Those of us who support Ukraine do not want to see Russia perish. Russia is indelibly part of world history, and our world. You may as well try to imagine the night sky without the Big Dipper. In the heat of battle, in the fog of war, it can be difficult to imagine a different future. Imagine we must. With the aid of memory, imagining is easier. For a better future looks like the not-so-distant past. For not long ago, Russia and Ukraine were like neighbors, working together. Brothers: traversing invisible borders to hunt, traveling back over the same ground with full arms. Sisters: shopping in St. Petersburg, getting married in Kharkiv, sunning themselves somewhere along the Black Sea. Children’s faces: laughter, mischief, at play anywhere. Couples growing old together, on familiar land whose boundaries were forgotten long ago: walking side-by-side. Hand in hand.
