Fancy Fancy Mind

A lot of kids, me included, aspire from early on to live in New York because the crushing smallness of their birthplace pains them. They're the town faggot or the town dreamer and they stand in their backyards and look into miles of desolation and quiet, knowing with bitter certainty that nobody—at least nobody they think of as significant—cares about them. They feel trapped in a tiny town beneath a massive sky full of stars, and they know they'll be gone someday.

I was in line at a Duane Reade when the cashier told the customer in front of me, “Have a nice day!” The customer responded with an almost instantaneous, “Don't tell me what to do.” This was admittedly pretty funny, and not a true depiction of the city all the time. This did, however, remind me of the famous graduation speech “Don't forget to wear sunscreen” in which the guy says, “Live in NYC, but leave before it makes you too hard” and “Live in California, but leave before it makes you too soft” Basically, I'd advise you to understand how the city is making you feel, shaping you as a person, and then decide if that's the direction you want to continue towards. If it's not, then it's time to leave NYC.

The problem, however, runs deeper. Trump seems to have no feel for, no interest in, the American story he is about to enter. He will lead a nation that accommodated a cruel exception to its founding creed; that bled and nearly died to recover its ideals; and that was only fully redeemed by the courage and moral clarity of the very people it had oppressed. People like the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. People like John Lewis.