I must have written something here in 2016, after the first Trump victory. I am too tender to go searching for it, too wary to read my 2016 thoughts. When I was checking in with my people today, I heard over and over, “I’m so sad.” “I don’t know how to be ok after this.” “I’m older than I was in 2016 and now I just want to hide under a blanket for the next 4 years.” “I don’t have faith in people any more.”
All so valid. All so real. I woke up this morning with veins of venom, “I will not be afraid. I will not allow this man or this upcoming administration to break my spirit. Joy, hope, calm and centered: these will be my acts of resistance!”
And then I was stuck in a meeting that lumbered on as usual, minutia and “policy” and “everything is impossible” and “we’ve always done it this way and no one ever had a problem before?, and I teetered on the edge of tears.
My office cubicle can be a comfort. The monotony, the smalltalk. It’s very tempting to conflate my work as a “public servant” with the story that this is the most, and best, I can do. No. For me, that story is simply -placency. I can do so much more. I am forced, by the vagaries of modern life, to spend large parts of my day working within the system. But I have time to work in other ways as well. I have time to help my community, to observe and listen, to stay awake.
Today, people want their pain to be observed. And I guess that is why I’m writing here, too. See my hurt, my anger, my incredulity at how out of step I feel with, apparently, the majority of the country. Take my feelings seriously. Feel them with me.
When people show you who they are the first time, believe them. Maya Angelou wasn’t talking about Trump or those who vote for him, but her voice rings clear all the same. I’m not saying this to say we should demonize all Trump voters. I am saying: they have shown us who they are, time and time again. It’s time we believe them, and get to work.
There are a lot of things I’m not good at. I can be indecisive, prickly, intense, illogical. What I can do is offer love. What I can do is hold space. What I can do is listen. Figure out what you can do. Figure out what your resources are, and give them generously. Don’t let scarcity stories, or what happened to you in the past, or what you can’t control of the future, cloud your vision.
I write this all to remind myself, as much as I do to remind you.
Remember you are so very loved.