I'm Mad as Hell and I'm Definitely Going to Continue to Taking It!

Yesterday, we decided to stroll over to a local restaurant for brunch. It was a lovely, warm day here in Savannah and the tourists were out. As we ate, I had a profound sense of déjà vu that took me back to the days right after the 2016 election when I looked at my fellow citizens with suspicion and thought to myself, It was you! Of course, now that I live in the South, it’s easier to judge my fellow whities because I have allowed my old biases to return in full flower. Is it fair? It is not. Do I care? I do not. I was pissed and wanted to take it out on those stupid brunchers. J’accuse!

Madness, no doubt, lies this way. However somebody did (or just as likely) didn’t vote is not a referendum on them as individuals. Ok, it kind of is. But there’s no need for me take it so personally. Ok, there kind of is. Even so, I am not going to spend the next four years of my life hating an entire demographic. That’s the job of the other party.

Traitor food.

Today is Sunday and, while I am not a Christian, it’s as good a day to sit with myself in some sort of meditation as any other, and to find as much grace as I can, given the present circumstances. What that looks like, I’m not sure, but I know it means not staring daggers at the lady who ordered the salmon eggs Benedict two tables over. It means not engaging in the same anger-casting that fuels the American right. So far, it’s not going well.

Yes, I’m pissed and I will remain so. That anger is valid and I’m not going to pretend I have nothing to be angry about; I’m angry for all the reasons all of you are angry. But unfocused anger is like a downed power line. It doesn’t help anybody and it invites disaster. I don’t need any more disaster in my life. So then the question is what to do about that anger?

A lot of people are urging people like me to turn it into something positive. Take to the streets! Protest! Cancel your subscriptions! Nah. I’m not falling for that again. Not right now. Maybe there will come a point where I don’t have a choice but to throw on my marching sneakers (Adidas), but right now I’ve got other things I’d rather do. What things? Literally anything.

That déjà vu extends to the slightly queasy feeling I’ve been carrying around since Wednesday morning. It’s the same sensation I had back in 2015 when Hilary lost. It’s a heavy, roiling feeling, almost as if we’re out at sea in high waves. We’ll probably get through it, but there’s no guarantees. Lots of boats have gone down in gentler waters than the ones we’re steaming into. I’m not making any predictions about the outcome, but I would encourage the band to starting practicing, “Nearer My God To Thee.”

It's never good when the best one can hope for about a new administration is that infighting and incompetence will prevent them from enacting their agenda. A friend told me he thinks the president-elect will spend the next four years playing golf. That’s possible, I told him, but he’s got true believers who are salivating at the chance to hurt people. And they’re going to do it. Say what you want about Elon Musk, but the guy is industrious. If he and JD and Vivek end up running a kind of shadow presidency while the new president futzes around on the back nine in Bedminster, we’re going to see a lot of chaos and pain. Those guys are all too jacked up on their own self-importance and neurodivergence to do anything but run around breaking things just to see what will happen. We might be entering the presidential equivalent of the old David Letterman gag where he drops stuff off a five-story building. Spoiler alert: nothing survives intact.

Brunch was good. I tried, and failed, to absolve my fellow diners of the sin I presumed they made. Obviously, I’m in no position to judge anybody about anything. That wasn’t going to stop me. I hope, I thought, that your goddamned salmon eggs benedict gives you the runs. The grace that I’m trying to find continues to elude me. Perhaps it will come in time. After the 2016 election, I eventually made as much peace with the result as I could; after all, I told myself, he barely won and only after losing the popular vote. This time, I can offer myself no such reassurances.

My anger remains unfocused. I have this Substack and this week we return to Have I Got News For You, which may be nothing more than a goofy comedy news program, but at least gives me another outlet to shit on the president-elect and his merry band of misfits. So I’m more fortunate than many others and it still feels like not enough. Which means I’ve just got to figure out how to live my life as normally as possible.

I don’t know how long it will take for me to get back to feeling “normal.” If I’m being honest, the last time I guess I actually felt that way was on September 10, 2001. Since then, an entire quarter century, that persistent heaviness in my stomach has never quite gone away. The Obama years provided some respite but we were still caught up in a war of choice in Iraq. But those were also the years of the Tea Party, the QAnon antecedent, whose conspiracy-riddled nonsense has now become mainstream Republican orthodoxy. “Where we go one we go all” is no longer a rallying cry. It’s a promise. For better or worse, we’re all about to take this ride together. How we manage ourselves through the storm is the only thing in our control. I plan on managing myself on a full diet of pettiness and scorn. I looked into my heart on this Sunday and found no grace. Perhaps it will arrive at some point, but not today.