You Are Not Alone In This

The results started coming in just as I got off work. The polls had already closed in Eastern states and they called some right out of the gate, but others -- ones that were supposed to be safely in Clintons column -- were too close to call. Looking back, that was the first time I felt the pit in my stomach. I dont think its left since.

When they called the final result (around 2:30 in the morning), I got up out of the chair in my office for the first time since I sat down to watch the election coverage, six hours earlier. I drove to 7-Eleven and bought a pack of cigarettes. I stood outside in the cold November air without a coat and smoked five of them in a row despite having given up the habit months ago. I had the same thought I did on the morning of September 11th: the world will never be the same.

I couldnt fall asleep for another few hours, and then only in fitful stops and starts. I gave up on trying to sleep, brewed a pot of coffee, and smoked another cigarette.

I was alternately confused, dismayed, and angry that everyone wasnt talking about it that day. Some were, of course, but others went on about their business as though the ground beneath us hadnt shifted and left an unbreachable chasm in its wake.

Dont you see the gaping divide?! I wanted to shout. Arent you worried its going to swallow us whole? I couldnt stop seeing it and I was enraged at everyone around me who wanted, or perhaps needed, to pretend it wasnt there.

I realize now that what that night in November felt like -- what it still feels like -- is grief.

Grief that Hillary didnt win. Grief that Bernie didnt either. Grief that 63 million people voted for someone who is the embodiment of our most cruel, petty, and vindictive instincts and impulses. Grief that the administration of an honorable, inspiring man would be followed by something so unprecedented in American history that we still cannot find the words for it.

Grief for something more ineffable as well: grief for the life weve known, for the progress weve made, for the surety that the long arc of the moral universe we thought we were traveling on was bending, as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, toward justice.

The truth is that this grief has bowled me over at times. Its made me stay in bed for the day and become physically ill and miss work. Its made me question things about life and the world I had never questioned before. Its made me feel unsafe and unsure, lost and completely alone.

But then something happened. Last Saturday I woke up and got on Facebook . I had a notification to watch a livestream of the Womens March on Washington. And then a notification to watch the Womens March in Park City, Utah. And the Womens Marches in Austin, Denver, Seattle, and New York. There were even Womens Marches in Fairbanks, Alaska and Lexington, Kentucky. And then photos started streaming through my newsfeed of the Womens Marches in London, Barcelona, Sydney, Copenhagen, Athens, Rome, Tokyo, and Tel Aviv. And I started reading stories about the Womens Marches in Ghana, Iraq, Kosovo, Nigeria, Lebanon, Kenya, and Antarctica. It became the largest single-day protest in U.S. history. And one of the largest protests in the history of the world.

Something in me broke open watching those marches. I cried all the tears Id been holding in. I cried and cheered and felt part of something, even though that something was being broadcast on the 4 inch screen I was holding in my hand while lying in bed with a persistent case of strep throat in the middle of Salt Lake City, Utah.

I remembered something my professor in a Grief & Loss Counseling course I took in grad school would often say: there is no way out but through. Thats why grief stays with us -- not to move us past, over, around, or out of something, but to move us through it. And the only way grief can be utilized as a weapon against us (from within or without) is when we believe we are all alone in mourning the vast emptiness occupying the space once filled by what we have loved, and lost.

So what I want to say to you -- and to me, and to all of us -- is that you are not alone in this. I saw that at the Womens Marches and again when they announced immediate plans to build a border wall and thousands gathered in protest around the country to say: well tear it down. And I saw it again this weekend when tens of thousands more held vigil at airports from coast to coast, including here in Salt Lake City, to say: we are all immigrants, refugees are welcome here, and bring me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free.

This is my America. And though I still carry the weight of grief over what happened on November 8th, my grief has now expanded to make room for some vital companions: indignation, defiance, and unyielding resolve.

I have no doubt in my mind that history will not look back favorably on this administration. I also know we havent seen the end of the ugliness, division, oppression, and corruption that are its hallmarks.

But what I also believe, deep in my bones, is that we are the most powerful part of this story. When the history books are written, they will document that nearly three million more of us voted for Hillary Clinton. They will show that the marches that took place the day after the inauguration eclipsed the size of the inaugural crowds. They will show photographs of us at town halls, city centers, and airports -- marching by the literal millions -- to register our outrage and our unequivocal opposition to tyranny.

Dr. William Worden described four tasks of grieving, the last of which is to reinvest the emotional energy of the loss. So here is my reinvestment:

I will march with you. I will rally with you. I will stand by your side. I will not be silenced.

To the new administration I say: you have no idea the sleeping beast you have awakened.

And make no mistake, we are fucking awake now. And we are not going anywhere.