I was fully expecting to be having a surreal experience swimming tonight, knowing my country was implementing mad Caligula’s plan to wipe out a 6,000 year old civilization. But for now, it’s not happening, and the work to remove him begins by the people trying to encourage cowardly leaders to action. As for the swim, it was sparsely populated in my community center public pool. Maybe people were at home, spending time with loved ones, remembering what’s important?

But it was utterly surreal to be at a community center, appearing like any other week, with scores of families and kids, with the illusion of normalcy. Nothing about today was normal.

At the pool, I felt like an alien, unwelcome in this strange nation, where its people (like me) go about our lives as my country prepares and plans to possibly use tactical nuclear weapons half a world away against people who are not even our enemies. As for my mind, it was in a trance of leaving my body and trying to realize I live in a country lead by an insane dictator, supported by oligarchs and a party of modern fascists.