At 6:10, the morning after the election, tired, numb, and reeling from the results I see our neighbor driving down the street on his green John Deer. A large American flag attached to its back. As he passed by, he began pumping his fists in the air whooping and hollering toward our direction as he continued back down to his house around the corner. He is one of seven known, MAGA-households in our little neighborhood.
This Veteran’s Day weekend, I’m struggling. Struggling to feel anything good, anything positive. My emotions are all over the place. Up. Down. Fluctuating between sadness and anger. A sucker. A loser.
A guy, driving his John Deer, waving the American flag down the street no longer evokes thoughts of Norman Rockwell’s small-town America. Not Mayberry. Not pride. Not patriotism.
I hate that. I’ve hated it for a long time.
I hate that they’ve hijacked the American flag. Desecrating everything it once stood for. A symbol of hope and dreams. Liberty and justice. With their MAGA hats and flags.
When I step outside my house. Now. I don’t know how to act. I’m emotionally raw. I’m finding it difficult to look at people, to meet people’s eyes.
Overnight, I no longer trust people. I no longer trust myself. I don’t know what I’d say.
Last evening, we ran up to Holland, to run errands, grab some groceries, dog food, a bite.
I was a mess. Everywhere we were. “Most of these people voted fascism into power. Was it that guy? That one for sure. Did she? Look at her laughing with her daughter. Those guys are smiling over there. They all did this.”
On the verge of a panic attack.
I texted a friend. She gets it. She mentioned some people are wearing blue bracelets and getting small blue-heart tattoos on their hand as a means of communicating to others while in public that they’re a safe person. It made me think of the days in the 1980’s and 90’s when it was the norm for business owners to display rainbow stickers and pink triangles on their doors, communicating their place of business was safe for LGBTQ persons to solicit.
“We’re not going back.”
I had a meltdown on Greg in the car. I don’t want to wear a blue bracelet.
I want every person that voted for this MAGA government to have to disclose publicly that they voted for him. I want them to wear the bracelets, I want them to get a T R U M P tattoo on their hand. I want them to have this T R U M P mark of the beast on their foreheads.
I want to KNOW who you are and where you are. So, I know who I can engage with and who I avoid. So, I know who NOT to trust. So, I know whether they outnumber us in a public setting if things go south.
To the neighbor around the corner—don’t come near me or my property. Lady with the two, little white dogs down the street—please don’t engage with m again.
I don’t want anything to do with you.
It’s not just the gay thing or my marriage. Oh, you better believe it! Obergefell vs. Hodges will be overturned. But it’s more than this. But I’m not going to waste my breath because they’ve made it quite clear they wouldn’t get it. They just don’t care. They don’t care about equality and equal protections under the law. They don’t stand for ANYTHING good.
No, we’ve not been through this before. This isn’t 2016 all over again. This time is different. Far more dangerous in many more ways.
The people that voted for him voted in a whole new era. January 6th, 2021 didn’t discourage 53% of America. They want this. A bloodbath. Retribution.
Yeah, I’m going to need more than a minute, so I apologize now.
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