On this day, two years ago

I was at the Obninsk State University for Nuclear Power Engineering, in the faculty lounge. Two professors approached me with a simple message: “Daniel, I am so sorry for you and your country on this terrible day.”.

I was shocked, and touched, and struck. Me, lone Amerikanitz, there, where the West is loved and lost, both bolstered and blamed, riveted, reviled, railed. I couldn’t help but be touched, but I went back to my room and did something Russian; I had a few shots of vodka and stared at the sky. I stared at the flower my students gave me on teacher’s day; there’s a day for every kind of worker, there are many days like it but that one was mine.

…

I have very little more to say beyond what Adam has said; my own country guts me. For those of us with long lives left to live, these will be interesting times. In the Chinese sense.