N O N F I C T I O N
The Culture of Life
MEGHAN TRASK SMITH
W
HEN THE CHADS let go and the spaces left by their papery corpses officially elected George W . Bush president , I could hear the shouts and screams emanating from the backs of pickup trucks that raced around the flat , dusty campus . These sounds of joy bounced around in my skull and translated into my own muffled groans of defeat . It was early November , fall , but Texas skips this season altogether . The night was warm and heavy . I peeked through my blinds and saw clouds of shredded road and pebbles spewing out from under the tires of the truck screeching out of sight . Before it turned the corner , I caught a glimpse of my classmates in the back , lifting their bare arms to the sky , mouths drawn back into noisy Os , eyes shut tight . Their cheers heralded the rise of the Republicans and George Bush ’ s “ culture of life .” Then , in the distance , the sound of gunfire , irregular and celebratory , popped in the darkness . I imagined bullets rocketing into the sky before arcing downwards , a salute to four years of concealed weapons , legislative anti-abortion attempts , and abstinence-only education . The continuation of the Bush line marked the end of my starry notion that Texas held any kind of answer to who I was .
Two years earlier , I boarded the plane to Texas with the determination of its rightness for me that only someone who has no idea what is right for them has . The fact that this silver escape capsule hurtled toward to a place whose roots and accents were deep and utterly unknown did little to undermine my unsupported confidence that I would fit into this new state as comfortably as a foot pushed into a well-worn boot . I had chosen this path because I decided it would work , and this path would work simply because I had chosen it . So there .
I made the decision to leave the chill of New England the moment I brushed the February snow off of my acceptance package . My brother grabbed at the box
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