For Some Moments There Are No Words

Quiet. Yes, I have been quiet since January 20th when I sat down and wrote about the inauguration while watching the inauguration. It was a wonderful morning of lasting imagery, healing words spoken, and the long lost feeling of hope tentatively settling back in. Like so many, I held my breath as I watched, so very afraid that despite the precautions, security, fences, and guards, a single shot would ring out.

The exhale that came when the songs had been sung, the poetry had lifted the heart, and the words of our new President and Vice President had been spoken — well, it felt both wonderous and something else I could not quite identify.

I have spent the past three weeks in “quiet” trying to muddle through it.

I warn you now this post may ramble and meander. It is personal, to be sure, yet may stray into the global, the impeachment, the virus. I beg your indulgence as it may also stray into your feelings, feelings that have made you feel adrift or frozen in place.

Quiet, for some moments there are no words. That has been a long running joke with my kids. A line spoken, often with a finger placed to the speaker’s mouth. A line meant to be funny, a line that often is. A line intended to let the funny just play out without the help of additional words.

Lately, the line has circled my brain nonstop. A brain that is usually at the ready to sit at the keyboard and eviscerate, to double entendre, to make up new words, to provoke thought, to incite laughter, to incite rage. A brain that sometimes just has to have the outlet of writing — an act akin to vomiting on said keyboard. That so many come here to feel validated, less alone in your thoughts, see your muddled feelings translated into rants — it has always been humbling. Yet when the words won’t come, when one day passes into the next, and no words find their way into this space — it becomes a personal shit spiral of sorts.

That’s where my words have been trapped of late. And I appreciate the private messages and emails asking if everything is ok, where I have gone, etc. It’s nice to be missed.

There is certainly no lack of things on which to expound. The world is a big crapfest of news on the hour. But sometimes, there is just too much from which to choose. And I cannot. And as one day has blended into the next, I keep reminding myself that we are all living through unprecedented times. That no man or woman is an island, despite all of us being forcibly islanded by this pandemic. That this is an extinction event.

Extinction event.

Those two words are harsh, but we are still in the thick of COVID and harsh words are necessary. Without our scientists and doctors and technology; without the vaccines now being distributed and those still being developed; without a new administration set on helping people, not sitting back and letting them perish — well, extinction event.

I do not like feeling weak. I hate it. I suck at it. I am a person who can forgive everything in another person, yet cannot do the same for myself. And that is where I have been floating. That is where the quiet has had me trapped. No matter how self assured I come off in this space, no matter how wonderful my life looks from the outside, no matter how strong my track record has been for handling adversity — I am no different than you. I am made of the same fears, insecurities, doubts, and stumbles.

Frozen. I used this word last night to describe to a friend how I have felt. She got it. Instantly. It was not a long message thread — it did not need to be. It took only a few lines of admission and understanding to immediately feel seen, less alone, validated.

Which is what finally got me to sit down here today. Maybe you are feeling the same. Spinning in place. Knowing there are things to do, get done, yet they stay untouched day after day. Maybe you are frozen, too. It’s ok. With all apologies to Elsa, letting it go is easier sung than done. I keep thinking about how things look on the surface. The whole iceberg theory of what we see vs the enormity of what lies beneath. The Titanic was not sent to the ocean floor by what passengers could see above the water line. The devastation took place below.

We are all functioning. Going through the motions of our lives. And that makes it look, to others, that we have our shit together, that we are winning this battle. And maybe we are on a day here and there. But right now, it is more likely that we are treading water, breathing in fear, exhaling uncertainty, and exhausted. And on those days if the most we can do is get dressed, fix our hair, and feed ourselves — THAT IS OK. Some days, good enough is good enough.

Our panic, our anger, our helplessness are all part and parcel of what makes us such an amazing species to begin with. We are complex. Our brains still a largely uncharted wonderland. Our brains completely in charge of how we are functioning through this crisis. Adrenaline, cortisol, imagination, daydreams, dream dreams, nightmares — the quantifiable and the ethereal — all working to manage us across these waves and eventually to safe harbor.

Am I rambling? Sure. But if you see yourself in this, keep going.

We have gained weight — as much physically as emotionally in the past year. And even though working out may be part of your regimen, as it is mine, that weight refuses to budge much if at all. Again, it’s because our bodies, our brains are in charge. They are protecting us from this very real threat. Your brain perceives the collective trauma and is acting as it was designed. So forgive yourself the extra padding. Buy new pants if that is needed. And for God’s sake, eat the damned ice cream if it makes you feel happy.

Maybe for you, this time translates to tears always standing at the ready, threatening to fall over the next detergent commercial. Let them. Tears are an emotional release of the most wondrous kind. I was a teenager when a neighbor’s husband died in an auto accident. I remember her telling my mom, when my mother remarked at how strong she seemed to be, that she cried. Oh, yes, she cried a lot. But in the shower so the tears went down the drain. And then she would feel stronger, get out, face her children and the world, and get on with it till the next shower and the next tears.

