The Luxury of Certainty

Knowing Who Holds the Reins of Your Aspirations

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My life, until recently, has been spoiled by certainty.

As a child, growing up in an immigrant household, it was certain that, even as my parents struggled, I would never have to endure the same hardships they faced.

Life in America offered certainty that was unparalleled to the world my parents left behind.

Theirs was a world where the lives and ambitions of its citizens were subsumed by the state. It was a world where my father, eager to learn English, instead, found himself studying Russian in primary school.

The teacher had split the class into two — one side would learn English, the other Russian.

By state decree, my father found himself sitting on the wrong side of his own aspirations.

My parents left a world where planning your future was fruitless because the government directed and arranged human resources as it saw fit, in the name of national objectives.

In that world, dissent against the Party’s vision invited public humiliation, persecution, and even death.

Without any outlet for political expression, my father found himself secretly scrawling critiques of the government on posters at home and slipping into…