Lucid Live Chat, April 2, 1pmET

And a few reflections about why I started Lucid

Good morning. First, thank you all for your support. Each signup and paid subscription means so much. I'm writing to announce the first Lucid live chat, Friday April 2, at 1pmET. Here's the Zoom link to join. https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82222821454?pwd=b3lScmlCSE53ZnovYmhTV2NrN0h1UT09. Meeting ID: 822 2282 1454; passcode 270025

We can talk about attacks on democracy, “drain the swamp,” and the interview with William Browder, promoter of the Magnitsky Act and Vladimir Putin target, that publishes tomorrow morning. But it's really an opportunity to meet and learn about you and your interests. I'm hoping it becomes a weekly event.

I started Lucid as a response to our dense and fateful times and the need for new forms of connection to talk about them. The pandemic has placed all of us in new situations. Home-schooling kids while trying to work, finding relationships fraying, and reeling from the loss of loved ones, jobs, or homes, is stressful.

Others find happiness from the upheaval: stronger bonds from extended time with family and pets, a new appreciation for the simple joy of seeing a friend, colleague, or family member in person.

These are the emotions and situations we live as we take in the dramatic political and social developments of our age: creeping authoritarianism, including in the US, and resistance to it. This tension between oppression and resistance to it is a central theme of Lucid, and we'll also discuss abuses of power that have little to do with politics, like workplace, school, and domestic bullying and harassment.

Like many things I write, some of it might not be the most pleasant reading. But the illumination of things that others want obscured, and speaking about things that others want to be kept silent, is part of the Lucid project. I'm also looking forward to sharing so many inspirational stories I have gathered in my research. And the occasional photograph, like this one of the Hudson River in New York state.

Until tomorrow, stay well, and stay lucid.