Temporary manifesto: Election

 

If Trump has won, I will be seceding from the Union in my mind. This won’t be difficult, owing to my strong, though not comprehensive, insularity. I don’t follow any sport: If you mentioned any team name (with one local exception), I wouldn’t know if it was in the domain of football, baseball, basketball or ice hockey. I belong to no clubs, no social or professional organi­za­tions, no religion. My two friends are remote and fifty years away. I’ve long been reduced to dyadic affiliations: my wife; one client per hour. Where do I live? Not in the U.S.: an apartment in Henderson, NV.

The notion that Trump is “my” president won’t register. What good will it do me to try to muster some proud ardor for The Competitive States of America? What good will it do to know that while I work with one troubled person at a time, I can’t treat the millions whose spirits are soothed by a crude, deliberately misan­thropic socio­path? I can’t give them lessons that will reach them, that will soften the calluses on their burnt hearts.

I know it will be difficult to be at work tomorrow and during the purgatory of the lingering counts. There will still be the residue, the vibration in the air of those clients who filled in the little Trump circle on the ballot, who are pleased and feel victorious and affirmed. I might be inclined to banish my professional mores and say: “I’m sure you are a decent person in most ways, but you just elected a psychopath.” I’d convince myself this was a helpful inter­vention. Confron­tation of the conscience.

We’ll see. In a few days, my sick deadpan visage will re-warm to what matters: mar­riage, helping people who can be helped, writing, the night sky. The country on my perimeter can do what it wants. Strangers have always polluted the air. This will be no different.

Rachel Maddow will, sadly, have to miss my rapt presence.

Still, it’s distressing to see, yet again, that the weakest and most lost souls can cause the most damage.