politics

Pushing Through

/ Alyxander James / Leave a comment

The post-holiday plague that I managed to come down with last week is continuing. I didn’t make it into the office at all last week. I worked from home Thursday, Friday, and Monday; I made it into the office on Tuesday, but just barely. I’m definitely improving, but it’s slow going.

Monday night, I had a gig. By the time I got sick, it was too close to the gig to try to get out of it, and I really wanted to go, anyway. I practiced over the weekend, and prayed I could get through the 25 minute set without going into a coughing fit.

It started off a little rocky. I felt shaky, and not just from the usually performance-induced butterflies. But as I continued to play and to sing, I felt myself falling into a groove. The longer I pushed through, the easier it got to keep going. By the end, I felt pretty good about how the whole thing went. As soon as I sat back down to listen to the rest of the performers, of course, I felt completely wretched. But what I want to focus on is the idea that doing the work is what makes the work easier to do.

I feel like this is going to be an important lesson to remember as the year wears on. There is no pretty picture to paint about the political landscape of America right now. There’s a lot of work to be done. I feel totally overwhelmed by it. But if I can just push through and take the first few steps toward sustainable action, the sense of overwhelm will, if not lessen, become easier to deal with. Just like practice improves ability at anything else, forcing myself out of my comfort zone repeatedly will expand what’s included in my comfort zone.

I’m not saying that I’m doing a good job of applying this lesson right now, because I’m not. But it’s a thing I’m going to work on. I hope you’ll join me.

Through Grief and Gritted Teeth

/ Alyxander James / Leave a comment

I’m writing this Wednesday morning, as I work from home and try to process the fact that Donald Trump was just elected as President of the United States.

I posted on Facebook earlier that I have wanted my whole life to believe that people are basically good, but that this election is causing me to call that into question more than I ever have before. This should not have been a close race. A blustering white supremacist who brags about sexually assaulting women should never have even been in the running. But this is reality for all of us now. And if I listen and pay attention, I can see that the terror that’s trying to defeat me today is a terror that a lot of people (particularly anyone who’s not a white, cisgender male) were facing long before Tuesday night. Trump didn’t win out of nowhere. These societal rifts have existed for a long time; this election has just brought to light a lot of ugliness that we (white people in particular) have been all to willing to turn a blind eye to. The fact that it currently appears that Hillary won the popular vote but lost the electoral vote doesn’t change this.

It’s scary out there. I want to hide. I’m fighting back tears every few minutes. My impulse when I’m afraid is often to shut down.

But I can’t do that. Yes, I am queer and trans, and I have personal concerns in this political climate. But I am a white person who operates in the world as a man, and that means this is all going to affect me less than it will affect many other people. I have a responsibility to stand up for those people more adversely affected than myself.

To all of you out there who are Black, or Latinx, or Muslim, or Jewish…to all of you who are disabled…to all of you who are women, or non-binary, or somewhere in between…to everyone who feels not only disenfranchised by these election results but also afraid for your safety as you move through the world: I see you, I love you, and I stand with you. I am not perfect, and I am non-confrontational by nature, but I intend to do everything in my power to stand up for you at any opportunity. I am going to do my best to remember that although I am afraid, your worth as fellow human beings is far more important and powerful than that fear. I’m seeing a lot of #LoveTrumpsHate going around, but that’s only true if people in positions of privilege get off our asses and work to level the playing field.

Another Week in a Five-Item List

/ Alyxander James / Leave a comment

Sorry for the late post today, folks; it’s been a bit of a nutty week, and I kind of lost track of what day it was.

  1. New England was great. The weather was beautiful, the scenery was lovely, I bought some gorgeous local yarn, I got to eat a lobster for the first time in my life, and I checked three new states off my list of places I’ve visited. There were a few hiccups along the way (including a horrifying moment where I brushed something off my cheek only to discover that IT WAS A JUMPING SPIDER), but for the most part, it was a really nice weekend away.
  2. I’m pretty annoyed with my country right now. Yeah, tomorrow is Independence Day and patriotism abounds, but the recent SCOTUS decisions allowing corporations to deny women’s health coverage on religious grounds and overturning the abortion clinic buffer zone law in Massachusetts are beyond maddening. The Hobby Lobby case in particular is causing all sorts of problems, and is going to keep causing them: If a corporation can deny health coverage on religious grounds, it’s not a great leap to allow them to discriminate against certain groups of people in their hiring practices, either.
  3. Aside from that frustration, though, I’m getting back to a better mental place. I’m still on the low end of this Bipolar cycle, but I’m not struggling as much to focus as I was last week. I feel like I’m actually accomplishing things at work. Things feel a little less hopeless than they did two weeks ago.
  4. On Monday, there were some pretty outrageous storms in Chicago. At one point, we had an enormous flash of lightning and immediate crash of thunder directly over our building (there was a lot of jumping and swearing in our apartment, and a car alarm outside started going off, it was that loud). Our internet went out. It’s not back yet. After two calls to our ISP, it looked like the problem was the router, so I ordered a new one and had it rushed to our house. I discovered when attempting to set it up last night, however, that it’s actually the modem that’s not working: the ISP can see the modem is connected, and they can reset it, but nothing comes through on our end. It is a little embarrassing how frustrating this has been. Being limited to internet just on my phone makes me cranky, apparently.
  5. Due to an unexpected change in her plans, my best friend will now be visiting us this weekend! I am unbelievably excited. We don’t see nearly enough of this human, and in fact yesterday we were bemoaning the fact that it had been too long since the last time we hung out with her. It is rare to find a friend I can have over without feeling pressured to entertain, and I am excited for a weekend of low-pressure hangouts with one of my favorite people in all the world.