My family is a farmer and textile artist living in rural Kentucky who rarely miss Sunday services at their local Baptist church. A former Jewish banker living on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. Florida theater director. Louisville Contractor. Boston lawyer. And gay Republicans.
Talking about politics at a family gathering is like smoking a cigarette at a gas station: there’s a good chance the whole place will explode. What always impresses me about our large, motley families is that not only do we survive Christmas dinner, but they also include the people we live with every day: our spouses and our political This includes several couples who disagree. They haven’t voted for the same candidate, much less the same party, for years.
For a long time, these differences were primarily an annoyance that intensified around elections, but in recent years they’ve become much more stressful for those couples. Especially right now, when the country feels so divided and angry, it feels like we’re so backed into our own corners that the seams that hold us together are finally about to snap. But all those couples are still together. I wondered how they did it.
This question became, in part, a novel about a Democrat and her husband, a Republican running for office. This book is not about politics or campaigning. It’s about marriage and ambition and what happens when we don’t align with how we see ourselves in the world. But in order to write it, I had to do some research. I could have watched hundreds of hours of Fox News or MSNBC and talked to dozens of strangers at the grocery store. Instead, I decided to talk to people in my family about guns, abortion, immigration, and climate change. I found their politics puzzling.
These are conversations that most of us desperately try to avoid during the holidays. I wasn’t particularly excited to get them either. But I thought it would at least be efficient, and I was hopeful that I might learn something.
I’ve been a reporter for the New York Times for 15 years, so I’ve spent much of my life asking personal questions about sensitive issues. My job when working on a story is to understand what the facts are, what they mean, and to present the information in a way that the reader can decide for themselves. Over the years, I’ve stopped countless people on the street and in parking lots to ask them about politicians, schools, how much they pay in rent, and what they think about ice skating in 78-degree weather in February. I asked him about things like that.
The people I interview usually don’t ask me what I think about climate change or who I’m voting for. If they asked me, I wouldn’t be able to answer them. My role as a reporter is to dig up information, not to persuade anyone. (I can’t say here what I think about these issues; Times guidelines require reporters to keep their political views private.) I’ve had hundreds of conversations like this, and I can’t think of one. It turned out to be a combative interview, even though I personally objected to every word.
So I decided to approach the family like a reporter. I didn’t mean to talk back. I was looking for information. I wanted to know what they were thinking and why.
I started with my brother. He lives in Tampa and sometimes walks his dog around the neighborhood while talking on the phone. This dog is a rescue dog, similar to a Schnauzer, who had a difficult time as a puppy and sometimes wears a weighted vest when he gets anxious.
We had always gotten along, but it had been several years since we had really talked about politics. Our last stop was at my parents’ dining room table, where my brother and I were yelling about Chinese takeout, even as my mom desperately tried to change the subject. I don’t remember what we were discussing, but I do remember how angry I felt, like an animal was trying to claw my chest out. I wanted to reach across the table and shake him. I could talk to strangers about their opinions with total calm. Not everyone will agree with me, and that’s okay. But how could my brother believe these things?
When I was writing a book and called my brother to talk about politics, he said he wasn’t interested in debate, this was research and we just needed to understand.
“Okay,” he said. I imagined him walking under a palm tree with a little gray dog. “Shoot.”
I started with some basics. If you were talking to a 5-year-old, I asked, how would you explain what it means to be progressive? How do you explain being conservative to your fellow kids?
I didn’t agree with his answer, but it didn’t matter. Some of my characters do that. I asked him to continue.
Tell me about immigration, I said. What do you think is fair for children who were taken illegally at a young age?
What do you think about affirmative action?
What should we do about climate change?
What about abortion?
As he explained his point of view, I felt I was able to understand my character more deeply. I could see their faces more clearly in my mind. And it was a good excuse to talk to my brother. We both have kids, jobs and marriage plans, but we don’t stay in touch as much as I would like. But suddenly I started calling more often and it became fun. I took another cautious step. I’ll talk to my in-laws.
In theory, my stepfather and I couldn’t be more different. I’m a gay Jewish New Yorker and he’s a pickup truck driver living in rural Kentucky. But we both like to read, we both like to fool around, and in the 15 years since I met my wife, her father and I have become good friends. There was always something to talk about, but I had a hard time discussing it. I remember a conversation from a few years ago. That time, we spent nearly an hour late at night taking turns giving “one last thing” about gun availability around the country. He was confused by the way I looked at him and it took every ounce of my willpower not to yell at him at his house. My wife only lasted a few minutes and got up from the table and left the room.
But his politics are unpredictable. For example, he doesn’t have a gun. Instead, I like to say I keep giant aerosol cans of wasp spray around my house in case of intruders. And because there are wasps in the barn.
A few months after I started writing the novel, my wife and I took our children on a spring trip to Kentucky. As we sat in rocking chairs around the wood stove, my father-in-law and I talked about electric cars and renewable energy. I took the same approach I did with my brother. I asked. That was research. We didn’t care who was right. And the conversation was…a lot of fun! It was truly a great success. It gave me more material for my book, and no one said anything that I came to regret.
So I tried two other members of my family. One evening, sitting around a bonfire in our backyard in Louisville, I talked with one of my sisters and her husband about how to vote. (Later, I decided to call this husband and ask him about golf and what he would do if he found out his wife had cheated on him with a woman.)
On another visit to Kentucky, I stood in the kitchen with my mother-in-law as a flock of white and brown sheep roamed in the pasture behind us. I asked her how it would feel to be married to someone who voted differently than you.
She sighs, shakes her head, and says she doesn’t understand. “But he’s a very kind person,” she said.
When I talk to people about my family or my novels, a common question I hear is, “If my spouse voted differently than me, I would divorce.”
Maybe you think so. But probably not. Not all of these couples were that far apart to begin with. But over time, like shadows in the afternoon sun, their perspectives shifted until they overlapped very little. But they continue to share day-to-day stuff that involves real life, like kids, mortgages, jobs, and more. they look out for each other. And if those things work out, if you’re on good terms with each other, do you really blow it all off?
No one in my family was persuaded by our conversations to change their political affiliation. But the more we had these discussions, the easier it became. And it became increasingly difficult for everyone involved to ignore the opinions of those on the other side, often seen in caricatures. Although you have finished reading my book, I will never forget how my family and I learned how to talk to each other. We try to remember that even if we despise each other’s leaders, we are all just people trying to do our best.
