I pushed the speaker button on my cell phone so that I could hear my daughter. “I can’t stop crying,” she said, her voice cracking. I stopped unpacking boxes; my breath became ragged; I felt the same evisceration of my gut that I felt 40 years ago when my husband asked for a divorce. “No!” I shrieked. “No, he could not have won.”
“Mom, wait. What do you think I’m referring to?”
“Biden lost.”
“No, he won. I’m crying for joy. You haven’t heard?”
A wave of pure relief washed over me. My heart stopped thumping, and I began to relax. However, I didn’t feel joy or elation We had narrowly won a reprieve, but we had not won the war. I did not vote for Joe Biden and the Democrats; I voted against Donald Trump.
While people came out onto the streets in big cities Saturday to celebrate the outcome of the election, my town was subdued, quiet, and careful not to start an altercation. Fear was palatable on both sides. Then the next day I read an article in Medium Digs by Lauren Martinchek called “November 3rd Was a Rejection of the Democratic Party,” which summed up my unease. Democrats are politically impotent and unlikely to make any real change. It is as if they are in black face and, like Ms. Martinchek, I fear for the future and the backlash of “right wing populism” that Trump harnessed. He may be gone soon, but his legacy of racism and white supremacy will still be with us.
Carole J. Garrison 