Digging Myself Out of a Depression

As a social justice progressive, I find the present federal administration–the POTUS, his administration, and his cohorts in the Congress–abhorrent to the max.

 

As a Bible scholar, I am reminded of the age of kings: the good kings and the bad kings, the united kingdom and the divided kingdom.

 

And I recall that, just before all that happened, God said, “Go ahead, have your kings…let’s see where that gets you.”

 

Well, we have a lout of a leader right now, and that’s that–until the other branches of government and the Fourth Estate (professional newsmen and women) come to their senses and force the lunatic and his minions out of power.

 

But right now it appears everyone has been castrated…or they’re gaining eyeballs and ears and reaping financial rewards every time Dump opens his mouth and inserts his foot  (in the case of broadcast news) and every time the public gets distracted from what the GOP is doing in Congress while we’re watching the sub-human train wreck in the White House behave like a two-year-old brat having a temper tantrum.

 

So I’ve been battling depression for months. I feel stuck with anxiety, anger, and depression. I’m doing what I can to help correct the situation, but progress is too damn slow. I feel like a fly caught in amber–slowly drowning, stuck tight, as the stinking ooze hardens around me.

 

I’ve been a real mess these past two weeks, which is why I haven’t been writing. And when I’m not writing, believe me: something is wrong! Because writing keeps me sane. But I didn’t want to write about what I was thinking–it was just too depressing! So I stayed in bed much of the time, trying to sleep, trying not to think too much or care too deeply.

 

But then I remembered what  happened the last time I stopped caring about what happened in politics (following Watergate): Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Dinesh D’Souza, Ronald Reagan, Pat Robertson, Spiro Agnew, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, Paul Ryan, Ted Cruz, Donald Dump. Every four years it miraculously manages to get even worse!

 

It has been decades since I felt this hopeless. I felt this way several times as a teenager (JF and RF Kennedy and ML King Jr. assassinated, my gender identity a hidden pain). I wasn’t suicidal but I sincerely wanted to go to sleep at night and not wake up in the morning. Mom told me then, “Just remember…things will change and you will feel better. No mood lasts forever. Hang in there.”  And she was right. Things did get better.  Each time it happened, I regained hope and my baseline positive nature.

 

All I have to say right now is things had BETTER get better. This is not the America that I pledge allegiance to. This, my friend, is a travesty.

 

Not that America, North and South, hasn’t had other equally-terrible eras of blind ambition and rapacity.  These continents were wrested from their rightful owners (native peoples in both hemispheres) on the backs of black slaves and other people of color; I just wasn’t alive then to witness it, and I have never subscribed to the notion that I have every right to become a self-serving sociopath to get ahead. Ayn Rand was a monster, not a role model to me.

 

I believe in helping people who fall on hard times. I believe in state and federal safety nets so that no one in this richest nation on earth ever has to feel utterly alone, unloved, and hopeless.

 

When I start to lose hope, that’s a freaking miracle in the wrong direction. That’s a disaster! I’m usually just about the most hopeful, positive, gung-ho person on the planet.  So this is a real departure for me–and I hate it–because there seems to be so little I can do about it.

 

I vote, I sign petitions, I write and call my representatives, I write articles. I worked my butt off for Barack Obama when he was running for POTUS the first time. I caucused for Bernie last time and held my nose and voted as he suggested in 2016. I figured we’d be as “okay” with HRC as we’d been with Obama/Biden–no better, perhaps, but certainly not much worse off. I considered HRC a falsely-accused, much-maligned, well-prepared stop gap candidate until more progressive folks rose in the ranks to take the reins. Surely no one I knew would vote for DT!!! The very idea was ludicrous!!!  (And HRC did win by 3+ million votes. It was the Electoral College that shat on her, not the voters.)

 

I still do what I can, but it doesn’t seem like it’s ever enough. Others are actively working for solutions, too, and they seem to be able to retain their hopeful natures. Look at Bernie Sanders and Nina Turner, Tulsi Gabbard and Pramila Jayapal, Al Franken and Denny Heck.  I don’t know how they do it!  I think I’d go postal trying to work with bought-and-paid-for GOP shills who seem unable to feel compassion or respect for the people in their districts that they don’t know–but are supposed to be representing.(Why are their constituents still voting for them? I don’t understand!!!)

 

Lobbyists count. Big money counts. The janitor, bus driver and teacher?  They don’t matter!  The people holding down two or three part time, minimum wage jobs to keep their heads barely above water? Not worth anyone’s time. Expendable. Collateral damage.

 

I don’t know what the answer is. Whatever it is, it can’t happen soon enough to suit me. In the meantime, I need to come up with ways to survive the time between now and then without sleeping, eating, or angst-ing my life away…

 

I’ve begun walking and biking again, and I plan to attend the Tacoma Pride Festival on July 8th. I went to see the Tall Ships in Tacoma last month. I’ve been watching some good movies and reading some good books. I sit with my goats and cats, out in the back pasture, and realize that I don’t have to eat, sleep and breathe politics to fix what’s wrong. I have to do right by me, mentally and emotionally, so I can keep doing right in the larger world without losing my equilibrium.

 

Today I smiled for the first time in weeks so it’s working.  GLEE, which I binge on once a week–every Sunday–makes me cry a lot. That’s good, too.  It’s good to feel something other than dread and despair. I recommend it!