None Shall Pass

In 2018, as a news reporter, I was going to interview a World War II veteran at his house. When I arrived there was a five-foot 87-year-old woman standing in the middle of the doorway. She made no move to let me in. Instead, she said, “Are you the reporter at the Record-Argus writing all those nasty things about President Trump?"  I looked her square in the eye and said, “No ma’am.”  She made a big deal of moving out of the way.

“You can come in,” she said.

I often wonder what would have happened if I’d said yes.