Better

No, there is no great rejoicing, right now. Everything still looks like several dumpster fires. People are already beginning to suffer. Loss is in store for us. In 2000, I kept my mouth shut after the election was halted by the Supreme Court and Gore conceded. In 2004, I cried for a while. I let it go, though. Things were shit, but I was getting myself untangled from a worse life. It could have been worse for me.

This time, I'm not just mourning the loss of a little hope for progress. This time is different. People willfully do not see what they've done. Or they think it's funny. All the stories of emboldened hatred and intimidation just sail on past them. Talk of internment camps being a precedent, talk of purging Silicon Valley of "too many Asians," appointments of people with dominionist and fascist ideation. Right over their heads, at best. Part of a heart-warming future of purging and genocide they dream about, at worst. It's different. I'm not sad Hillary lost. I'm fucking brutally angry that Trump won.

"When someone tells you who they are, believe them the first time," Maya Angelou said. Instead, people are going to turn their face to the walls and hope it isn't true.

Yes, I'm furious. I'm not apologetic about it. I am not a pacifist, either. I come from a different background. I am not a strawman people create of liberals singing "Kumbaya" or whatever. My background is one of fight over flight. Those talking about empathy for anyone who envisions genocide and purging aren't going to ever get through to me. My rage is squarely centered on them.

After all is said and done, though, I am through the grieving of a future that has been aborted. Whatever twisted manifestation is in store isn't here yet. I will use the time allotted to me to do the things I still love, while I still can. I realize that before this, there was no promise of a new day. Death comes. It is our only truth. Each second that ticks is mine, as long as I can breathe. When dementia comes for me, I hope that I've sucked every last good bit out of my life. I hope to skid into the pine box and the crematorium having used up all I can.

Nothing will take that from me. Certainly not a hollow, orange egomaniac.