Kamala Harris! I am excited to feel, for the first time in a long time, a twinge of something other than despair and disgust about politics. I am excited for a presidential ticket that includes a legislator who has sponsored many bills I agree with. And yes, I am excited to vote for the daughter of immigrants from Jamaica and India. We interviewed Harris on CYG back in 2018, and asked her about "identity politics":

We have huge disparities in this country. We need to deal with that. You call that identity politics? I would say that's an American issue. [Laughs] That's not any one identity issue. It's our issue of identifying as Americans. That's an issue. That's a problem. 

So I reject that motion. I think it is an attempt to marginalize conversations that are about inequities based on gender and based on race. And if we're ever going to deal with these realities we have to dispense with notions that it is an issue that is only of concern to someone of a specific background. It should be of concern to everybody.

She also talked about racism as a national security issue, which is something I've been thinking about as Republicans dust off their racist Obama-birth-certificate talking points and apply them to her. 

I'm on the record with my complicated feelings about Biden. And I don't love every point in Harris's record, either. But I keep thinking about this insightful comment from Travon Free:

Voting isn't marriage. It's public transport. You're not waiting for 'the one' who is absolutely perfect. You are getting the bus. And if there isn't one going exactly to your destination, you don't stay at home and sulk. You take the one going closest to where you want to be.  

After years of riding in the wrong direction, desperately trying to pull the brakes as the country and policies I want recede in the rearview, I am eager to catch this Biden/Harris bus. Excited, even.
 

Quick programming note: The Big Friendship virtual tour is over (WHEW), and I am profoundly grateful for all the support and attention. I'm also very tired. I'm taking the next two weeks off, but don't worry, the newsletter will still arrive on schedule. I have some very special things lined up for you in my absence. 

Are racial attitudes really changing? Jamelle Bouie on the bid to contest Harris's identity. How social-justice slideshows took over Instagram. What the Southern mythology of glamorized defeat predicts about a (possible) post-election America. I won't eat another cherry without thinking of the lives of workers who must hand-pluck 24 billion cherries in eight weeks. Bosses are smothering remote workers. How did the internet get so bad? The truth about those Facebook "fact-checkers." Asian Americans are being subjected to virulent racist attacks right now, which is sadly not surprising when politicians are selling anti-China face masks. On learning to make small talk with white people. Are we in the middle of a Black art renaissance? Profiles of artists Luchita Hurtado and Toyin Ojih. On the concept of community. Wellness doesn't belong to white women. On the class delusions of millennials with family wealth. Are National Parks really America's best idea? How the Aztecs told history. An elegy for the landline in literature. A gynecologist weighs in on WAP. The science of skin. Rob Delaney describes his vasectomy. The joy of sober sex. The drama of sharing a refrigerator. A post-pandemic social calendar.

On my break I'll be reading Marie-Helene Bertino's Parakeet, N.K. Jemisin's The Fifth Season, Lesley M.M. Blume's Fallout, and (finally!) Sarah M. Broom's The Yellow House.

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The 5-minute check in, an idea from Alisha Ramos of Girls' Night In:

"I've been texting my friends on my afternoon walks, 'Can I call you in five minutes for five minutes' and the response rate has been 100% yes so far. It feels nice to make time to talk about something small too."

When the time zones don't align, I've been sending so many letters and postcards to faraway friends I miss. For this personal reason—and also reasons of protecting democracy—I'm very invested in supporting The US Postal Service.