There is a monster in our midst
I know how you’re feeling, brothers and sisters. I’m feeling it too. We are all in this together. I feel right along with you this baffling confusion of emotions and physical sickness. That these emotions and symptoms of this terrible calamity are natural and are part of what psychologists call the “Stages of Grief” is minimally helpful. In the end it only explains what we’re going through. It doesn’t solve what we’re going through.
Your first instinct will be to find someone to blame. But where does one go to blame an evil that is ubiquitous? Where does one begin? Russia? Certainly. They and their bots and their traceable emails made dozens of bomb threats to polling places in the left-leaning parts of swing states. They did it in order to discourage voters from voting. The mainstream media? Yes, their part in this is obvious, and doubly disgraceful because they did it out of cowardice and for money. The craven Republicans too fearful to stand up to Trump, the timid Democrats in the judiciary and the legislature too fearful to take decisive action against him? Yes, yes, a thousand times yes. And many more.
They are to blame. So are we. We all share some of the blame. I am to blame for not seeing the danger clearly enough.
So what do we do? How do we proceed? The clock ticks by another second, another minute, another hour. It won’t stop for us. “Nor all thy piety nor wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all thy tears wash out a word of it.” The only way out is through. The only direction is forward.
So what do we do? For now, I know what I am going to do, and I hope you will do the same, brothers and sisters. I’m going to rest, sleep, eat and exercise. I’m going to do all the little things to nurture and preserve my life and my strength for later. I’m going to take good care of myself, physically, mentally and spiritually.
Of course we understand what just happened, you and I, and as infuriating, as preposterous, as absurd as it all is, it did happen. Yes it did. Millions of our countrymen and countrywomen just rescued a very bad man from prison. They didn’t merely rescue him, they set him on high and placed the ultimate levers of power into his hands. And in gratitude for the salvation they so blithely bestowed, he will despoil our government, deprive us of our freedoms, ruin our beautiful planet and enslave and imprison us all. They know not what they have done, but they will — soon enough. It will be little consolation that they will wake up one day and see what we have seen all along. There is a monster in our midst.
So what do we do after we have rested and regained our strength? I don’t know what anyone else is going to do, brothers and sisters, but I know what I am going to do. I am going to fight. I will fight in spite of all terrors, in the face of all consequences, no matter how formidable the foe should become, however long and hard the road ahead may be. I am going to fight.
So rest up. Care for those in your care, love those who love you, nurture yourselves and those around you. Grow strong again. Then, once rested, I ask one more thing of you. Will you join me? I hope you will. Remember, great adversity creates great warriors. No greater adversity has ever faced us before. I believe in you, in myself, in the stuff Americans are made of. Yes, it will be a long and bitter struggle, and in the end there remains the possibility that we may not succeed. I believe we will succeed, eventually. But let no one ever say we didn’t try. And let no one ever say — of any of us — that we ever, ever gave up.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.