Want to save the republic? Find your Kippy Kauffman.

Way back in January, Kippy and I met under terrible circumstances: her daughter Haley’s boyfriend Greg had been in a serious accident and airlifted to the hospital where my sister had just delivered my niece prematurely. I was in the lobby trying to get change to purchase something from the vending machine when I noticed two blonde women in the corner by the windows; I was upon them before I realized that one was in tears — Haley. Still, I asked: did they happen to have change for a twenty? Kippy reached into her wallet: I don’t have change but here, take this ten, you can just have it. She held it up to me kindly, smiling, her other arm tightly around her daughter. The three of us spoke for a few minutes and shared our stories of how we’d ended up here. We hugged and somehow I found myself wrapping my pale blue scarf — a gift from a favorite aunt — around Haley’s shoulders, hoping she felt the love I always did when I wore it.

Within a few days, I received a Facebook friend request from Kippy and gladly accepted. Scrolling through her page, I realized my new friend and I had diametrically opposing political views; no, this can’t be, but she was so lovely. As though having a different view of the world and being lovely couldn’t both be true. Of course, I still accepted, she was Kippy after all: the fact that she supported our current president was not…