I have had a deep, romantic love for this country for as long as I can remember.

For the courage and boldness of our democratic experiment, for the light we represent to the world.

For what we aspire to in our Constitution.

That romanticism didn’t blind me to where we fall terribly short, but I naively thought that we were immune to what has destroyed other nations: citizens turned against one another, whipped into a frenzy of vitriol and mistrust, rule of law abandoned for the will and whim of a leader who places himself above and outside of it.

Not us.

We are Americans.

With compassionate, brilliant, dedicated patriots in both political parties.

But here we find ourselves.

Teetering.

As we head to the polls, my wish is that we remember who we are as spoken by Lincoln at Gettysburg:

It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.