We disagree on the how, but we shouldn’t disagree on the what. We all want good, safe, and free lives. When someone you love is threatened with the loss of those things, please stand up on your side of the line and oppose him.

"I feel concerned," he told me. "If humans are trying to make ourselves extinct, we couldn't be doing a better job of it." 

"I feel really good about America."

"One thing they've done since dropping out is go to seminars. And heck, they keep on going. And inviting me. They were always wanting me to go, too. You know whose seminar they loved the most? Donald J. Trump."

"I was in Japan on Election day," she told me. "I called my mom on FaceTime and we cried together. She wished I could just stay in Japan. I asked her if anything in American every felt this dire before."

"I don't love everything he's doing. But I love that he's doing." 

Thank you for emailing me regarding my vote in the Electoral College as a Kansas elector. In the interest of courtesy, I am replying to all individuals who reached out to me

I guess I just wonder if exclusion of any group is the answer. Curious for examples of times this has been the best course of action for social change — leave in the comments below. 

There must be a word for those people that stand in brightly colored vests on busy sidewalks, trying to convince harried pedestrians to stop, listen, and pay up — something beyond obstacles or nuisances.

"Why astronomy?" I asked. 

"The stars are a puzzle," he said. "But the answers are all out there. It's a puzzle I can put back together." 

"They make it sound like I didn't have to work for what I have. I worked. I worked hard. I saved." 

“I think the divisiveness you’re expressing, the "us" versus "them" mentality — that’s the issue. Maybe it sounds a little Kumbaya of me, but we need to stop looking at what makes us different, and really look at what makes us the same...American. Besides the soil we stand on.”

All I could think while watching the older men get up and give short speeches was, This is politics. Politics, at least in Arizona, seemed to be mostly men, mostly white, and a strangely vintage-style show of pomp, circumstance, and old boys club. 

"Is it because I'm Mexican?" he asked, his shoulders folding inward. 

Horrified, I reached my pinky finger out and he instinctively returned the gesture. I swiped his pinky with my own and clasped his hand, pinky swearing that his race had nothing to do with it. 

"It kind of feels like it does," he mumbled as Tami and I walked away. 

This is my challenge to you: We need to embrace need. We need to get closer to the problem. 

Proximity has taught me some basic and humbling truths, including this vital lesson: Each of us is more than the worst thing we’ve ever done.