Who is this person? This person sitting at her desk on a very cold morning in November is not the same person who was sitting at this same desk weeks ago, months ago, years ago…This person who always joked that she was a “silver lining seeker” is feeling disappointed, disenchanted, disengaged, distressed, disheartened…and is finding it harder and harder, day by day, to see any silver lining whatsoever…who dis??

Usually at the week of Thanksgiving I am just bubbling over with gratitude and overwhelmingly emotional about all that is good and beautiful in my life, and all of that is still true this year too, but there is an ugliness inside of me that is darkening and inking out the light of who I think I am. There are people I love very much to whom I am related and people I work for who I cherish and am deeply thankful for, but the way that these people think is anathema to me, and it pains me. I can’t end my relationships with my loving and generous family and I can’t end my relationships with my trusting and generous clients but it feels like there is a wedge between me and them now and it makes me sad.

They certainly have every right to think what they think and say what they say, but I continually come back to the fact of the matter that is this; I have watched in real time this person talk, this new incoming president, and have heard in real time what this person said, this person who did not even get more than 50% of the votes and yet still wins, and cannot believe that any thoughtful person would also hear and watch this man and think, “yes this is the best choice for myself and my family and my country” and these people did, and it has made me feel bad every day since.

I can only wonder if this is the same feeling old people had in the sixties when their college students were hippies, and these old people wondered how on earth their kids could think like they did about civil rights and war?? I can only wonder if this is the same feeling as picky eaters at fine restaurants where they sit and eat buttered rolls while the other guests around them eat beef Carpaccio with Beluga caviar, and wonder how these foodies could enjoy these things??? Or is it more like when someone picks the ugliest wallpaper, or itchiest sweater, or most uncomfortable shoes? I don’t know what it is but I do know that I don’t like how I feel about it.

I don’t have any answers. I did all that I could and read all that I could and acted accordingly. I simply have a really hard time believing that the people who voted for him actually did read any of project 2025, and read the part about how the incoming administration would aim to cut more than 96% of the budget for social security and think that was great and would somehow make their lives better. I simply have a really hard time believing that that people who voted for him realize how many billions of dollars immigrants bring into our country every year, and what the loss of those tax dollars will do to our economy, or how the loss of laborers will hit farming, hospitality, and construction. If you were mad about the price of lettuce or berries over the summer when they were picked by mostly brown low paid non-American workers, imagine how mad you will be when farmers have to pay white college students off for summer break a living wage to pick them. It’s certainly not that simple and it’s certainly not anything easily conveyed in a blog, but it does make me wonder when the buyer’s remorse might set in?? Will it be when your daughter’s insurance that she buys through the marketplace gets canceled and then months later she finds out she has breast cancer and loses her house because she can’t afford the treatment?? Will it be when your granddaughter has an accidental pregnancy and can’t get an abortion and neither wants nor can afford a baby?? Will it be when you get the notice next year that direct deposits for any social security numbers that end in an odd number will now be cut in half and every social security number that ends in an even number will now be cut by one third, is that when you will wish you had read more of the fine print? Maybe it will be when all of these tariffs are put in place that are supposed to make America great but will perhaps make consumer costs higher, unemployment higher, and plunge the stock market into decline, and nobody but the very wealthy will be able to afford to buy a new washing machine or television?

If I am wrong I have no qualms about accepting my errors or ways of thinking. If I am wrong I will admit fully that 49.6% of the voters saw something in this person that I clearly did not. If I am wrong I will be so happy to have cheaper vegetables and fruit and chicken next year. I’m just an angry woman who reads, I’m like Ruth Langmore from Ozark, “I don’t know shit about fuck,” but what I do know now, at least for me in this moment, is that nothing feels good and nothing feels like joy and nothing feels like a silver lining and that disturbs me and disrupts my brightness, and that kind of Dis does not suit me at all at the time of year that I am normally abundant with thanks and kindness.