My brother Drew is the youngest of my family’s four kids (I’m the oldest). The following is a message to him and all the children who will grow up in Trump's America.

My sweet boy,

First of all, hi. I don't know if you'll ever read this — I have no idea what cool middle schoolers do on the Internet these days. Snap-Gram? Insta-Vine? Is Club Penguin still a thing? Sorry. I'm riffing because I'm nervous.

Drew, you're going to be newly 12 when Trump is sworn into office on January 20th, and you'll be 16 — or God forbid, 20 — when he leaves.

I lived through the same range of ages during Obama’s presidency — 12 to 20. And it's only now that I realize how incredibly lucky I was to have such a president during those years of my life.

My entire teenager-dom, when I was becoming aware of myself in the world, of the extent of privilege and racism and homophobia in our country, I saw a black man leading our country. He led us out of economic downfall, granted more rights to women and to members of the LGBTQ community than had ever been known before and refused to fear-monger against Muslims and immigrants. I saw a graceful, fiercely intelligent first lady who wasn’t afraid to point out the inequality, stereotyping and violence faced by people of color, women and especially those who were both, such as herself.

If the Obamas hadn’t been in the White House during my formative years, I don’t know if I ever would have understood the importance of feminism and of speaking up for those who have no voice. Would you believe I was surprised, at 12, to learn President Obama was our first African-American president? Like so many fortunate enough to grow up surrounded by love and tolerance, it never occurred to me that the president couldn’t be black. What a wonderful thing, to grow up in a country like that.

I’m terrified that you've been robbed of that.

I’m terrified you'll spend your teenage years seeing an admitted sexual assaulter giving the state of the union address, watching his cabinet, full of people of your race and gender, do everything they can to hurt and marginalize those who are any other race or gender.

I’m terrified you'll come of age thinking it’s OK to hate, to behave like Trump or Pence or any of their horrid, racist, sexist, anti-semitic, Islam/trans/homophobic minions.

But I'm also hopeful, sweetie pie.

I'm hopeful that all the parents, teachers and other big sisters and brothers will do our best to carry the lessons of love and tolerance through the next years. I'm hopeful we won't be complacent or normalize the presidency of a man celebrated by the KKK and staffed by white supremacists. We won't do this with empty platitudes about coming together as a nation, but by teaching that it’s never, never okay to live like those in power do. I will make sure of that. It's the responsibility of all us grownups to make sure of that.

I'm hopeful because I have faith in you. That you will be kind. That you'll think before you speak and before you act. That you will be a force of good in the world despite the world doing everything it can to convince you no one else matters.

I will be diligent in doing all I can to help those less fortunate than us. To - like the photo at the top of this says - care a whole awful lot.

I care about you and our brother and sister so much, darling. And by the time you turn sixteen, if you and all of our country work hard to care not about our own families but for those of all religions and races and genders, we're going to come out on the other side of this. I promise.