Election Eve: “Once More Unto the Breach, Dear Friends.” Or, A 3-Step Plan for Muddling Through
Welcome welcome to an Unruly Election Eve special. How y’all be? Where’re you at on the spectrum of “So fucking over it already,” to “Chaotic anarchy,” to “Stress baking like never before,” to “Packing a go bag,” to “5 simultaneous screens of election coverage,” to “Sitting vigil at my church,” to “Straight-up panic”? Whew. It’s a lot. As you already know. I’ve made me a 3-step plan for managing this week… and beyond. Your mileage may vary.
STEP ONE: Stamina.
I want to be prepared for this election to drag on. And on. And maybe on.
Unless tomorrow is a clear landslide, which seems unlikely, there’s every indication this will drag on. Trump folk are promising, and have been actively laying groundwork for, all manner of shenanigans.
That means I’m keeping gas in the tank, keeping a reserve of energy, girding my loins, any number of metaphors, for whatever may come: hanging chad nonsense, Brooks Brothers riots, stochastic terrorism, SCOTUS weighing in, January 6-style insurrection/s.
(And maintaining a healthy skepticism if election interference gets attributed to “pro-Palestine activists”. While not impossible, messing with the election is not anti-genocide activists’ focus. I expect election interference from Trump folk because they are literally, openly planning it.)
Step Two: Focus on what matters.
What matters is caring for our youth and our most marginalized.
I don’t mean charity or condescension. I mean solidarity. I mean putting my [surprisingly perky for a 51 year old] ass on the line to protect folks, folks who would come to more harm than I would in a similar situation.
My mantra is: IT IS MY JOY AND MY RESPONSIBILITY TO PROTECT AND DEFEND YOU.
Why joy? Because it is fucking joyful to know awesome people and to be in community and to be in resistance and working together towards radical equality and liberation.
Why responsibility? Because I genuinely try not to be an asshole. And not being an asshole means I am accountable to our entire big ol’ human community. Especially those who are in the most peril, most targeted, who have been most historically marginalized.
To bring it back down from theory: when I start to worry about what this election could mean, or feel hopeless about genocide or climate catastrophe or any of the gazillion awfulnesses, I do two things:
I let myself “just notice” what I’m feeling. No judgment, no need to “do” something with it, just notice. Then:
I picture a friend, or I imagine a mom in a US detainment center, or I think of an unhoused neighbor, and I say my mantra—
IT IS MY JOY AND MY RESPONSIBILITY TO PROTECT AND DEFEND YOU.
And I sit with it until I mean it. Like, in the marrow in my femurs, in my spinal fluid, in the expanse of synapses in my brain. I sit with it until I feel it all those places, and when I do, what do you know: in sets a steely resolve.
And yes, of course, when I’m with someone who is worried, or despairing, I say it out loud. I have look a worried kid in the eyes, and smile, and make sure they know I’m speaking some truth, and I tell them:
IT IS MY JOY AND MY RESPONSIBILITY TO PROTECT AND DEFEND YOU.
WE ARE IN THIS TOGETHER.
AND I MEAN IT, PEANUT.
IT IS MY JOY AND RESPONSIBILITY TO PROTECT AND DEFEND YOU.
What mantra do you use to defeat hopelessness or helplessness?
It matters less what the words are than that you have one. And that you mean it.
Quoth Dorothy Day:
“People say, what is the sense of our small effort? They cannot see that we must lay one brick at a time, take one step at a time. Each one of our thoughts, words, and deeds is like that. No one has a right to sit down and feel hopeless. There is too much work to do.”
Which leads us to:
STEP THREE: SELF CARE.
But self-care in the radical, queer, feminist, Audre Lorde meaning of self-care. Not the self-centric, spendy, consumerist way that capitalism sells us.
Lorde wrote about self-care in her 1988 book, “A Burst of Light,” after being diagnosed with cancer a second time:
“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.”
--Audre Lorde
Get what this self-care is about, then: a queer Black feminist knowing that the dominant culture does not value her, but she says “fuck that,” valuing her self, her health, her well-being and identities IS political. It’s warfare in the sense that her survival and thrival in a nation that is designed to weaken, silence, restrict, deport, kill … that her self-care IS resistance. It is, in itself, flipping a capitalist white supremacist empire the biggest bird of all time.
Yeah. See how that’s a little different than buying a mani-pedi spa day?
The ALP. - Audre Lorde Project - puts this into practice as “BREAKING ISOLATION: SELF CARE AND COMMUNITY CARE TOOLS FOR OUR PEOPLE”
“In moments of grief, crisis, or trauma, and in the time before and after, we need each other to survive and thrive. We are obliged to lift up, honor, and hold space for our self-determination, to fight for our lives, and to remind each other of our worth and that none of us are disposable. In a time and place where we [LGBTQ+ BIPOC] are hurt, isolated, silenced, murdered, imprisoned, disappeared, and deported, it is a radical act of self and community love to name our trauma and needs, and to love each other fiercely to meet those needs. We have been taught and conditioned to turn to the state in moments of crisis and trauma, to turn out and away from the communities and relationships that hold us. In this moment of community grief, let us find each other, and radically turn in to each other with love, consensually present each other with our hurts and needs, and strategize as community to get those needs and desires met. We must remember, share, and practice strategies for grounding, support, resilience, transformation, and accountability.”
(for more go to ALP.com)
OKAY but what does this mean exactly?
It’s a little different for everyone.
For me, self-care means:
FOR MY SPIRIT:
A turning-toward: community and connection.
This means reciprocity / belonging / accountability. I’m intentionally reaching out to friends and family for more conversations, laughter, company, support.
Lots of texts and GIFs and in-person coffees when possible.
It means being in spaces with folks I love: classes, meetings, marches, time with my son and husband watching dumb-ass movies.
It also means remembering the liberation struggles that came before. It means recognizing we can stand on the shoulders of radicals who came before us. It means knowing histories of resistance. For me that means reading, and reading some more, and then reading more.
It means knowing where to put my faith and my energy. It means not falling into a complacency of thinking that this election will be the only thing that brings danger, or the only thing that brings transformation, hope, liberation, or meaning. Presidents don’t do that. We do that for each other.
A turning-inward: times of silence, to be in touch with that of the Great Cosmic Echidna that dwells inside me.
It means prayers and meditations first thing in the morning, in the afternoon, and last thing before bed.
Specifically it means asking my God squad, and the God squads of all my relations (spoiler alarm: that includes every atom in the cosmos) for blessings as they would will us to be blessed (which I would wager is way more than we could even know to ask for.)
FOR THIS MORTAL COIL: y’all I gotta try to regulate this lil’ ol’ nervous system.
Which means as much cuddling and sunshine as possible. Which is why I’m writing this on my phone, so my work space can look a little something like this:
So yeah for me, bod care means being intentional about regulating my nervous system or vagal nerves or whatever idk I’m not a scientist. Helpful for moi: Tai Chi in the morning, yoga in the afternoon (with a very very heavy focus on the lying-on-your-back, “corpse” pose), and walks with my husband and my dog. And prioritizing sleep over social media or news, even though (or especially because) I’m not a good sleeper.
It means staying hydrated and eating as well as I can. Things that taste good and help me feel nourished. This of course includes my daily breakfast cookie.
Also sometimes, and by “sometimes” I mean tonight, self-care means taking a Xanax with my chamomile tea.
Sending you and your communities love, stamina, fortitude, and feistiness.
It is my joy and my responsibility to protect and defend you.
XOXO