The daughter called me last night, saying she just wanted a chat. Then she detailed what happened on the campus, and how she tried to avoid the violent people by taking a different route on the way home, but still came across a guy with blood all over his head. My girl, whose communication with us is mostly through texting, voluntarily called me, and her topic this time was different. I sensed spontaneously how she felt in that situation. She said she was worried that Mom and Dad may possibly get detained at the airport one day,  if the detainment is not limited to the citizens of those seven countries in the future. I comforted her that it wouldn't happen, and if it ever would, nothing we can do now. "So don't worry over the things that are beyond our power or will. Stay safe, and enjoy your last semester there", said I. The phone was hung up later, but it made me search all the related news online in the next hours. ...Where is America headed?

 

I still have not finished Reading Lolita in Tehran, a book I started late November. I am such a slow reader, constantly interrupted by something else. I will finish it by this month, for sure. Knowing so little about the history of Iran, I found the reading provocative, to know the war in Iran, the Islamic tyranny, and how the writer cherished American dream and yearned for American freedom, through her reading and teaching of American literature. But what kind of freedom we should go after? Shall we still value the freedom of speech if it makes us feel unsafe?