Hillbilly Elegy

either. There is room now for both anger
at Mom for the life she chooses and
sympathy for the childhood she didn’t.
There is room to help when I can, when
finances and emotional reserves allow
me to care in the way Mom needs. But
there is also recognition of my own
limitations and my willingness to
separate myself from Mom when
engagement means too little money to
pay my own bills or too little patience
left over for the people who matter most.
That’s the uneasy truce I’ve struck with
myself, and it works for now.
People sometimes ask whether I
think there’s anything we can do to
“solve” the problems of my community. I