Road 2 Elsewhere, Excerpt #37*: Fortunate, Not Lucky

How my dad helped me parse my privilege, long before I understood what that even meant.

IN LATE OCTOBER, I had a drowsy morning in the Paris Metro. It was interesting to watch people on the way to work—an alien culture for me. We were rolling toward Gare de Lyon, where my travel companion David Copperfield and I caught the train to Switzerland.

I went along for many miles watching the landscape as the Alps rose up around me, but eventually…