I've spent the last two weeks unable to see. I slipped on a blanket two days ago and reinjured my back. Last night was the first night I was really able to see and I was stuck on the couch, barely able to move as I watched my country die. My gift this year was a resounding message from my countrymen that the people I love aren't just unwelcome here, but actively in danger.
My wife and I were holding off on having kids until we could afford to raise them. This morning she told me that the only safe and responsible way to be parents now is to adopt. She's right. I can't ask her to risk her life in case something goes wrong. Even if I could, we won't have any money once Trump's economic policies double the price of everything. What about my other partners? He promised to deport 2 million people. What does that mean for my girls who want to immigrate?
The future of my family was on the ballot. Not for the next two or four or eight years, but for the next three to five decades. My children and their children will suffer for what my neighbors did yesterday. What's even more mind boggling is that they will suffer too. This administration is going to kill people. It's going to silence people. It's going to take food out of the mouths of children and it's going to devastate this nation so thoroughly that it will be a miracle if we don't fall. There may never be a real election in this country again. But the worst part, the thing that fills me with disgust rather than dread, is that it wasn't even close.
A lot of you are going to be feeling terrible right now. A lot of you are going to be feeling scared and alone. What's worse, you likely feel helpless. I know I did. The soap box failed. The jury box failed. The ballot box failed. Now in two months, we'll have a dictator with popular support and a Supreme Court and Congress that not only won't stop him but will actively aid him. They are coming for everyone and everything we love and they are supported by an army of our own neighbors who look at us and don't see us as people. It seems hopeless, but it isn't.
The village is stronger than the king. It doesn't matter how big his army is or how rabid his followers, the country is too big to hold. We need to come together and stick together. We need to accept that if they won't treat us like people then they don't deserve the courtesy. Don't try to convince them. Don't try to make peace. Do what you have to to survive. They cannot be saved. They cannot be reasoned with. They cannot be made into human beings without a single shred of decency, so don't pretend that they're anything more than a plague. Get away. Run. As fast as you can and as far as you can. Protect yourself. Find safety in numbers. Build up your defenses and shut them out. We have to take care of each other. We have to be the anvil that breaks the hammer.
I'm not celebrating my birthday today. I'm not holding a funeral for my homeland either. I'm finding a defensible position. I'm covering a retreat. I'm doing everything I can to make sure everyone I can protect stays safe. If you're looking for a place, if you're in need of a community, I want you to know that you're safe here and that I am moving heaven and earth to bring that safe place off this screen and into the world. I'm not helpless and neither are you. We can overcome this. Together.
I'll be changing some plans around in the background here. I'll be more present in the coming days and I'll do my best not to be so negative. I want to provide a salve for the pain and ways to help yourselves and each other as things get worse. I hope you'll help me support you and that you won't let your good heart be your undoing. Until then, I leave you with the two things keeping me going:
Even monsters need to sleep.
