Checking in ❤️

Just sharing what's on my mind.

If you’re feeling shitty right now, trust me when I say you’re not alone. I would be more surprised if someone told me they were thriving right now. The current administration is actively making life worse for large swaths of this country, and that’s phrasing it as lightly as possible. From threatening to incite trade wars with our neighbors to banning trans people from having their passports renewed—effectively trapping them in a country that wants to eradicate them from existence—the U.S. government is leaning harder and harder into fascism. Don’t let anyone gaslight you into believing otherwise.

I’m not a political scientist or a sociologist, I’m just a writer with three cats and a complicated religious upbringing. I’m not writing today to teach you anything, nor am I writing to stir up negative feelings or catastrophize the present moment. What I am writing here are the swirling thoughts and feelings that are wreaking havoc in my brain. I’ve found that simply writing things out helps me make sense of things, even if just a little. If you're not interested in following along for this, totally fine and I do not blame you! But I recommend you stop reading now.

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Still here? Great. I’m gonna be real. I’m fucking scared. I’m angry. I’m worried that some of my neighbors may go missing after a secret ICE raid. I’m worried that the trans and nonbinary people in my life are going to be targets of violence, sanctioned or otherwise. I’m worried that once the current administration is satisfied with the current scapegoats they will begin targeting other marginalized communities like my own. If you need some background on why I’m so afraid, it may be time to freshen yourself up on the history of pre-Nazi Germany.

I imagine if you’re still reading you share at least some of these fears. And I imagine if you share these fears, you also share the irresistible pull of hopelessness. If you take anything from what I’m writing today, please let it be this:

Do not succumb to despair. Not only is it exactly what this administration wants you to feel, it is a feeling that will kill you. I do not mean that metaphorically. Hope is necessary if we want to survive this.

By now you may be asking, “Okay, so what now?” And you may be dissatisfied with the very Mars-retrograde answer I’m going to give:

Do only what you can.

Take care of the people in your life. Watch out for your neighbors. Check in on the people you haven’t seen in a while.

Learn what you can actually do for the people around you. Focus on the things that are actually in your control, and be intentional about doing those things.

Apart from that?

Go dancing. Have sex. Make yourself laugh. Listen to the latest Gaga single on repeat.

Fucking LIVE, bitch.

Joy and love and laughter is what they are trying to take away from you. Don’t fucking let them! These feelings are the sustainers of resistance.

Beyond this, I don’t have much more to say. It’s okay to be afraid. It’s very much okay to be angry. Sit with your feelings but don’t let them take over. Take care of yourself so you can better take care of others.

I love you and I’m praying for you and I believe we can get through this together.

❤️ Sterling