There have only been two times in my life that I could not get out of bed the morning after. The first was after the death of Princess Diana; I grieved for a woman I had long admired for so many reasons–her death so sudden, so tragic, so senseless. She left behind two little boys (I had three young children of my own). The second was after the 9-11 attacks–the realization of loss (of life, of safety, of humanity) shook the country’s foundation, and I knew we’d never be the same again. And this morning, the morning after the 2024 election, will remain a scarred, third tally on my heart. This morning-after isn’t so unlike the previous two: I’m grieving the death of our country as we know it and I fear we will never be the same again.
I woke up at three AM, checked the news on my phone to discover the imminent fate of our country. I can’t rightly describe my feelings. They were a knotted combination of distress, disbelief, disillusionment, dread… I stared at the ceiling for I don’t know how long. A wave of nausea overcame me, so I got up to call out of work for the next day; for, I knew I couldn’t find it in me to put on my teacher-face in order to be neutral for my classes of innocent youth.
Overcome with lethargy and brain fog, I navigated through the day, chalking it up to one of processing. I was eager to hear from Kamala Harris who hadn’t yet conceded; I could barely watch ten minutes of Trump’s self-aggrandizing victory speech. I was too restless to catch up on social media, glaring sentiments that I was struggling to make sense of mirroring back at me.
But how did we get here?
How did our country get to a place where a convicted felon, misogynist, racist, bigot, narcissist, who lacks human decency, encourages deplorable behavior from his following, and cannot clearly articulate anything gets to become the figurehead of this country? What am I missing, I asked myself? What is half the country missing?
Look, I get the bureaucracy of the government. I get the appeal of having a businessman leading our country versus life-long politicians. I know it isn’t the most honest profession. But I’ve seen many presidents in office, some popular, some not-so-popular, and I have never witnessed the kind of divide that one man has spawned. Our country is broken. It’s been broken since his first presidency. And, I’m not sure there is an equitable way forward from here. When Kamala Harris spoke about bringing the country together, Donald Trump spoke about seeking revenge. That is a very dangerous quality in a supreme leader with supreme power.
I’m a reader, as most of you know. When I first read 1984 by George Orwell and The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood as a college student, I read these books as fiction. Now, they seem like a manifesto not so unlike Project 2025. I am scared for me, for my family, for future generations, for every American citizen that the America we know now will not be the same America in four years; it certainly hasn’t been since 2016.
I take solace in the fact that nearly half of the country feels like me right now. Through adversity, we learn just how strong our resilience can be. I pledge to remain hopeful because I have to…for my daughter, for my future daughters-in-law, for all of the daughters of our nation, for our sons who marry women and have daughters because our freedoms are at stake and our lives depend upon it. I pledge to use my voice to speak-up for what I believe in. I pledge to act to keep our civil liberties intact.
“Only in the darkness, can you see the stars”: Martin Luther King, Jr. I promise to keep my eyes on the stars and let them guide me. Wishing you love and light.
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