It's like Christmas, but in the way I assume it was for Dickensian-era children. I hope for the best—a wonderful goose dinner with all the trimmings, all the presents and toys and things one could ever want. But, deep inside, I'm afraid I'm going to get coal. Or, worse, a beating from the schoolmaster.
The election has me antsy and doing things completely outside of the norm for me. I find that even though I don't have a TV and have eschewed (or so I thought) ties to the MSM, I am addicted to the 24 hour news cycle. I use Firefox as a web browser, and recently clicked on my "Most Visited" icon. MSNBC, CNN, BBC, CBS, ABC, HUFFINGTONPOST, MCCLATCHY, and DIGG top the list. It used to be gardening and comics, Google and web games. I visit them several times a day, sometimes several times an HOUR.
I am constantly on edge wondering if, on Nov. 4th, am I going to get coal in my stocking or am I going to get the present of a lifetime? Because, if McCain is elected, I am afraid the work I have done to rebuild my life and my sense of self will be in jeopardy. The election of George W. Bush to a second term was, to say the least, a difficult thing for me, and I am not sure how I would react to a McCain presidency. It is a very personal thing for me.
When the last general election happened, I had just had a serious neurosurgical procedure for a very recently diagnosed congenital brain malformation. (For those who are interested, an Arnold Chiari I malformation--my brain is literally too big for my skull). I was a career woman, in a PhD program and working full-time at my dream-job as an archaeologist and museum specialist with the National Park Service. I loved what I did, I loved the people I worked with. On the flip-side, I was also very sick, physically and emotionally.
The day after the election I chose to stop taking the opiates AND Valium I had been taking for over a month. You see, the election results rolled in the night before I really didn't feel anything. Not only was George W. elected for a SECOND term, the populace of my home-state of Oregon voted to ban same-sex marriage. Everything was falling apart around me. Because of the drugs, I just didn't care. Somewhere inside, I knew that was wrong.
When I woke up the next day in withdrawal, the reality of the night before hit me hard. I cried for hours. Days, really. I started to cut up newspapers about the election and I made a collage that--in my withdrawal-befuddled mind--I felt encapsulated exactly how I was feeling. Alienated, isolated, betrayed.
Since then, I have gone on with my life. I have turned off the radio whenever I hear George W. speak, I have tried to keep my ire low and my positive feelings high, just as my psychotherapist, doctor, and acupuncturist order me to do. I gave up hope that things would change, and tried to come to peace with that.
I have healed over the last four years. I am no longer taking the mind altering drugs I have had to depend on to recover and deal with the damage wreaked by my condition. I no longer have my excruciatingly demanding but amazing job, and I left the PhD program. I work very part time, volunteer when I can. I have changed every aspect of my life in order to accommodate who and what I am now, today. A difficult balance to keep, I have learned.
I feel that this horrible condition was the best thing that every happened to me. I am more aware of who I am, what I want, and I appreciate life and the people and things around me so much more. I am more alive. I wouldn't change it for the world.
So, I find myself wondering, was my reaction to the 2004 election the result of the drugs, or sudden lack-thereof? Was it my newly operated-upon brain? Was I just too stressed out? Why did I fall apart when George W. was elected and the Oregon electorate rejected people based on who they love? Should I feel in a similar, Panglossian, way about the political reality of the world?
I want to believe that the answer is NO, it wasn't just me. The George W. world is not a Panglossian one. The longer this general election goes on, the more I believe it, too. I want to believe I fell apart because it was the right way to feel, and I just had the luxury to feel those emotions and express them so intensely because I was sick and convalescent.
I believe this because in the last six months, Barack Obama has given me back the sense of hope I had over four years ago. Nay, he has put me in a position I have never been in before—I have more than hope, I have empowerment. He has returned to me the feeling that it is possible to change the course of history, not as individuals, but as a group of people who see that thing CAN be different, and that I can help make them that way.
Things are difficult. Things are hard. My life is following a course that is certainly different from the one I imagined myself to be on four years ago. Shit happens. The important thing is what you do with the shit. Do you let it get in your way? Do ignore it? Or, do you acknowledge where it came from, what role you had in creating it, and making sure it doesn't return to soil your shoes?
I am spending some of my precious time volunteering for Obama. I will feel just as betrayed and hurt if the nation rejects hope again. However, this time I have the self-awareness that it isn't just me or the drugs. It is real. We have a chance to make things right, and I hope the people of this nation take the opportunity to do the hardest thing anyone is ever asked to do.
Change.