When I'm feeling things, my feelings tend to come out of my eyes. It's just how it is. I've been crying a lot since yesterday. My friend Peggy commented last night, "I didn't realize how bereft of optimism I'd become." And that's exactly it, I think. So many of us have been sick at the thought of eight years of this, and now we can actually imagine a more hopeful future.
Watching Kamala Harris and Joe Biden speak -- watching with my husband and children (especially my children) -- was exactly what I hoped for. I cried over what we've been missing, but I also wept because I feel hopeful.
For three? Four? mornings in a row I rose long before dawn, raised the blinds in the living room, and waited for daylight. Isaac was the first to join me, every day.
"Did Biden win yet?"
And I said, "Not yet, but I really believe he will."
The official call came just before 8:30, just before the hair appointment I made weeks ago -- to go back to blonde. When I made the appointment, I hoped it would be celebratory, rather than an attempt to cope with anger and fear and loss. As it turned out, I got to tell my stylist that Biden won -- she hadn't heard yet.
"Oh, thank God," she said. "Every night this week I've gone to bed wondering if we'll still have a democracy in the morning."
When Van Jones teared up on CNN, he spoke to so many of us: "It's easier to be a parent this morning. It's easier to be a dad. It's easier to tell your kids that character matters...Telling the truth matters. Being a good person matters."
Four years ago, I sobbed in Matt's arms: We're raising a daughter. For that matter, we're raising a son.
So this matters. We need better than what we've had from the leader of our country.
*
But I'm still afraid of complacency. Trump didn't create the racists, misogynists, and xenophobes; they've been here all along. He merely gave them a voice, and they're still here, and we all know them. Naive, optimistic little me learned this week that I overestimated the number of conservative friends and family I believed would never vote for Trump, and while I'm heartsick I shouldn't be surprised. I just hoped that some things would be dealbreakers, at least for folks in my life: Unapologetic racism, white supremacy, white nationalism. Misogyny. Mocking the disabled. Anti-semitism. The incessant name-calling. The bullying. The narcissism. But they weren't dealbreakers, and that's a heartbreak for me.
Don't you dare speak about your pro-life motivations if you've never cared about children in cages, forced family separations, children sexually assaulted in custody at the border. Don't tell me that your goal is saving babies if you care more about punishing women than supporting their health. (Don't you dare claim to be "not political.") Abortion rates drop during pro-choice presidencies, but if that were ever the goal, instead of control, this wouldn't be the reason someone is a single-issue voter. Don't ever, ever claim to respect women. I just call bullshit, no matter how much I love you, no matter how much I always hoped you loved me, too.
But do dare to tell me. Truly. Tell me. Look at me, and make me understand: what made you choose a monster because you've convinced yourself it supports some greater good? (What is that greater good? Does it reflect only what you see in the mirror, and shut out anyone who doesn't look like you?)
Or let your silence speak for you. It speaks more loudly than your words.
Yes, yours.
*
So this is what it feels like, in 2020. To have the tentative hope of the next four years. To feel a little broken because four years of Trump held up a mirror to what we should have seen already. But also, to feel hopeful. I'm a teacher who sees the fire in our kids. I'm a mother who strives to raise children with fierce empathy, who understand their privilege and use it to make a better world. I'm a woman with a partner who shares these values. We know we have a lot to learn. We know we have work to do.
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