Dear President Obama,

Thank you for the work that you’ve done to bring the Affordable Care Act to fruition. Leaving aside the government shutdown nonsense for a moment, today the healthcare exchanges opened, enabling many of my friends and colleagues to get affordable health care for the first time. They are small business owners, independent contractors, freelance artists, and people with pre-existing conditions that made them ineligible for basic health care.

I am one of those people. I run marathons, don’t smoke, eat a mostly vegetarian diet, wear my seatbelt, my sunscreen, my bike helmet. I should be an insurance company’s dream. But I was treated for skin cancer when I was in my early twenties, and as a result, I’ve never qualified for an individual health insurance plan. I could never start my own business or work as a freelance theatre artist, because no one would insure me unless I was under an employer’s giant umbrella. And going without health coverage would have exposed my parents and their retirement assets to the unlikely-but-still-possible chance that I would sustain some extremely expensive illness or accident. The Affordable Care Act has opened up whole new opportunities for my life and my career. For so many Americans like me. And unlike me.

We have a long long way to go in order to untangle the mess that is our healthcare system, but for today, thank you for standing strong in the face of many many opponents and showing the country, and the world, that, just like education, shelter and food, access to health care is a right, not a privilege.

Sincerely,