When I walk into my local shop in my rural Michigan village yesterday, nobody was wearing a mask, not employees, not fellow shoppers, not anybody. Except me. I passed a sign saying that fully vaccinated shoppers are allowed to enter the store without masks.

But the store doesn't check. Nobody asks to see proof of vaccination. I know lots of people probably aren't vaccinated, because I live in the deepest of Trump where people are proud of refusing vaccinations. Where people mob school board meetings and scream about their right to be free. Where people are often, and I should say this without pulling punches, deeply ignorant and proudly stupid.

So I wore a mask. I do when I go out, because I know how willfully stupid and ignorant my neighbors are.

And wow, do I ever get the stink eye. Around here, there is intense social pressure not to wear masks, that is to say intense social pressure to behave in ways that will hurt others.

It's mind-boggling. They demand the right to be free to hurt people.

Why are people so fucked up? I don't understand. Why are people so proud of being stupid and ignorant? I don't understand.

I just can't wrap my mind around it.