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No Country for Honest Men
Trump’s failed coup was a stain on our democracy.
Sitting in the kitchen with an after dinner coffee I watched as my mother-in-law — belle maman, as she prefers — took a long drag on her cigar and blew the smoke out the window over the sink. “I wish you wouldn’t be so political,” she intoned slowly so I could understand her French.
It was not a comment I hadn’t heard before, but it did seem strange coming from a strong feminist like her. “Why?” I asked genuinely interested.
She shook her head. “I don’t want you running for office.”
“Who said anything about running for office. I just write.” In truth I was lying. I have been toying with the idea of running for office for years. In my childhood I pushed it to the back of my mind because there were not really any female politicians and I didn’t think I would be able to do it without marrying a politician first and then after visiting the state Capitol I had realized that the smell of the building was overbearingly decrepit. I reviled the idea of every morning having to dress in a scratchy suit and go to an old ugly building like that to discuss things only old white men may have. As an archaeologist I love old things. But the smell of something which is simply a few hundred or thousand years old is very different from the smell of something…
