Veterans, Thank you. And I’m sorry.
Recognizing the profound sacrifices veterans have made, and the freedom we can collectively enjoy because of it.
Early in the pandemic, after COVID and mass protests turned America upside down, my partner and I moved to extremely rural New Mexico. I’m talking about a 2-hour drive from the closest city, well water and propane, grocery shop with a cooler territory. There were many odd and magical things about this experience, but strangest and most wonderful were the hodgepodge of people we encountered — a farrago of Zuni and Navajo people, a Mormon commune, a radical gay live-off-the-land commune, older ex-Burning Man liberals and off-grid QAnon naturalists. Essentially, typical New Mexico things.
I learned many things from all these people, in a stark and surreal landscape where everything was laid bare. I arrived in New Mexico angry, emboldened, and resolute about my values after marching day after day in the protests about George Floyd’s murder, followed by driving across the country in the pandemic before the 2020 election. What I did not know, was how the desert would desiccate and crumble every sinew of my rigidity, forcing me to become a new person.
Like many lifelong liberals, the years leading up to the 2016 election were a wake-up call for me. I…
