Hi, everybody. This is Episode 3 of the Hopeful Locals for my free subscribers, and it's Episode 6

for the paying subscribers. If you'd like to hear the entire series and help make my work possible,

consider becoming a paying subscriber on Patreon or Substack. You'll also get 90 other exclusive episodes,

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The Hopeful Locals is very much a serial story, and if I were you, I'd go listen from the

beginning, but this episode can also stand alone, and here goes.

Today you're going to hear the story of a woman I met a couple years ago who really impressed me.

She wasn't much past 40, but she already seemed to know who she was and why she was put on this earth,

and she was very good at what she did, which made me feel hopeful in a way that few things had.

Her name is Erica Warren Yarber, and she grew up and still lives in Riverton, which is

a town of about 10,000 people in central Wyoming.

It's surrounded by mountains on three sides, and it's hard to get to in winter, as I'd experienced myself, over two exhausting days and one failed attempt to cross the mountains.

Wyoming is the least populous state in the country, and Riverton sits on a plateau where everything is incredibly flat, so there's lots of open space

and you can see for miles and miles until your eye hits a mountain somewhere on the horizon.

Riverton is roughly 75% white, 12% Native American, and 12% Hispanic or Latin X.

Erica is half Native American and half Mexican American, and her story spans multiple cultures and many stages and emotions.

This episode is first and foremost a portrait of a woman.

It's also a portrait of a family and of a corner of this country that is far from the coasts,

geographically, culturally, and economically.

In Erica's story, the American dream is alive and well across three generations, but we'll also see stark reminders

of America's constitutional injustices and present-day failings. Riverton borders the Wind River

Reservation, which is home to the eastern Shoshone and northern Arapaho tribes. And compared to the Navajo tribe, I've just visited in Arizona, which is home to the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho tribes.

...