An English Jew's Love Letter to America

One of the earliest beliefs I still cling to in life is that I was born an American trapped in an Englishman's body. That is the kind of story you manufacture about yourself when you grow up in a place like Liverpool in the 1980s. Back then, the city was apocalyptic. A rotting, dilapidated carcass in grim decline. When I first watched Mad Max, I thought the wasteland Mel Gibson braved appeared like an upgrade in comparison. When you live somewhere like Liverpool, you ask yourself a simple, yet powerful question on an almost daily basis: How on earth did I land here?