Clearly Crisis

Such a terrible moment to write again.  It has been so long and there’s always so much to say about RR that often life runs away with the keyboard. I’m not saying much of anything this week. I’m trying to find coping mechanisms for what was, to me, a shambles of an election – one in which the popular vote did not (yet again) reflect the electoral vote and one which decided that a man who was primarily known in popular culture for being an extravagant, gold-plated-toilets and gilded ceilings reality TV star could be president more effectively than a seasoned female political professional. The decision itself being awful but the aftermath, for me, being significantly worse. Coming to work to face the tyranny of respect, bullying, and asking marginalized people to seek out allies instead of the other way around is panic-inducing. Knowing I sit in rooms every day with those assholes – the women who hold a double standard for women, the bullies who are demanding we all respect the decision they made to vote for a platform of racism, sexism, violence against women, and every other flavor of bigotry and hate – it’s crippling. I can’t even open my inbox to do basic tasks without facing some well-meaning call to silence in the guise of unity and the public good. I’m paralyzed. I’m becoming acquainted with the sudden, embarrassing, humiliating, uncontrollable panic events which leave me breathless and sobbing without warning. I’m facing a constant inner argument between belittling my reactions as a privileged, could pass for straight, well-off, white person and desperately seeking some sort of self-care that will allow me to do my job, leave my house, care for my child, and keep a shred of self-respect. I’m losing both sides. It’s awful, humbling, and frightening. I can’t get a handle on it.

As one of my efforts to pull my brain back, I’m writing here, hoping that a short paragraph or two daily will help recenter me around what’s actually happening rather than what could, or did happen. I have always loved your comments but, like much of the rest of my life, I’ve turned them off and will leave them that way for the time being. Tune in or not, I wouldn’t blame you if you turned out the lights on the world.