impact politics within congregation. Recalls experiences with anti-Semitism, particularly while in college; local hate groups?????????????...11-19 Mentions Ralph Engelstad and Hitler birthday parties; difficulty unionizing local Jewish police officers, unlike other minority groups; Officer Steve Riback, member of Chabad community, and discrimination lawsuit against department. Reflects upon decision to become police officer, after joining for a ride-along; the unique professional rewards and challenges???????...20-24 Talks about passion for writing poetry, which started as a child; getting into performance of poetry as adult, including reading to fellow officers; style of poetry and major themes of hope and suffering, building off his work as police officer. Discusses changes in law enforcement vii profession; current anti-police sentiment; institutionalized racism. Shares Mafia story father told him involving Tony Spilotro; about working at cousin Freddie?s restaurant, Piero?s???.25-33 SESSION 2 Talks about childhood; once living in Boulevard Apartments and the changes to area over the decades; more about significance of bar mitzvahs; family role models, including grandfather, mother and role of Judaism in establishing values. Reflects on parents? divorce and its impact. Mentions friends from AZA, including Jeff Roth, Ivan Nathanson, Bobby Eisen, Robert Eisen, Dayvid Figler, Kenny Myers, Steve Orlob, Elliot Sirota, Steve Holfin, Steve Reiniger??.34-39 Remarks about stepfather; his sons? interests and talents. Remembers events that made him realize wanted to devote his life service of others, and eventually, law enforcement. Talks about poetry and developing his craft from youth; starting performance later, as a policeman; writing commissioned pieces, including for Dallas police officers killed in 2016 ambush; themes of his poetry and its purpose to connect with and to others. Mentions favorite poets?????...40-49 Comments on finding refuge, community in cigar shops. Mentions performing poetry with musicians; writing about suicide, in response of those he?s lost. Talks about city?s community of poets, including Dayvid Figler and Rodney Lee; how he gets the word out about poetry readings; process to writing commissioned pieces?????????????????????..50-55 Talks about transitioning from heading Major Violations task force with Las Vegas Metro Police Department to leading the force in Laughlin; the impact of switch professionally and personally. Shares about dangers of police work; the progressiveness of Las Vegas Metro, as compared to other departments nationally; police training; increased violence against police officers?...56-62 Reflects on changes in safety in neighborhoods; importance of building trust with communities; increase in violent crime in city. Mores about wife, Leilani; intentions for life?s legacy. Shares more about father and the evolution of their relationship over the years????????.63-73 viii ix x 1 SESSION 1 This is April 15, Tax Day, 2016. This is Barbara Tabach and I'm sitting with Harry Fagel. Harry, spell your name for us first, okay? H-A-R-R-Y. F, as in Frank, A-G-E-L. As I was explaining for this project about people of Jewish ancestry, I like to start with whatever the family story is that you know about your ancestors, where the roots are. My mother is from London, England; my grandmother, also. My grandfather is from Vancouver, British Columbia. He was actually raised in an orphanage in Winnipeg, but his father put him in an orphanage, and his father was from Vancouver. My grandparents met in England while my grandfather was serving during the Second World War for the Canadian Army. My grandmother was an entertainer for like the equivalent of the OSS, almost like a vaudevillian. They met during the war and got married and had my mother in London, and then my mother was being raised in London during World War II. When she was twelve years old, my grandparents and her traveled to the United States. I can't remember what year it was, but it was back in the fifties. They came to Las Vegas. My cousin was living here?I don't think he was here yet, actually. But anyway, they came to Vegas. And while they were here my grandfather worked at a place called Market Town, which was...Do you know where White Cross Drugs is? Yes. It used to be called Market Town. He had a barbeque business there. So they barbequed chickens. And my uncle, his brother, who was also raised in orphanage with him in Winnipeg, my uncle Harry Dvorak, they called him Chicken Harry because he would carve all the chickens. My 2 grandfather had this barbeque sauce that's still in our family that is...It's the bomb. So that's how they came here. On my dad's side, it's a little bit different. I've done a little research on that side because my dad was from Duluth, Minnesota. He met my mom here in Vegas. He had traveled to Las Vegas and met my mom here. He served in the navy for a while. My dad was a real character. He hustled pool for a living, did a lot of interesting side things, was quite a character. Him and my mom met and when they were probably twenty-one, twenty-two years old, they got married and I was a product of their union, their first child. Then I have a sister, too, who was born a year and a half later. So there is me and my sister. But my dad's family came from Russia. So there's a guarantee, between the Scottish blood that I've traced back on my English side and the Russian blood, alcohol is definitely involved. So there's definitely alcoholism in the family tree. A genetic