Leila Mesdaghi was two weeks into her third year at Bard College when the bombs started falling. The Iranian American artist faced an impossible choice: continue her studies in the safety of New York or abandon everything to care for her Aunt Mina in Iran, a country the U.S. State Department has designated as a Level 4 or "Do Not Travel" to area.
She chose family.
"I was at college, and two weeks into the program, this thing, the war happened, and I had to leave everything behind and just like, come back, like, right away, because she was alone," Mesdaghi explained from Iran, where she remains today.
Her journey to Tehran wasn't simple. With all air travel suspended, she described her route: "the borders were closed. I had to come through land to Armenia, and then, like, 24-hour bus drive to get here."
Mesdaghi, 48, was born in the U.S., moved to Iran at age two before returning to the United States and then resided in Fort Myers for 20 years. Her son, brother, and even her dog remain in the U.S. while she tends to her elderly aunt in a country under distress.
Photo by Somayeh Farahani
"I was mostly worried about the chaos — that's what worries me, when war breaks and supplies are limited, and then you have elderly that you know needs hospital and care. Yeah, people's lives are affected. Mine was very affected," she said.
When she finally arrived, the reality of her decision hit her — the city felt hollow. "The first night, I was coming home the city was so empty. There were guards everywhere, and I could see the fire from where they hit the jail."
One night stood out in her memory. Bombs fell. "We had one, like, about maybe three miles away from me, that really shook the building and the glass and the wind and the windows, which I was like, oh my god, this is all gonna shatter now."
The psychological toll varied among neighbors. "I see all kind of people. Some are like, just living their lives, not like nothing had happened, but they just, move on. I see people who become more sensitive to any noise, like a little switch of a lamp, for example, like would just trigger them," she said.
For Mesdaghi, art became her anchor.
"I'm home. I water the garden for two hours a day. You know, I'm, I'm an artist. I'm working," she said. Ironically, the thesis she abandoned at Bard seems eerily relevant to her current situation. "It's about this conceptual game, the dots and boxes ... instead of winning, let's try to be equal."
The contrast between her academic work on equality and her lived experience of conflict created unexpected emotions.
"I was feeling, feelings that I had never felt before, the level of anger and rage and like revenge and like what to do with all these feelings at once. For me right now, I'm back to making work and that's what's really, that's my coping mechanism."
Despite the chaos, Mesdaghi has witnessed significant social changes.
"We are much, much more progressive than when let's say 30 years ago, 20 years ago, even, like, after the Mahsa Amini uprising that we had three years ago, things have changed. The girls are walking around without the hijab, and now this summer, I'm seeing girls with, like, short sleeves and with skirts."
Still, information remains scarce. "We don't know what's happening. This whole thing is so unclear, we're cut off from the internet for a lot of times, the VPN that we have to use, those were not working. So, the news that's given to us is like, delayed."
Photo by Frances Mortel
The uncertainty extends to simple questions about leaving. For now, Mesdaghi hopes to return to her studies in June of 2026.
"I left everything at school and going back again, hopefully next year."
Her journey reveals the human cost of politics. As she puts it: "I think anyone who wants to understand, they have to do the work on their own to want to understand what's happening."
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