Finding Solace: Writing Through Political Disappointment

Tuesday, November 12 reads the home screen of my phone. I feel sucker punched knowing it has been a week since the election and, we have already settled into a new normal. None of this is surprising yet, I feel a sense of loss I can’t articulate.

In the wake of the election results becoming a foregone conclusion, I processed my grief in a very private, quiet way. I was not surrounded by my echo chambers. I was thousands of miles away with a group of women from all around the world dabbling in different forms of writing. I felt like a zombie, sitting in classes, hearing things without actually comprehending what was said. I took time out. I let the feelings wash over me.

In a couple of days, I reconciled myself to what was. Now, back home in my now red state of Pennsylvania, reality hits hard. The first thing I did was deactivate my Twitter account. It has been a long time coming. It’s been forty eight hours and I have survived without that cesspool.

If after 2016, there was a sense of devastation and a desperate clinging to hope that somewhere, sometime people would be held accountable, this time around, there is no hope, nothing to cling on to. Instead, there is a steely resolve now that we are each on our own. I will have to create my circles, my little bubbles of kindness and inclusion. My little world where things can be as right as possible. I need it. My children need it.

Over dinner last night, I asked my teens what the chatter was at school about the election. Pattu talked about the 4B movement. She talked about how many kids were TFG supporters, even the ones she thought were okay. Ammu veered off on a tangent talking about Finland where life seemed much more equitable for women.

This morning, the grief washed afresh which I promptly drowned in K-pop. I have been refusing to read takes on the election especially ones that blame the Dems or Harris. In my eyes, she ran as perfect a campaign given the short runway she had. That this nation has chosen the path it is on, is a reflection of its people and the white Christian nationalism that has its grip on the majority of the population.

2025 and beyond looks very hazy. I am grateful for any bit of privilege I have that will let me protect my children should the worst happen. So, at the moment, am choosing to insulate myself in books, shows and the blank page. Maybe in the distant future, I will step back into the real world to engage, protest and fight.

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