And...

on holding rage and hope as the snow falls

Snow started falling as the first returns came in on election night in Denver.

Sensing impending shock way too early in the night, I shut off the news and crawled into bed hoping to thwart full-body shivers — the same trauma response that hijacked my nervous system in 2016.

Ten hours and scant fits of restless not-sleep later, I dragged weary limbs out of bed. I swaddled my body in layers of warmth and forced myself outside for a walk in the snow — a luminous event which under normal circumstances would have had me leaping out of bed at dawn. But that morning, the morning after, it felt imperative — like an act of radical resistance — to force a sliver of a smile looking at beautifully assembled snow on late autumn foliage. I maintained this frigid state-of-denial all the way to the coffee shop, where talking to humans, well, shattered me. A tsunami of tears pressed behind my skull as I choke-whispered rapid thanks to my barista, scurried to the farthest corner, and sobbed into my Americano.

…the morning after…

Two days later it was still “puking snow.” As the ski-bums used to say. This was turning out to be the kind of storm I’d wished for since moving to the city from the mountains as a 2009 housing crisis refugee. I was financially desperate but infused with blazing optimism for the fledgling Obama administration, unaware of the fight Kamala Harris was about to wage and win, recovering billions of dollars for middle class Americans in her state who’d fallen prey to the kind of greedy lending practices that almost led me to “owning” a home. A home I, too, would have lost.

By Friday the steady, quiet assault of snowflakes grounds me, gathering on tear-swollen eyelids like a cooling balm. I stick out my tongue, hoping the crisp flavor of my favorite season will heal something broken inside me. Moisture penetrates the fifteen year-old protection of my parka, sending a wet shiver across my shoulders. As I leave footprints in the still gathering snow, my mind works to process a different kind of assault: the and-ness of this moment. The paradoxical realities we have to hold in our hearts at the same time. Fear and determination. Gutting disappointment and the need to go on. Exhaustion and resolve. Furious rage and the audacity of hope. The discipline of hope. Not blind hope, but an activist’s hope backed by innovation, imagination and action.

Because here’s the thing: for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. It’s Newton’s Third Law of Motion. When hate roars, love rises up with overwhelming force. We know this. We’ve seen it throughout history. We saw it most recently following the 2016 election when more women ran — and won — leadership roles than ever before.

We are in a period of dizzying pendulum swings. And there will be a swing back.

A few things helping me as I grope for a reframe right now:

• The actual ideas of Project 2025 are so unpopular (even on the right) there was an aggressive attempt to deny any association with it, it’s not hard to imagine implementation will not be met with open arms

• Voters have been fed a diet of misinformation and at some point, when wages, unions, health insurance, rights, etc. are threatened, there might be more resistance than we’re yet able to imagine, even from those who voted for him

• Promises have been made to too many self-interested entities around the globe to be resolved efficiently… how long before they turn on each other?

• Incompetence, chaos, greed from aforementioned outside influences, (and dementia) could turn out to be unlikely allies for good in this f*cked up, upside-down world

• A third of us didn’t vote… this is not a good thing, but DO NOT fall prey to believing “half the country” wanted this outcome. Do not give it more power than it has. There are deeply disgusting things happening from a grossly loud minority and we need to push back ferociously against hate in all forms. But I still believe (I have to) many of those who voted for this outcome didn’t vote for hatred: they wanted “economic prosperity” (something he has no intention of giving them). And ultimately, tyranny by a minority is not sustainable.

Listen there’s no getting around the fact that this SUCKS. My guts are still tangled in the kind of knots that make the idea of eating unappealing. We’ve been dealt a blow to everything we’ve been fighting for and my heart breaks for groups already being targeted. But everything in me is screaming: do not surrender to fear. Fear is the fuel authoritarians use to gather power. We have no choice but to resist. To keep going. To practice radical kindness and compassion. To use our bodies and connect with others.

So what now?

Heal. Regroup. When each of us is ready, we come back and armed with whatever skills we might have to offer. It might be our voice. Our compassion. Our questions. Our innovative thinking. Our imagination. Our courage. Our ability to organize. Our creativity. Our hands, heart, body or whatever each of our contributions may turn out to be. The first thing dictators do is come after the arts through censorship, banning books, and attempts to tamp down creative thinking, so artists, keep making and keep sharing your art!!

Perhaps, as Baratunde Thurston suggested in his morning-after thoughts, this will be an accelerant towards something we can’t yet see — a more perfect version of something we’ve been striving to be. Young people are rightly disillusioned and frustrated with broken systems so it was already time to ask: what might be possible moving forward?

It will take human innovation to re-imagine this. Thankfully, there are a whole lot of wildly smart, fiercely talented humans working for good. I want to be part of that.

Today in Denver our days-long snowstorm is packing up for departure. In its wake, drought-stricken water-tables are replenished and visibly embattled trees stand their ground. There are broken branches everywhere and it will take time and nourishment for them to regrow. But they will regrow. We will regrow.

And the sun, according to the forecast, will come out tomorrow.

“Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.
Just keep going. No feeling is final.”

— Rainer Maria Rilke (with a hat tip to the film JoJo Rabbit, which everyone should absolutely watch again immediately)