disposition. Exactly. It's funny. I joke around about that. But the truth is that I find it to be kind of a rich and interesting history. I just got back from England. I have family there still. We came to Vegas. We were in Vegas. My mom and dad moved to Vancouver. They were going to go to live in Vancouver. They left Las Vegas to go live in Vancouver. There are ties there from my grandfather's side of the family. Then when I was six weeks old, they came back. So I was born in Vancouver and I have Canadian citizenship. I had to get my U.S. citizenship just because somebody screwed up; I shouldn't have been a Canadian citizen; I should have been an American citizen born on foreign soil. But somebody screwed up at the border; I ended up being a Canadian citizen. When I turned sixteen and went to get my driver's license, they said, "Hey, you're not a citizen in the United States of America." I was like, "I've been here since I 3 was six weeks old, in Vegas." I had to go get my U.S. citizenship paperwork. So it was kind of an interesting little conundrum that occurred. Did you have to go through the whole process? No. It's just the paperwork thing. Basically the paperwork thing and I then had to raise my right hand and swear my fealty to the United States. So it was kind of interesting. Later on that always became an object of...I guess it was just another road?it wasn't a roadblock as much as it was a little hurdle for every job. I'm in the government sector, so I always have to prove my citizenship, bring my citizenship papers in. Those are very hard papers to come by. There's this dumb sixteen-year-old kid's picture on there from back then and I'm an old man now. So it's interesting to me. I always could go back to Canada and be a Canadian citizen if I wanted because I have birthright there, but I grew up in Las Vegas. Interesting. So the Vegas roots are deep. Yes, they are. What does your mom say about being?how old was she when she was? Twelve. She was twelve, okay. So does she tell you stories about growing up here? Oh, yes. Growing up here, she went to Vegas High School, which is now the Las Vegas Academy. There was only a couple of high schools here in Vegas; I think there was Rancho, Vegas and maybe Western; I think that was it back then, and I think maybe Gorman. I don't know if Gorman was open yet. But it was a much smaller place. My mom belonged to the temple. She was a member of BBYO. So she was very involved 4 in the Jewish heritage; my grandmother sent her that direction. My grandfather, it was a Jewish orphanage that he grew up in in Winnipeg. So he was very involved in Judaism right from the get-go. When I was a little boy, we attended Temple Beth Sholom, which was the main Conservative temple in Las Vegas at that time. It was kind of the central point; it was at 16th and Oakey; it was kind of the central point for the city for Jewish religion. A lot of people that lived near there obviously were Jewish. My grandparents lived in an old neighborhood off Fifth and Bracken that was not far from the temple. I guess back in the day you walked even if you weren't Orthodox. But we didn't walk that much to temple; we drove. What was cool for me?and I'll give you a little bit more. I know I'm going to bounce around a little bit. That's fine. I will tell you that growing up my very fondest Jewish memories are from Friday nights, from Shabbat. My grandmother made a big deal about Shabbat. How did she make a big deal out it? Describe that. The best China would come out and the table would be set and the cooking would happen and the candles were lit and we would enjoy dinner together as a family. Afterwards, the bickering would begin and the arguing and it was loud. People talk about Italian families being loud, well, they've got to try the Jewish families, too. So it was enriching. I will tell you that as a little boy growing up, my parents when I was probably eleven years old, started to get into real?or maybe ten years old?they were having a lot of problems. By the time I was twelve, they were getting divorced. At that time in history divorce was not a common thing like this is now. It was very frowned upon. There was a stigma attached to it. 5 Absolutely. As a little boy being in the temple at the time, we were poor in comparison. I look back now and I think we probably had it?because of my grandparents we did better than some. But my dad and mom were not wealthy and we were poor. We lived in a little apartment and we didn't have a lot of money. When that divorce thing happened, I felt at the time, twelve, thirteen years old, I started to feel shunned from the people I went to temple with; it began to build up a resentment for me. There were things said about me and my family that caused me a lot of pain when I was a little boy. I began to drift away from the temple at that point. I just didn't want anything to do with it. I decided that I didn't care for organized religion. This was back when I was a little boy, after I got bar mitzvahed. Now, my bar mitzvah, I have to touch on that a little because I'm a performance artist now. I do poetry. I'm a published poet and I go out and I do poetry. And I have this kind of belief that bar mitzvahs are why Jews are successful in life; it's one of the main reasons that Jews become successful. I think that had to do a lot with my success, the fact that I was bar mitzvahed, the fact that I did the entire service and I learned the entire service, everything?the beginning, middle and end, big Torah portion?and I sang it with all my heart. At the