Next Year in Havana

by Chanel Cleeton

There’s a violence to our history that gets lost somewhere in the telling, buried beneath the beautiful scenery, the deceptively blue sea and sky, the palm trees swaying placidly in the breeze. It’s the sound of firing squads that echo in the wind.

So terribly frightening.

I can’t fathom living in a world where you have no rights, where there is no oversight, no accountability. The United States isn’t perfect; there’s injustice everywhere I turn. But there’s also a mechanism that protects its citizens—the right to question when something is wrong, to speak out, to protest, to be heard. It doesn’t always work, sometimes the system fails those it was designed to protect, but at least that opportunity—the hope of it—exists.

Key point- too many of us are unaware of the preciousness of our freedom. We must never become complacent. I applaud all who have had the courage in these last few years to stand up and march to ensure our freedoms stand up to the assault that’s being launched against them.