As soon as my class ended, Alice ran up to get me. A tragedy had occurred. She was getting the newly made pumpkin pie out of the fridge for a snack and somehow dropped it. The whole thing smashed. She scooped the pie off the floor, unaware that it was full of glass already and couldn't be salvaged. She also did this in her bare feet. I knew it was an accident, but sometimes when your regular life is so full of stress (I worry a lot about the political situation plus the pandemic), a broken pie can feel like the straw that breaks the camel's back. We were unreasonably sad about the shattered pie. Is this a metaphor for our democracy? Yes.