time the temple did not allow recording of bar mitzvahs. Oh, they didn't even like trip the? Until the next week when the rich guy's kid got bar mitzvahed, then they did. So there was that kind of shit that went on. It was like, you've got to be kidding me? I won't mention the name of that person. But it was just interesting that we weren't allowed to record ours. But I actually sang it and probably...They thought I was going to be a cantor because I had so much heart and soul. It was kind a breakpoint for me because I was so stressed out. Cantor Bergman was the cantor at the time. 6 I was just going to ask, who you were studying under? With Simon Bergman. And he was horrible, just a throw-shit-at-you, kind of scream-in-your-face. That was kind of the way of the world back then. It was very stressful as a kid. He touched whatever needed to be touched in me to break me out and put me to another level. So my bar mitzvah was wonderful. By that time my mom had gotten remarried to a guy that was a total piece of shit in my opinion and that was starting to get worse and worse. I'm thirteen, going through the hormonal stages being thirteen. My parents are divorced. Get shunned from the community, in my head at least. Then the stepfather comes along. Meanwhile, my relationship with my own father was beginning to tear because of the divorce and everything else and I wanted to be with my dad and he wasn't having it because he had started his new life cavorting around. Was he living here still in Vegas? Oh, yes, he lived here in Vegas. He was on the ground floor. I'm going to spin back a bit. In 1969 or '68, Jay Sarno opens Circus Circus. Jay Sarno loved my dad, Jimmy. I mean he loved him. So he put him in charge of junkets. He was originally called Madman Fagel. My dad would run around in a caveman hat and do slot promotions for Circus Circus and he would get people all excited. So he started bringing in junkets from California. I don't know if you know what that is. Yes. Some people are like, junket, what is it? He would bring them in. But my dad was still hustling pool and drinking all the time and gambling and whoring and doing all the shit that he did. He was a real womanizer, bad. My mother, God bless her, for a long time she didn't know this stuff, but I think she was peripherally aware that he was out cavorting around. But Jay Sarno loved him. I remember being six years old and sitting in Jay Sarno's office. I am friends with Heidi 7 Sarno, his daughter. She is married to one of my closest, dearest friends, David Straus. Yes. I've interviewed both of them. Yes. And I love them both very much. They're wonderful. They are practically family to me. David and I, we have an amazing history. Good people. Phenomenal people. Neil Straus, their father, and Joyce, just a wonderful family, and Danny. They're just all great. So I'm fortunate to be friends with them. But that interesting little touch point was because we're from very different worlds, obviously, especially at that point in time. One dad's a doctor; the other dad is a whacko that's running junkets in from California. My cousin is Freddie Glusman. I just saw him the other night. I've interviewed him, too. [Speaking with accent] "What are you doing? What the fuck do you want?" So Freddie and my father didn't get along, which was hard on us, but Freddie loved my grandfather. So how are you...? He is my grandfather's first cousin. So he's my third cousin or fourth cousin, whatever it is. He loved my grandfather. My grandfather, Sam Dvorak, was one of the greatest people I've ever met, just one of the kindest, most compassionate?he was my best friend. It's why I'm successful today; it has a lot to do with him and the lessons he taught me growing up because my dad was...He was around and I worshiped the ground he walked on, but my grandfather really help set my moral compass. That's nice. He was the light in my sky at my darkest hours. But Freddie brought him here. They had moved 8 back to Canada. It's really interesting. That's a whole other story when my grandfather was involved with Dickie, the ice cream company in Canada. He was the owner and he ended up selling his piece of it. He would have been a multibillionaire right now. Well, they sold the Good Humor for sixty million dollars back in the seventies. So he would be a very wealthy man. But he did okay. He worked for Circus Circus. So Freddie brought my grandfather and helped him get in at Circus Circus because Freddie knew Jay Sarno. Freddie is kind of a linchpin in this city. He's an interesting character in and of himself. But my dad worked for Jay. And then my dad got pissed off at Mike Ensign, who was then boss at Circus, and took a junket across the street to the Riviera and they fired my dad. So that the end of my dad's time at Circus Circus. But my grandfather stayed at Circus Circus for a long time, for many years, and he retired from there. So I always kind of had an in with Circus Circus, too. I always got the free midway tickets and I was always able to go and play the games, and I was always hanging out at Circus Circus. I worked there for a short time as a teenager. What did you do? What was your job? Just the midway, working the games. It was one of my first jobs. I made the mistake of dating a girl there. I was young. Then I learned why you don't shit where you eat; one of those things. Pardon me my expression. I have a really bad potty mouth, but it is what it is. I claim poetic license to curse. Meanwhile, the temple bubbling in the background, since this is