Post Election Whiskey
Wednesday, November 6
Early this morning, Donald Trump won the presidency for a second time. Eight years after his first victory. Eight years after the Democratic party realized its complete disconnect from the working class. Eight years for journalists to fight for the critical media gaps that were filled with mis/disinformation, sending those dissuaded by the left to Trump once and then again. Eight years of inadequate change and inadequate action. Eight years of ignorance in the form of American exceptionalism.
I fell asleep at 3 pm and woke up a little after 5 covered in sweat. It was dark but the façade of midnight was pierced by the sound of circular saws cutting through metal at the construction site behind our building. It’s November 6th and 75 degrees even with the sun down. Discomfort and shock have made it hard to move my body outside. Can’t escape the unnatural.
Here to write but it’s too soon to say. If I let the feelers in a little they, at first exploration, touch the raw feeling of betrayal. Betrayal by men, adding another jagged rock to the pile they’ve left for me and all women with their powerful, decisive vote for an adjudicated rapist. A vote to “protect their daughters” by ignoring our pain and consciously stripping away our rights, leaving us at the mercy of their simple choice of where and when to nut. Fuck you.
Devastation. And terror, honestly, at what we don’t know will come next. Four years is a long time. Longer if term limits cease to exist.
I spent last night with my housemates on the verge of being ill, pacing from the C-SPAN live stream to the roof to the deli to our drawing books and back again. Shock and numbness kicking into proactive auto function, working to mask the rapid-boil of panic that had started up in the pits of our stomachs.
In a Puritan Literature class I took in undergrad we were taught the distinction between horror and terror. I forget it now, but in my mind horror is the fear of fantasy, a film, something seen, while terror is the fear of something experienced, hammering down on reality with its hard consonant beginning.
My inbox has been filled with news outlets pledging their continued “fearless” coverage of the Trump presidency, asking for donations. Fear is something journalists should most certainly be feeling right now given Trump’s frequently expressed desire to lock them up and shut down the free press. But they had eight years to call him out for his filth, most of which they spent beating around the bush in an attempt to seem objective and rational. A wasted eight years and I fear we have grown tired. Overnight. I feel like my optimism and drive to help facilitate change has been extinguished overnight. I’m sure many who voted for Harris (and those who couldn’t bring themselves to vote for either candidate) are feeling some sort of the same.
The fatigue, the willingness to lie down and accept the beating, is what scares me the most. I don’t know what positive action should or will look like in the coming months and years, but we cannot submit. It’s exhausting. I am so exhausted, crushed, but an old friend reminded me this morning that nihilistic thinking is not useful at times like this which require diligence and loyalty to the truth. I will sleep now but I await my strength as it reemerges. Feed it. And remember the power of endurance under a tyrant.
A text from my good friend in Atlanta, GA:
I am sad. Sad for my mom. Sad for Gustavo who I worked with for 4 years and whose visa expired so he had to go back to Mexico and leave his wife and child here who probably won’t be able to come back home. Sad for all the minorities who have seen 70 million people vote for a white supremacist. All sad sad sad.
For the Black teachers who will be forced to teach a different side of American history that glosses over slavery and racism.
I feel like we just inched so much closer to a theocracy and I don’t think Trump even has the brain cells to know what’s wrong with that.