I’m writing to you again not as a public official but as a person, a fellow native Californian and a Bay Area homegirl transplanted to Los Angeles, where I grew up, so I feel a natural affinity with you and a familiarity that permits me to address you by your first name, even though we’ve never met. Before you return to private life, for now — I expect to see you in public service again after a richly deserved break — I want to tell you how much I admired your presidential campaign, and how great an impression you made on me as you rose to that major challenge.

We’ve all seen the postmortems and the finger-pointing, including at you, about who’s to blame for your loss, but as far as I’m concerned you made the most of a daunting situation and conducted yourself with dignity and grace in the face of an onslaught of racist and sexist assaults by your opponent and his acolytes. As vice president you were already at a disadvantage as the office requires a recessive profile with zero power (notable exceptions: Dick Cheney and Joe Biden, veteran Washington players recruited to mentor younger, less experienced presidents) and you couldn’t declare independence from your boss. But I thought you performed a nuanced high-wire act balanced on a fine line between loyalty and independence. Still, as a member of the current administration you were operating on short notice at a handicap in a time of populist revolt against incumbents.

And while you never played the race or gender card, appealing instead to those who longed for competence and integrity, no one can honestly pretend that being of Jamaican and Indian ancestry, and female — and from Berkeley, no less — didn’t cost you at least a few points in some corners of the electorate. My late friend Wanda Coleman, the “unofficial poet laureate of Los Angeles,” used to complain that for the gatekeepers and reputation-makers of the New York literary establishment she had three things going against her: she was Black, female and from L.A. I’m sure you can relate to that without making any claim to victimhood.

But look, after an undefeated, rocketlike rise from local prosecutor to district attorney to state attorney general to senator to vice president, you were due for a setback, and I bet the defeat will build your character in a way that victory never could. I had no doubt about your ability to run the country; that with a strong team your leadership chops would be sharpened and that you would demonstrate your full capacity for governance. You showed a naturalness and humility on the campaign trail that earned my respect. You were truly a class act, and the moronic commentators who tried to compare you to Dan Quayle or Sarah Palin were only revealing their own intellectual limitations.

But as the Tao Te Ching says, there is greater dignity in defeat than in the noise of victory. So I think in the long run having lost will make you a better person, and a better politician. I’m still idealistic enough beneath my cynicism to believe that the two are not incompatible, and that what you’ve gained experientially and philosophically will make you even stronger in your rough and ruthless profession. I consider you an example of politics at its best: you’re smart and tough and you know how to play with the big boys, but you have a softer, more sensitive side manifest not only in some campaign-trail photographs but also in the glimpses we got of you as a cook and with your family. You are well-rounded, and I’m sure we haven’t seen the last of you in public life.

Like your husband, I’m just an old white (Jewish) guy, but I recognize the comportment you modeled as an example, especially to girls and young women, but also to guys who don’t buy the vulgar, cruel, mendacious, impulsive, domineering behavior of your bad-mannered opponent. I hope young people realize that good can be done by those with the calling and the courage to do the work. And so, dear Kamala, I thank you for all you’ve done so far and look forward to your future.

Stephen Kessler is a Santa Cruz writer and a regular Herald contributor.

. To read more of his work visit www.stephenkessler.com