It feels all December 26 up in here. So much anticipation about the last few days. So much anxiety now replaced with relief or anger, or perhaps relief and anger. That I crave salty foods and alternative country music indicates a bit of the sads for me. I’ve been processing this all morning, talking it over with my sister. Trying to figure out what’s got me down on the day after my guy got elected. And I think that’s the first thing.
Ever since the second presidential debate, we’ve been hearing about how we heard what we wanted to hear from our guy. Some of you have been hearing what you wanted to hear from your guy since the first debate. But hearing, we do not understand. Seeing, we do not comprehend. There was no 50 state strategy and there are red states and there are blue states. And there is Florida. What went misunderstood was illustrated locally when my party was shocked, SHOCKED, to find that not everybody in the county supports them.
Maybe this was already apparent, but it became clear as the newly created rural districts began to send in there results. “These people must be morons” the liberal pundits said. These people are my neighbors. The one who mows his neighbors grass after the neighbor’s knee surgery. The one who, having been laid off twice, uses his professional certification to deliver pizzas so that he can make the mortgage. These are people I would like to be. Me, I’m an idiot, from the Greek “idios” meaning “one’s own.” (Thanks Sam.) I can see what I can see and hear what I can hear, but I’ve got no lock on comprehension or understanding.
For that matter, I can’t see what’s happening when my head is turned. To claim to champion people who in their own voice choose another representative and then to belittle that voice as ignorant, scared, or depraved would mean that I practice another Greek term: hypocrisy. It is harder to understand than to listen. It’s harder to comprehend than to merely see. But I am convinced that we are going to be called upon to understand and comprehend each other more and more as our ecological, economic, and social environments become ever more strained. What hope do I, an idiot, have for reaching out beyond my own? Not much. Not unless you help me.