Jesse Ashlock

Flying out of Newark the other day, I got one of those perfect IG-friendly aerial shots of New York City. Lower Manhattan was in shadow, but Lady Liberty was bathed in glorious sunlight, and as cheesy as it sounds, I got misty about all that she still represents. She stood watch when my Hungarian mother arrived as an infant; last year my half-Korean daughter, whose own mother also came to America as a child, visited Ellis Island on a school trip and was so proud to find her grandmother’s name am…