My longtime friend Ed, a retired railroad executive, called the other day to inform me that a mutual friend, “Kim” had suffered a stroke. Back to Kim shortly. Well, it came as no surprise that we ended up talking in, eh, “choice” words about, what else, the results of the recent election.
Now although I’d tried to put the election behind me – hey, talking about Trump had become as taxing as the tariffs he’s threatening to impose – it was clear that Ed, like others I’d talked to, wanted to ventilate. To summarize those conversations, they woke up the after the election into a world they’d hope for, one they thought we’d become, one they thought they knew but apparently didn’t.
“The weird thing is Terry, that the week after the election I traveled through several airports and wondered how many strangers I saw, the majority of them white, who voted for Trump given his disastrous debate performance, felony convictions and vile things he’s said about others. I also wondered about African American and Hispanic Trump supporters who voted for him despite his record of racism. Suddenly I felt alone, like I was now living in a strange new world.”
| Author John Pavlovitz publishes “The Beautiful Mess.” Like Ed and other, he too was dismayed by the results of the election. “Over the weeks since the election,” he wrote, “many of our sacred givens are up for debate.” Among his “sacred givens” are these: America is beautifully different. “I always believed that my country was marked by something singularly wonderful which separated it from every other place on the planet. I always trusted that my country was aspiring to incarnate the ideals of personal liberty and collective liberation. Seeing what inexplicably unfolded here in November and the staggering ugliness that it has produced since—has all but shattered the myth of my childhood that America was a beacon of hope for the world, and this grieves me greatly. I now feel decidedly homeless here.” The table is big enough. “Until recently, I was certain we were becoming people who together embraced the full breadth of humanity. I’d started to believe that the rich diversity of pigmentation, religion, sexual orientation, and gender was being celebrated more than it was being assailed. Until recently, I would have said that we were pushing hard toward equality, but right now it seems as though people are more committed than ever to seeing difference as a barrier—or worse, as justification for exclusion and eradication. “ “These days have unearthed an ugliness that may have always been there, but that doesn’t make it any less horrifying to witness or disheartening to accept. Maybe the table is big enough, but some will never desire to gather there.” “Look, I’m still trying to wrap my head around why, despite his documented record of physical abuse of women, 47% of white women still voted for him,” wrote Sara a business owner. “To me that’s confirmation that race still trumps (no pun intended) everything in America. I and many other women of color feel betrayed and no longer will be conned into believing in the myth of the so-called sisterhood” with white women. “As a Black man,” wrote Bernard, a real estate senior manager, “I have never felt safe in America and never felt like I belonged here. If home is a place for emotional comfort, then this past election has confirmed what I concluded years ago: America is NOT my home and never will be. Allow me to paint a picture of what it feels like for me today. Imagine when you step outside your door a menacingly dark cloud hovers above. It is there every day and seems to follow you. Even on a beautiful day with the sky backlit in an azure blue, you look up and there it is, slyly hidden behind a large cumulus cloud. There are times when you fear that you might be hallucinating. Maybe this threatening cloud does not exist anymore because in 2008 America elected Barack Obama, but this dark cloud still lingers. Now although people of color tend to see it immediately, many whites claim that they don’t see this dark cloud because they don’t see color. Days, months and years pass, and you get adjusted to the presence of the dark cloud. You carry this extra layer of anxiety and learn to cope. Then, on the morning of November 6th, 2024, you step out, look up and there it is. This time, the dark cloud has grown larger, darker and more ominous than you have ever seen it. And you know, deep down in your knowing, it won’t be long before this dark cloud erupts into a downpour of division, hateful rhetoric and acts. History is the greatest storyteller, and stories exist about clouds that erupted. Torrential rain pounded the earth causing floods and wreaking havoc on those at the bottom of the “Great American Mountain.” In the aftermath homes were destroyed, people were relocated, killed and left a trail of tears. This time it appears that “brown” people are next on the list to get the brunt of this trauma. What stresses me the most about this past election is that no matter the rationale, be it the cost of a dozen eggs, the high cost of rent, the “invasion of criminals and rapists” or the people who “eat pets,” or just his masculine bravado, the reality is that too many Americas were propagandized and mesmerized by the wizardry of the greatest conman in American history.” Okay, back to Kim as promised. Ed informed me that she’s in great spirits and in full recovery. In the end, her story is a ray of sunshine piercing through the dark cloud that hovers over us during this strange new world. Terry Howard is a contributing writer with the Chattanooga News Chronicle, The American Diversity Report, The Douglas County Sentinel, Blackmarket.com, recipient of the 2019 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Leadership Award, and third place winner of the 2022 Georgia Press Award. |