a Jewish heritage discussion, I was getting more and more fed up. I was still attending. I was in AZA and that was a great thing. My friend Jeff Roth, he's become a very, very well-respected doctor here, plastic surgeon. His brother Jack. Ivan Nathanson was in there with me and he went off to California; I 9 don't know what activities he's involved with. But all these kids that I grew up with, they've all done okay and we were all in AZA together. So I think there is a really important thing there; that community. However, there was the poison side of it. There was an ugly side to it. As I grew up I just became more and more just like, I don't want to be a part of this. Yet, still I was; I was drawn in because of my family and everything else. My mom was in Hadassah. My grandmother was in Hadassah. My mom was in a bowling league that bowled at the old Showboat, which has been torn down. I know I'm jumping all around. No. You make sense. This is the way it works. This is life. It's all happening at the same time. It does. It does. So I get bar mitzvahed at Beth Sholom. My sister get bat mitzvahed at Beth Sholom and has a party at Jubilation. It's kind of funny because that place was Paul Anka's place. Is that where you had your party, too? No. My party was at the temple and it was a big deal. My whole family was there and I had a lot of my family that I haven't seen?there's some family that I haven't seen since, like my first cousins on my dad's side. My dad and his sister became estranged. My dad and his mother became estranged. So my grandma on that side, even though she used to come and stay with us, was out of my life. She has since passed away. Her grandchildren, his sister's kids, I was really close with, and then they disappeared out of my life. I just learned recently that they were at King David, my aunt was at King David and was saying that we never reached out to her?I don't even know how to find her?but we never reached out to her when my dad died. And I'm thinking, I looked all over the country for you and I have pretty good resources. I can't use my police resources, but I have resources. And I looked for her and couldn't find her because I wanted to let her know that when my dad was sick, let alone when he died. I couldn't find her. They've never 10 ever?and you run my name, you can find me. It takes two seconds. I'm all over Google and I'm on Facebook. It's all it would have taken. My two cousins, Stacy and Amy...I'd run into Amy and started to develop a relationship with her and then she moved to another state and I lost her stuff when I lost my phone and I hadn't heard from her and my cousin Stacy. So that part of my dad's side of the family just disappeared. It's funny because I just learned last week that they had been at King David, my aunt Shirley, looking and was complaining?because someone I know?"Hey, this family, they never reached out and told me." I'm like, I hope she left her?I haven't gotten to go back there and find out if she left contact information because if she did I'm going to contact her. But I have this whole piece of my family that is just like broken off and I don't know where they are. So it might be nice if you reconnect. It might be. And I'd like to see my cousins. We were close. Let me get back on track. So the temple. So I go through BBYO and I end up graduating from high school. I end up going to UNLV. I meet this girl there; her name is Lisa Cline. She went to Gorman. Then I find out she went to elementary school with me. We end up getting married. I insist that she has to convert to Judaism because I still have this Conservative thought process going on. I'm like, I'd really like to get married in the temple; we should raise our kids Jewish; blah, blah, blah. And she, although she went to Catholic school her whole life, converts to Judaism and we get married. I know walking down the aisle that I'm doing the wrong thing. I just know this was a... How old were you? Twenty-two. Yes, yes. I was like, I'm making a mistake; this is not right. While we were on our honeymoon, I told her 11 that I didn't know if I loved her. And it was really awful and I felt like a real piece of shit, but when you're that young you tend to be a little bit more abrasive. Yes. I'm going to take a little piece out right now that I forgot. It's important. My dad ended up going to work eventually...After all his little hustles and stuff, he ended up becoming a time-share salesman and he became one of the best in the word at time-share sales and he ended up living in a lot of exotic locations. I got to travel to the Bahamas and Hawaii and Mexico when I was a kid to these places. And he lived very well. He did very, very well with his second wife. She took him to the laundry mat, man. He ended up with nothing again and he built himself up another empire, which he lost because of his...My dad just had an odd way of doing things. But he ended up moving to Mexico and living in Acapulco when it was a nice place. He was the sales manager for the time-share there. I went and lived out there for a summer. So I had some really interesting times. That was during my college year beginnings and just after high school. But I just want to digress. So my dad is living in Mexico at this point in time. I have a relationship with him. It's still strained. It still goes back and forth. I believe all cops have daddy issues. It's just one of those things of some sort. It's just one of those things that you're always trying to prove to your dad that you're okay; not all of them, but