Fear and Freedom

I never thought we’d fall.

But now I can’t help but see the small, seemingly harmless ways we’ve given up our freedom
manipulated to do what’s right, practical, and safe.

I remember 9/11.

Listening to the news on the radio. Numb.
Certain it had to be a misunderstanding.
It couldn’t happen here.

I was a college student, wandering campus,
searching for other dazed faces.
We huddled in a classroom and watched the towers fall.

So when they asked to screen us for safety,
to rifle through our things,
to scan our bodies,
we said of course.

Wanting everyone to be safe.

So I took off my shoes,
put a little flag on my car,
and called it patriotism.

This little piece of convenient technology in my hand,
I remember when the idea of carrying a phone everywhere seemed silly.
Even absurd.
Then I willingly agreed to give away my data,
never thinking of how or why it could matter.

I laughed when the ads started to know me.
I called it ease.
And didn’t even notice I’d gifted away my autonomy.

Now, looking around
at Chicago,
D.C.,
my home in the PNW,
I can’t help but feel shame
for what I gave away.

We called it safety.
We called it progress.
But every camera on a corner,
every armored vehicle in a neighborhood,
every protest met with shields instead of dialogue
reminds me how fear became the currency of control.

Maybe freedom doesn’t disappear all at once.
Maybe it slips quietly into comfort,
into safety,
into our pockets
until we forget what it felt like to choose for ourselves.

But maybe we can still remember.

Maybe freedom begins again in the small acts:
turning off the noise,
looking one another in the eye,
asking better questions,
refusing to trade our humanity for convenience.

Maybe it starts in the places we still gather;
around kitchen tables,
in classrooms,
on quiet streets where we dare to talk honestly again.

When we stand up for and with one another.

Because if we lost America in fear,
perhaps we can find her again
in courage.