Hillbilly Elegy

Though we sing the praises of social
mobility, it has its downsides. The term
necessarily implies a sort of movement
—to a theoretically better life, yes, but
also away from something. And you
can’t always control the parts of your
old life from which you drift. In the past
few years, I’ve vacationed in Panama
and England. I’ve bought my groceries at
Whole Foods. I’ve watched orchestral
concerts. I’ve tried to break my
addiction to “refined processed sugars”
(a term that includes at least one too
many words). I’ve worried about racial
prejudice in my own family and friends.
None of these things is bad on its
own. In fact, most of them are good—