Okay That Was Embarrassing

The first time my future husband visited my apartment, I lied to him. As he took in all 300 square feet of my Hong Kong home—hardwood floors, light blue sofa, light blue bedspread—I watched his eyes settle on my “dining room” table: a white, lacquered IKEA desk.

“It came furnished,” I said, suddenly wanting to give him permission to hate it all, without hurting my feelings.

In truth, everything about my tiny Bonham Street flat was something I had chosen. It was high up and sun-flooded. The windows were brand new. The floor was unscuffed. The white tiles in the bathroom and galley kitchen gleamed. Even the grout was perfectly clean. The appliances were miniature by American standards and had never been used. After 13 years of messy, grown-up life, it was like I was back to playing “House.”

I loved that bright, spare space. It contained nothing I hadn’t purposefully placed. I had no idea what I would do next—my life was the very definition of an amateur production—but I was at least, and at last, the director.

The downside to being the director, I’ve learned in the decades since, is that you have to own who you are, what you do, and what you say. There’s no one else to blame.

On Tuesday, when Joe Kent left his role as director of the National Counterterrorism Center, I read his resignation letter and marveled: it expressed clear opposition to the war in Iran, came from a senior Trump appointee, and—perhaps most surprising to me in these word-salad days¹—was well written.

We know that shows of strength get Trump’s attention; we also know that Trump is quick to shift blame and that he loves to think that only he can fix things. Kent’s letter seemed to me to have been crafted to hit all these buttons. It was light on honorifics (“President Trump,” not “Dear Mr. President,”) and stated plainly Kent’s reason for resigning: “I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran.”

Having gotten Trump’s attention, the letter then served up a tempting excuse for Trump to consider: you were lied to, said Kent. You were deceived. This—a bitter pill but also a possible out—was paired with just the right amount of fawning: “In your first administration, you understood better than any modern President how to decisively apply military power without getting us drawn into never-ending wars.” And the whole thing ended with the written equivalent of Coach Taylor putting both hands on Trump’s shoulders and giving him a pep talk: “The time for bold action is now. You can reverse course and chart a new path for our nation, or you can allow us to slip further toward decline and chaos. You hold the cards.”

Clear eyes. Full hearts. Can’t lose.

For a moment, after finishing the letter, I let myself think: this is a good day! The tide is turning. Even people from Trump’s own team have at last had enough!

I had never heard of Joe Kent, and I had no idea, until friends in a small group chat filled me in, that while he may be—or have access to—a skilled wordsmith, he is also a shameless antisemite, an election denier, and a January 6th conspiracy theorist.

Well, SHIT.

My good day, all of five minutes old, had already come to a close.

Muttering “the enemy of my enemy is…also f*cking awful?” I started researching Kent. It was mildly embarrassing to learn that he ran for office in (my very own) Washington State. And it didn’t feel great that I—a hardcore news junkie!—had somehow missed his confirmation hearings entirely. But what was truly mortifying was that I had read his letter—however quickly—without detecting Kent’s deep-seated antisemitism². Without knowing anything about him, the letter had landed on me as a well-crafted missive on geopolitics, aimed at getting an erratic president to de-escalate a dangerous situation. To understand what I had missed—and what was dangerous about the letter itself—I needed to read this, this, and this.

Ugh. It’s hard to own who you are—to share what you think, what you know, and what you don’t know. It’s so much easier just to keep quiet and let others share. But I’m going to keep at it. It seems to me the only way to really connect—and to keep learning and growing.³

1. Word-salad days are not to be confused with Shakespeare’s plain-old “salad days.” Those sound like a total delight.

2. Whenever I mention antisemitism, I get mail about Gaza. I welcome thoughtful engagement of any kind…but, after receiving some real humdingers, it’s probably worth noting that I come from South Africa and I live and work among Seattle progressives. I’ve been immersed in—and I care deeply about—structural injustice. So, by all means email me—but please write knowing that you and I are likely haunted by many of the same numbers, images, and stories. In fact, it is my overwhelming empathy for the people of Gaza that I think has led to some real blind spots for me about antisemitism. Dare I ask my Gaza-focused readers: is there any chance that’s the case for you, too?

3. Chris knew I was lying that the apartment had come furnished. Twenty years later, he still knows when I’m lying—which is every bit as magical and maddening as you might imagine.

Thumbnail image credit: KWON JUNHO on Unsplash