I don’t want to be long-winded today, because I was a bit last week, and I’m just so tired. But. Things are complicated, aren’t they?

In the midst of a great moment of political upheaval and distress, my…I don’t know, she’s not my niece; she’s the daughter of Dave’s cousin – has been diagnosed with leukemia, and I think about her poor, pained, three-year-old body all the time. There are different levels and kinds of grief, different levels of hope and pain.

Yesterday Dave and I went to the Tucson #nobannowall protest (I found myself almost writing hashtags on my protest sign. Why?!?), and it was extraordinarily heartening to be surrounded by so many people – & witnessed by so many more – who also believe in giving support and hope to refugees and immigrants, in our country of refugees and immigrants. I’d say 70% of the people who drove by the protest supported it, and the glee on the faces of the children waving and smiling from their cars will carry me for a little while.

There were of course a few people who flipped us off, and many more who were indifferent, but the only open condemnation we got was (predictably) once we’d left the group and were walking alone back to our car. Some dude at a red light shouted “Why don’t you try going to their country and see if they’ll take you??!?” And I wish I’d had the wit to shout back “OF COURSE I DON’T WANT TO, THEY ARE REFUGEES! THEIR COUNTRIES ARE WAR-TORN!” because: what an inane thing to say. But instead I just shouted “Why don’t you try having some common human decency?” And then we met our friends for dinner.

It’s spring in Tucson, and the weather is perfect, and sometime when the wind blows gently on your face you wouldn’t think anything at all was amiss.