Where we go from here
After reading George Saunders' Love Letter
This morning I read George Saunder’s short story Love Letter, from his 2023 short story collection “Liberation Day”, and did it ever strike a nerve. It me.
Saunders shared Love Letter with all subscribers to his Story Club substack, even free subscribers like me—offering it up as “a tariff-free gift” (that’s his subject line, not mine). Of course, I appreciate and respect the cleverness of reclaiming the title of his recent work from the cynical Orwellian lies and destructive edicts emanating from the US executive branch, but Love Letter is more than that. So go ahead, click the download link and read it. Really.
Although I’m nobody’s definition of a hard-ass, and labeling myself a badass is probably a stretch, I don’t weep easily. And yet, this fictional ten-page letter from grandparent to grandchild brought a gasp of recognition and tears to my eyes: for its prescience, its tenderness, and that note of whatthefuckdowedonow?! One part urgent, one part despair, one part OK I need to respond in some way. With this post for starters. What so many of us are feeling. It’s a puzzle.
These are unimaginably awful times. I did my tiny part today by participating in a Hands Off rally in a small Montana town. It felt like too little, but hopefully small points of light can illuminate the darkness when they come together?