I've met a lot that have had similar estrangements. That's interesting. Maybe it's just a man thing. But back to my ex-wife, as I am sure you can see the writing coming on that. We were together for a few years and we ended up getting divorced. It was the right thing to do and it was right for her and for me. I'm so thankful for that time because I learned a lot about myself. I learned a lot about who I was. I decided that I was just going to be myself. I wasn't 12 going to be anything for anyone else because I had kind of been someone else for this woman. That's why I knew it was wrong. Were you a police officer at that time? I became one while we were married. So I wasn't. I was a bartender and I worked at Piero's for my cousin. I also worked at Main Street Station. I had already tested for the police department. I wanted to be a cop. So when I got hired on?we have a high divorce rate for a reason. It's one of the highest. I already knew this thing was wrong with my ex-wife, but also that was the tipping point because when you become a police officer, it changes who you are. You just can't help it. Your core changes. Whereas many things in life you have to go through trauma to change, this is a kind of trauma that happens to your system when you become a police officer. You become very different. You see the world differently especially when you're new. A lot of cops that do things and people don't understand, like, why are they acting all that way? or whatever it is that people perceive police to be, usually they're the younger cops that are still learning their way and they're still scared and they haven't experienced enough yet to know what's dangerous and what isn't, so everything is dangerous. Got you. You know what I'm saying? And you really have to keep that in the back of your mind anyway always in this type of work. It's just kind of a weird thing. But you learn to temper it and you learn to not stand so stiffly and you learn to be a little less paranoid. But you still have to be aware of the potential for harm. So you're adding this career obstacle into this already tenuous marriage. Yes, this marriage that was based on basically I was just keeping my promise. It wasn't because of the passion. I knew it wasn't right. So we ended up getting divorce. It was not an ugly divorce; it 13 was fine. I got my get from the temple. We got married in the Conservative temple. So off I go, single, happy after some sadness. It was very hard at first for me. She left and I would have stuck it out. That's just how I am. I'm a tenacious person. Even being unhappy, I would have just kept going because I think this is how I am. But I'm glad that she took the plunge and that she had the fortitude to do that because it was the right move on her part and mine. Ultimately that led to me being single and carousing around Vegas for a while, for about a year or so, and then I met my wife, Leilani. So Vegas...What year would that have been? Nineteen ninety-six, 1995, in that time frame. I was a new cop; I had been on for about four years at this point. I was very, very loosely involved now with the temple. I had pretty much turned my back on it. I was like, I'm done with organized religion. But on High Holidays I would still get dragged in because of my mom. So I'd go to High Holidays, but I was not in any way involved. I had kind of pushed it aside. Still my grandfather kept me engaged a little bit and we still did Shabbat at my mom's. Still doing this. From time to time. Not as much as, but from time to time. I really like that Shabbat concept, though. You know what I mean? I agree with you. I really do. Then I meet Leilani, a white girl from Tennessee, which, of course, you figure right away by the name, right? Right. She was married when I met her. So she was off limits because I had already gone through those type of things and that was not my thing. But while we got to know each other as friends?she 14 was doing cocktails at the Orleans?she was getting estranged with her husband. One day she said it was done; she was leaving them. Since then we've been together. It was like God smooshed us together. What's really interesting is that her dad died when she was six years old and she's from Tennessee. Her stepdad was a Southern missionary Baptist preacher. So she grew up with hell and brimstone stuff. She loved my grandfather. She absolutely adored Sam Dvorak. And what's not to adore? I told you the guy is just amazing. The more she got to know him, the more she liked Judaism. She felt Jewish in her heart; she told me. She goes, "But my stepdad"?it was her stepdad that was the minister. She goes, "He raised me; he took care of me; he never acted like he had the ultimate say-so; he never pretended to be my dad. And I respect him and I don't want to disrespect him, but when we have children I want them raised Jewish. And one day I'll convert, but right now I want to keep it." So it was really interesting because there was no pressure for me whatsoever. I had given up on it at this point and here is this woman and she had been to Friday night dinners at my grandparents' and saw and just loved everything about it. So we were still doing Shabbat now more and more now that I had this relationship. I shouldn't say we ever stopped because even with my ex-wife, we would go to Shabbat dinner. It was always there; that Shabbat. Shabbat to me is the essence of Judaism. It truly is. And I went to Jewish camp. I didn't mention that. I went to Alonim and that was my grandparents who made that happen because w