It’s been almost two weeks since the insurrection attempt at the US Capitol. I haven’t written about it, shared all the thoughts that have been swirling in my brain for nearly two weeks now. I’ve been frozen, paralyzed and stuck between being terrified, horrified, disgusted, despairing, and wanting to believe that things have to get better.
I’ve been caught in the never-ending spiral of the news – anxiously monitoring the live updates for further threats to our democracy, further evidence that the psychopath in the White House will stop at nothing to take our country down with him.
And I feel a deep sense of shame that I’ve been unable to communicate just how I feel about what happened. Instead, I’ve found solace in others’ much more eloquent – and timely – denunciations of the riots and aftermath. I’ve stepped back in a way that I don’t often do, taken cover, in a way. I haven’t written much else here, because it feels disingenuous with all of this so front of mind for me.
So I just want to make clear that I am, indeed horrified, terrified, appalled, and unbelievably anxious at what happened and the equally hideous aftermath. That’s probably all I can – and will – share about this, at least until after Wednesday. I am keeping my eyes on 12:01 pm EST (11:01 am here in the Midwest) and desperately hoping that the inauguration actually occurs. Until it does, I will likely remain in my frozen and incoherent state.
I have found some comfort in poetry and other writings in the last few days… Of course, today, Martin Luther King, Jr’s eloquent writings are front of mind for many of us. The full text of Letter from a Birmingham Jail is on my TBR, but in the meantime, this excerpt spoke to me this morning:
“Like a boil that can never be cured as long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its pus-flowing ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must likewise be exposed, with all of the tension its exposing create, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.”
I want to do my part to expose injustice. I want to find my voice. Until then…
I hear you, Anne. The last couple of weeks have been hard and a part of me is paralyzed too, waiting for the other shoe to drop. I am counting the minutes until we have a sane president again.
It’s really hard, isn’t it? And YES – waiting for the other shoe to drop is the perfect way to describe it. The wait has seemed interminable, but we’re finally getting close. That just makes me more anxious, though! I’m focusing on 11:01 am (CST) tomorrow… I imagine you, and many others, are doing the same.