Perhaps you have availed yourself of therapy to help work through this period. GOOD. I say that in caps because the stigma of even slightly wobbly mental health needs eradicated. Quite frankly we could all do with a therapist on our side, ready to listen, help us sort through our thoughts. If you broke your leg, you would not hide it and try to just get on with things, correct? Your mental health is no different. And there is no shame in that.

I think often about the now 476,553 families who have lost someone to this virus. The horror of the loss, the unfinished way in which so many goodbyes have had to play out, the fears that must linger in their minds at even the slightest cough in another loved one. Then I watch as state after state encourages its citizens to act like COVID has magically gone away. It hasn’t. And with each passing day we are advised of yet another variant being discovered.

We are still deep in this pandemic. If you have been vaccinated — that is great. Wonderful. Yet it does not mean you can cavort unmasked, undistanced. There is no certain Get Out Of COVID Free card. If anything, your two doses mean you must now stand as the best example of how to continue to be cautious, protecting others.

We are still averaging 3,000 lives lost daily to COVID. A 9/11 every single day, yet because we are bored with the pandemic, we act as if things like the Super Bowl and the surrounding street parties are ok. They’re not. They are still super spreader events and people will contract this virus and die from it. Someone you know, someone you work with, maybe that someone will be you.

That fear can, and quite frankly should, be paralyzing. Should make us all freeze in place. Should render us speechless.

I think my “quiet” coinciding with the inauguration may stem from the feeling that grown ups are finally back at the helm of all this. That it is ok to exhale, to release a bit of the grasp, to float in the normalcy of a White House where forward motion for the people is the norm, not the exception. Maybe that has been a part of where I have been. Maybe.

But I do know that part of my state of being an emotional ice cube stems from what has begun to take place in the Senate today. The second impeachment trial of Donald J Insurrectionist. Like you, I have watched for weeks now as those who have been elevated to high office have shown that they simply do not care. Not about what happened on January 6. Not about the lives lost. Not about knowing many of their coworkers were complicit in the attack on the Capital building. Not about the rule of law, the Constitution, not about anything but their own grip on power.

That has been as defeating as it has been nauseating. We want to believe that right will win out. That surely, in the face of overwhelming evidence, the system will apply accountability and consequences. But the reality is that the system is flawed because the system is nothing but people. And people are all inherently flawed. There is real heartbreak in that. Because there are Senators who will simply look the other way, whine about unity (which is code for no consequences), and acquit the SOB who incited it all.

Leaving the door open, even wider than before, for the next attempt. There is no kumbaya to be had, only another coupbaya in which more fake cosplayers with real guns will take more lives. And those who encourage them, incite them, give them safe harbor, will sit back and watch as their co-workers are threatened and attacked. The Greenes, the Hawleys, the Cruzes, the Johnsons, the Gaetzes — they will smirk and watch as their useful idiots do more damage to our nation.

That has had me frozen in fear and anger — A LOT.

I raised three kids with accountability. The understanding that their actions have consequences — whether good or bad — that cause and effect is a real thing. I raised them to understand that words have power. That the whole “sticks and stones” thing is bullshit because words move people to action, far too often to bad action that cannot be undone or forgiven. That words fall harder than fists because words inflict memories and those do not fade like physical wounds.

As I type this part, I am feeling a thaw of sorts, and for that I am glad. I am feeling the rage that has sat silent for three weeks, feeling it finally work its way to the surface, to the keyboard.

I am angry. I am. This nation is filled with honest, decent, forward looking, open hearted, open minded people. We outnumber the racist, bigoted, lunatic, conspiracy loving horde. We wear our masks and limit our outings because we want to protect ourselves and our loved ones, but also because we want to do our part in the societal contract. We believe in the societal contract. That so many others are selfish, self absorbed, hate filled, hubris laden, intellectually famined wastelands only adds to the burden we carry. They cannot be reasoned with. They cannot be separated from their Qanon fantasies in which Donald Trump is a hero, not a zero. Yes, they are incredibly stupid. No, they do not deserve organic coddling in jail or permission to take vacays to Cabo. Yes, you are right to be incensed.

They must simply be squashed, shoved back into their sewers by our votes. Their representatives must be ejected and never again allowed near the levers of power in this country. They are not worthy of the honor. They are only worthy of the contempt of decent society. They must wear the scarlet Q for life, because that is what they have taken. Life. So many lives have been imperiled or already lost because of their choices. Call them a cult, call them brainwashed, but do not for one moment acquit them of their actions. They chose, they bought in, they loved the lies, the thrill, the shock on the faces of others. They still do.

For some moments there are no words. That moment is not now. And as I sit here typing, finally feeling it all, freeing it all, unfreezing it all — with all apologies to my poor keyboard — it feels good.

We are all living through a shared trauma. On so many levels. But I am not alone. And neither are you. Feel that.