In early spring of the year that I am writing this,
I, a writer, and my boyfriend, a video artist,
began to discover evidence that an ancient system
was and is being used to interfere with our lives
and with the lives of many others.

As the details of covert manipulation slowly emerged,
we dealt with the sadness and anger
by unraveling the truth, by sharing our histories,
and by working with our community
to bring what we learned to a wider audience.

There may be times when the reading of this story
is as difficult for the reader
as the writing of it was for me.

But the manipulation of people's lives continues because of the silence.

I begin this story to break that silence.

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