Late afternoon on Election Day, before the dismal returns began coming in, I was copied on an email from a friend of a friend, a guy I’ve never met in person, but who has been a reader of this blog for several years. John’s story was terrifying when I first read it, but as that unhappy evening wore on, it grew into a sort of metaphor for what was happening to the rest of us. Trust me, John’s night was worse than ours. He and his wife Julie spent it in fear for their lives. They had been living their dream retirement in the wilderness of Western Montana, on a mountainous property four miles from town, but two miles from their own mailbox. To them, this was an idyllic lifestyle, a home in the woods, exactly what they wanted. But in recent months, it had all turned dark, and the blame is entirely Trump’s. As long as a year ago, John had written privately to several friends, including me, about the extreme Trumpy-ness of his adopted region. There was trepidation,
Life and Politics in the Age of Covid